ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, April 27, 1996 TAG: 9604290022
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: MARTINSVILLE
SOURCE: Associated Press
AT FIRST, THE POLICE didn't think hospital security did anything wrong in staging a drill that seemed all too real. The nurses disagreed, pressed the case, and now six men face charges.
A hospital security director and five other men have been charged in connection with a mock hostage-taking that traumatized nurses who thought the emergency room assault was real.
``We think it's great,'' Jim Shortt, an attorney representing three of the five emergency room nurses, said Friday. ``They're happy somebody is attempting to punish the people who did the wrong.''
Jeff Bledsoe, security director at Memorial Hospital in Martinsville, was charged with four counts of aiding and abetting assault, and four counts of aiding and abetting brandishing a firearm, according to Martinsville police Sgt. G.R. Ramsey.
John W. Cassell, a security guard at the hospital, and four men recruited to stage the drill were charged with four counts each of assault and brandishing a firearm. The charges filed Thursday against the six men are misdemeanors.
Ramsey said Bledsoe did not participate in the 4 a.m. drill Jan.25.
Five men wearing ski masks and carrying guns burst into the emergency room, demanded drugs and took hostages while one of them held a nurse and pointed a gun at her head. Two nurses were forced into a back room, and another hid in a closet.
They were unaware the event was staged until the men removed the masks after about five minutes and explained.
``Suddenly, this is no longer a joke, which is apparently the way it was treated,'' Bob Morrison, an attorney representing another nurse, said Friday.
Memorial Hospital director Joseph Roach said the five-minute drill was carefully planned to test his staff's reaction to violence.
But an emergency room physician, Dr. Philip Levin, wrote to hospital officials afterward that the use of real guns was inappropriate and dangerous.
All hospitals conduct periodic drills to test the preparedness of emergency department personnel, but Levin said the standard procedure is to notify everyone involved and use obviously fake props.
Last month, four of the nurses, Holly Posey, Lisa Meadows, Susan Martin and Karon Southerland, tried to file criminal complaints. A magistrate decided to ask the police to investigate.
Before the nurses pressed the case, police had declined to investigate it, and the local prosecutor refused to seek charges.
Martinsville Commonwealth's Attorney J. Randolph Smith Jr. said last month that he ``was hard-pressed to see any criminal intent.''
Susan Reynolds, director of human relations at the hospital, would not comment on the charges or the individuals involved, but said Bledsoe and Cassell are expected to continue to work at the hospital.
The hospital issued a statement that said, ``We have every confidence that these individuals were not engaged in any criminal conduct.''
Shortt said the nurses are finding it increasingly difficult to deal with the trauma they suffered.
``The reaction of the hospital has been `grow up and get over it,' and that has caused the wound to fester quite a bit,'' he said. With the charges, ``We feel we are vindicated to some extent; of course, it remains to be seen if anything sticks.''
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