The following is a collection of excerpts, quotes and articles dealing with issues that arise in the practice of The Law Offices of Skip Simpson, Attorneys and Counselors. Click on the title to view the full document.
Inpatient Suicide in Behavioral Health Care Facilities
In a Law.com article discussing inpatient suicides, Skip Simpson offers valuable insights on how and why these preventable tragedies continue to occur, focusing on a lack of supervision, specifically in a case from June 2023. Skip emphasizes the importance of following the standard of care not just for high-risk patients, but all patients within the facility. Additionally, he points out that money is often spent on the wrong things when it needs to be spent on proper staffing and training.
Medscape: Handling Your Grief After a Patient’s Suicide
Skip Simpson is quoted in an article about how physicians can best cope with a patient’s suicide. In the article, Skip encourages physicians to always reach out to the family after a suicide to show them that the doctor cares about them and about their loved one. He also explains that even during litigation, a physician can confide in a therapist, colleague or trusted friend without disclosing patient information.
The Plaintiff Attorney’s Perspective: Avoiding the Malpractice Snare
Skip Simpson wrote a chapter of the 2022 book “Malpractice and Liability in Psychiatry.” In the chapter, Skip shares recommendations on how psychiatrists and other mental health professionals can avoid the risk of a lawsuit by being competent, abiding by patient safety rules, and being attentive to patients. Mr. Simpson also details how plaintiff’s attorneys select cases for civil prosecution and how to avoid becoming a target for a lawsuit. He also shows how a defendant psychiatrist can be cross-examined in a malpractice trial when a provider harms patients.
Law and Psychiatry
Skip Simpson co-authored an article about suicide-specific diagnoses and potential liability in a medical malpractice or wrongful death lawsuit. Skip pointed out that the proposed diagnosis, rather than exposing providers to liability, would protect against a lawsuit if handled properly.
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Skip Simpson is quoted in a story of a tragedy involving a hospital patient who died by suicide by breaking a window. He notes that hospital administrators should have taken steps to prevent suicide, such as installing breakproof glass in the room.
Atlantic Monthly Article
Skip Simpson is a suicide-malpractice attorney, but from talking to him, he doesn't seem vengeful. He says he's interested in bettering the current mental-health system, not bringing frivolous lawsuits.
Dallas Morning News Article
Skip Simpson called the circumstances surrounding the suicide "absolutely appalling" and the hospital's failure to change the doorknobs beforehand "completely reckless."
Preventing Suicide through Improved Training in Suicide Risk Assessment and Care:
An American Association of Suicidology Task Force Report Addressing Serious Gaps in U.S. Mental Health Training
Video - Peer Reviewed Frisco TX, Inpatient Suicide Lawyer
For more than 130 years, lawyers have relied on the AV® Preeminent™ Rating
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Settlement reached in case against Arkansas mental hospital.
Pine Bluff Commercial
Settlement reached in case against Arkansas mental hospital.
Time Magazine
Lost on the Campus. More mentally ill students can cope with college. But what happens to the ones who can't?
Corpus Christi Caller Times
Skip Simpson, a Dallas lawyer who works with suicide, child murders and mental health cases nationally, said there are several reasons, however twisted, why parents kill.
Chicago Tribune
The state agency that regulates doctors moved Wednesday to strip the medical license of Dr. Bennett Braun, an internationally recognized Chicago-area psychiatrist specializing in multiple-personality disorder and repressed memory therapies.
Lancaster New Era
The psychiatrist summarized the Lititz woman's problem simply, according to court papers: she had been raised in a satanic cult. Her family had forced her to participate in the ritual killing of babies and sexual orgies, Rose Gray said Dr. Stephen Powers told her. And her husband, Mrs. Gray said she was told, married her for "inbreeding" purposes within the cult.
Dallas Morning News Article
Don't ignore symptoms of mental illness. More people need to understand that conquering our fear of mental illness can save lives.
Dallas Morning News Letter
Open Letter composed by Skip Simpson
The tragic murder of two U.S. Capitol Police officers has all of us wondering how to prevent such a tragedy. Some demand more stringent security measures at public buildings. Others say it's finally time for strict gun control.
Ann Landers Column
Dear Ann Landers: I am an attorney who fights psychiatric malpractice. In my work, I've seen many families agonize over deaths that could have been prevented. While we have been told that no one is to blame when someone takes his or her own life, the truth is that many deaths could be averted if mental health workers, physicians and families would simply stop, look and listen.
Detroit News
The concept of repressed memory - one of psychology's most controversial - again has found its way into public thought with the conviction this week of a Macomb County man in an 11-year-old sexual abuse case.
Lawyers Weekly
Dallas Lawyer Sues Therapists for Suicide
"For example, the therapist might have missed entirely the fact that the person was depressed, or in the case of a manic depressive, the therapist might have only treated the mania and not the depression," he says.
Psychiatric Times
Psychiatrists can significantly decrease their chances of being sued for malpractice by remembering several key points of good patient care and communication. Here are some practical tips for helping patients, and decreasing the chances of being sued for medical malpractice. Understand the risks to help your practice.
Psychiatric Times
The stakes in the debate over recovered memories therapy ratcheted upward in October with the indictment of five health care professionals, including two psychiatrists, in Houston. Charged in a 60-count indictment-believed to be the first of its kind in the United States-the former staff members of the now defunct dissociative disorders unit at the Spring Shadows Glen Psychiatric Hospital are accused of perpetrating a "scheme to defraud by allegedly falsely diagnosing patients with multiple personality disorder caused by their alleged participation in a secret satanic cult"; this according to Larry Eastepp, an assistant United States attorney for the southern district of Texas.
Psychiatric Times
The fallout from the controversy surrounding memories of abuse that are recovered during psychotherapy escalated dramatically in August, when a Texas jury awarded $5.8 million - the largest damage amount to date in these high-profile cases - in a lawsuit in which a patient sued her psychiatrist for malpractice. She had charged the therapist with planting false memories of sexual abuse and participation in satanic cult rituals.
Wall Street Journal
Dallas Lawyer Makes Suicide Focus of Lawsuits
Mr. Simpson insists money is not the most important factor for his clients. 'Suing gives them some satisfaction of knowing what the facts actually were,' he says. And indeed some therapists concede the suits are beneficial in emotional terms.
Houston Chronicle
Jury awards $5.8 million in satanic memories case
Carl's attorney, Skip Simpson, argued during the trial that therapists implanted false memories that worsened Carl's condition so they could collect more than $1.1 million in insurance. "This case was all about creating victims so the mental health field could have patients and expensive treatment," he said.
Skeptic Magazine:
Misplaced Trust
On June 25, 1993, Skip Simpson called me at work. He told me they were having a meeting to possibly settle my case and for me to stay by the phone. When the call came, I went to his office. We talked and he gave me two options for a settlement. We decided which would be the best one for my particular situation and that of my daughter. He went downstairs and moments later came back up. He said, "It's over." Tears were streaming down my face. We hugged. I looked at this man who had taken my case before he knew it was a national problem, believed in me before I could believe in myself, and I said, "You helped me get my power back from those who took it from me. I have my mind back and for this, I cannot thank you enough."
