VA searching all patients

BY STAFF REPORTS
SALISBURY POST

The W.G. “Bill” Hefner VA Medical Center has tightened security since the Aug. 3 shooting that left a patient dead and a doctor seriously wounded.

The hospital is now searching all patients brought in by law enforcement officers, according to Nancy Martino, hospital spokesman, even though they have been searched by the officers who bring them.

“That doesn’t matter,” she said. “We have instituted an automatic searching order.”

The medical center has also placed an armed security officer in the admissions area at all times and may hire more officers.

“We’re considering a number of different things, and we continue to be vigilant,” said hospital Director Timothy May.

“I’m glad we’ve instituted the new procedure,” Martino said. “It will provide reassurance to the staff in the area that their safety is being looked after, and hopefully it will prevent any future incidents like the one that occurred to Dr. Flynn. ...

“It is entirely possible,” she added, “that we will need to add additional staff because we will be staffing the evaluation area 24 hours a day. That’s the first point of contact, especially with veterans who come in on a holding order.”

A holding order, she explained, means a patient is being brought in involuntarily by police.

“And we have patients brought in from all over our service area, which can stretch as far as Asheville or Durham, even though Durham and Asheville have their own hospitals, because we have programs those hospitals don’t have.”

Johnnie Reid, 83, shot Dr. Charles Flynn through the heart after a Rowan County sheriff’s deputy took Reid to the hospital on an involuntary commitment.

Reid’s wife, Dorothy Reid, had gone to a county magistrate and asked that Reid be evaluated because he was acting erratically. The deputy failed to notice that Reid had a gun hidden in his pants.

Flynn, another doctor and two nurses were examining Reid when he pulled out the gun and shot Flynn, police said. Hospital police shot and killed Reid minutes later.

As part of a nationwide effort to boost security at VA hospitals, Salisbury’s 14 officers received weapons training in April and starting carrying firearms in May.

The VA national office is reviewing the shooting and will determine whether to recommend any other new security measures, said department spokeswoman Laurie Tranter.