NORTHVILLE TOWNSHIP, Mich. – Successfully suing the state and winning doesn’t happen often, but a group of patients and staff from a Northville Township child’s psychiatric hospital just won a $13 million class action lawsuit against the State of Michigan.
The hospital, which has since been shut down, was run by the state and the state decided to run an active shooter drill inside the hospital. Staff and employees were not told it was a drill. They thought it was real and they were traumatized.
A former hospital employee a mental health worker is sharing not only what she went through that day, but how that day has impacted her now 14 months later and reveals what the settlement means for everyone involved.
Naquana Jones, who worked as a mental health worker at the Hawthorn Center in Northville Township, said she heard the announcement that there were two intruders in the building. She said she could hear the fear in the voice of the announcement
“They sounded really afraid, it sounded serious,” Jones recalled. “And so my first thought was, ‘Oh, my God, how am I gonna get out of here?’ So I immediately close my office door.”
She called her supervisor, who did not answer, so she sent a text and asked if it was a drill. Her supervisor replied that she did not know, so Jones barricaded the door to her office with furniture before freezing.
“I just kind of sat there,” Jones recalled. “I was very much afraid, because, to be honest, I went into freeze mode because I wasn’t sure what to do.”
Other employees, also under the impression their lives were in danger, started calling 911. Law enforcement from four agencies arrived at the facility with their guns drawn because they also did not know it was a drill.
Jones, a mother of four, considered breaking a window and jumping to freedom in an effort to escape the two nonexistent people she was told were armed with semi-automatic rifles.
State supervisors knew the situation was an active shooter drill, but the staff and patients inside the psychiatric children’s hospital had no idea. They said they were traumatized and have been ever since.
“It was terrifying, actually,” Jones said. “Being in a space of pushing stuff up against the door, and just laying there not being able to do anything, it was just so many negative thoughts running through my head that I just panicked, really, really bad. And I started crying.”
Finally, the mental health workers were told it was a drill, but Jones said she wasn’t so sure.
“I’m scared to even go out the door,” she recalled. “I didn’t even open my door. So the way that my office was set up, it was called South Wing, I was able to look out the window and I saw all of these police cars. [Expletive] drew all these police cars out here. I actually saw one policeman take off his suit jacket and put on a bulletproof vest.”
She recalled seeing the hospital’s maintenance man in handcuffs on the ground.
“He’s a Black guy. They’re telling us ‘This is a drill,’ and you want to believe it, but worst case scenario, this man could have lost his life,” Jones said. “And nobody considered that. It was just horrific.”
Jones said the state handled things terribly and she doesn’t believe they have taken full accountability.
“As far as us working in a setting where children are already living and reliving trauma, it definitely was not completely thought out to the point of thinking about the mental space and how it would impact the people that we serve,” Jones said. “We’re already working in a place with this sensitivity. And you go and do something like this and not expect it to bother people a little bit?”
She recalled how unfair the situation felt because while everyone was terrified, the adults and staff had more autonomy than the children they served.
“With them, it was a sort of imprisonment to me, and I felt with the settlement, it is helpful for them with having some type of compensation and a little bit of an apology, but not a full accountability,” she said.
Since the incident, Hawthorne Center has been shut down. Jones left the job, but she still has concerns about working in an office setting.
“I didn’t like being in there with the office door closed,” Jones said. “I ended up paying for mental health services out of pocket. And I took a leave -- like I took a few weeks here and there because I just did not I didn’t feel comfortable in there. I had this very deep mistrust for every person and leadership there.”
Jones still works for the state, but in a different capacity, spending more time in the field.
“I feel more comfortable because I feel like I have an escape,” Jones said. “I don’t completely feel comfortable with working for the state if I have to commit to staying within an office space.”
Jones is among the 110 Hawthorn Center employees who will receive part of the $13 million settlement.
The settlement money won’t be handed out as a check; instead, a legal team will monitor its dispersal to assist the children with their medical bills.
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