Posted at 5:00 am.
Caroline Touzin Investigation Team, La Presse
At the end of the line, desperate screams drown out Jonathan*'s voice.
Like every day, Véronique Fortin contacts him.
Today the legal aid lawyer finds it difficult to understand him because the screams of another patient in Ward 44 are so loud.
When she calls Jonathan, it's not to talk to him about her case. This is because she is afraid that he will kill himself or attack someone.
The lawyer encourages her to persevere. To apply tips on managing your emotions.
Together with three of his legal colleagues, they vowed to do everything in their power to improve his sad fate.
Jonathan is a “child of the DPJ” who has grown into an adult no longer able to care for himself. The 31-year-old young man, who lives with a mental disability, is under public guardianship. For this reason we cannot identify him in this report.
According to a psychiatrist who examined him, he is a ten-year-old child in a man's body.
His parents, who also have disabilities, were never able to care for him. In addition to an attachment disorder, he has a severe behavioral disorder.
For almost two years, Jonathan has been living in Ward 44 of the Rivière-des-Prairies Hospital because there is nothing better. This should be a temporary solution. It's still there.
Here he is the only one of the unit's eight residents who can speak. Impossible to establish connections with others, more severe cases.
PHOTO PROVIDED BY JONATHAN
Department 44 of the Rivière-des-Prairies Hospital
The others scream. A lot. So often, in fact, that Jonathan describes the place as “hell,” a “prison” that he wants to escape from, even if it means he has to return to the streets.
The quartet of legal advocates take turns visiting, texting and calling him, while also taking steps to find him another place to live.
“Jonathan has many problems and many needs. On the other hand, he has the ability to move forward,” summarizes Me Catherine Lapointe, another lawyer in the quartet.
PHOTO PROVIDED BY JONATHAN
Jonathan's room
But he risks ruin rather than progress, because “there is currently no suitable environment to defuse the Jonathan bomb,” she explains.
The experienced lawyer even wrote to the Minister of Justice Simon Jolin-Barrette with the aim of meeting him to talk to him about “the” Jonathan – because he is not alone – who she meets in her practice.
His room in Unit 44 is small and without furniture. Long naked, it is now crammed with boxes in which he stores his meager personal belongings. The walls have seen better days; Color is missing in places. The room opens into a dark corridor. The small concrete terrace where he can get some fresh air is fenced off, adding to the impression of a prison, according to photos he sent to La Presse.
Jonathan has lived in 14 Rehabilitation Center for Intellectual Disabilities and Pervasive Developmental Disorders of Montreal (CRDITED) facilities.
He was driven away or ran away from each of them.
Each time he finds himself on the street being beaten, robbed or, worse, sexually abused.
Or he ends up in prison because he attacked a speaker after a “disturbance.”
This child of the system has adopted the jargon of the stakeholders who raised it.
“Déso” stands for “disorganization”.
All of his previous convictions are related to “mistakes” in housing resources.
For him, prison is just as dangerous as the street, if not more so.
“Jonathan is not fortunate enough to be privileged and have a social safety net or outside resources that allow him to fight,” continues Me Lapointe, who works in the Mental Health Justice Support Program at the Montreal Municipal Court. “He has survived since birth and no one is so worried about his situation that he would shake up the bureaucracy. Especially not the supposed ones: Board of Trustees. »
Unit 44
His fate hangs in the balance.
That's how we concluded an article about Jonathan when we first featured his story as part of a La Presse investigation into the shortcomings of the Curateur public du Québec.
It was March 2022.
Almost two years later, Jonathan is still unsure of his fate.
He was incarcerated at the Montreal Detention Facility (commonly known as Bordeaux Prison) for assaulting a worker at the shelter where he was living at the time. He had to plead guilty and leave prison.
However, Montreal's CRDITED was unable to find a new home for it. Neither does the delegated curator.
No accommodation facility in the Montreal health network would be suitable for the security support required.
PHOTO OLIVIER JEAN, THE PRESS
I Catherine Lapointe
Jonathan spent more time in preventive detention than his crime was worth. Nonsense for one of his lawyers, Me Catherine Lapointe. But “if he pleaded guilty, he would end up on the streets and possibly killed,” she told us at the time.
Jonathan was sent to Ward 44 of Rivière-des-Prairies Hospital while he waited for an admission resource better suited to his needs.
However, he still lives there. And he's not feeling well.
His lawyers dragged out his criminal trial as long as possible while the state found him a resource that would allow him to thrive.
But the judiciary cannot compensate for the deficits in the health system, it is said.
They admitted him to the Justice and Mental Health Division of the Quebec Court of Justice.
In order to successfully complete the program, he had to complete around forty hours of volunteer work. He did housework in a newcomer organization. It kept him busy. It appreciated him. And most importantly, it allowed him to get out of Unit 44.
One day he ran into a crisis in the unit and attacked the staff. It was then decided that he could no longer continue his voluntary work. He technically failed his court program.
It took a toll on his morale and… his self-esteem.
In the eyes of his lawyers, Unit 44 is such a hostile environment that it exacerbates his behavior.
One example, among others: His roommate often walks naked through the hallway. This rekindles the trauma within him.
As a child, he experienced violence and sexual abuse in certain homes where he was placed by the DPJ. Even on the streets, as his vulnerability is obvious, he was forced into prostitution and then robbed by people with evil intentions.
When other patients explode in Ward 44, he sometimes gets beaten, he told us on the sidelines of one of his appearances at the courthouse, which was also attended by La Presse.
Is the system failing to protect him again?
When he gets hit, he tries not to hit back.
PHOTO PROVIDED BY JONATHAN
Goal
To help him vent his anger, the hospital placed a padded target in his room.
He shows us his injured ankles. He uses the target a lot.
“Hell”
“He is not someone who deserves to be isolated and thrown away the key. »
It's September 2023 in a room in the Montreal courthouse. Me Charles Benmouyal, another lawyer in the quartet, passionately argues Jonathan's case before a judge at the Quebec court.
“Sir is over there [à l’unité 44] Lack of resources appropriate to its development capacity […]because the health system is not able to plan better,” he says.
Jonathan stands tall before the judge. He has tears in his eyes.
He knows what's coming.
A few moments earlier, Me Benmouyal and his colleague Louis-Philippe Roy took the time in a cabin to explain to him in simple terms what would happen.
Me Benmouyal reminds the judge that Jonathan “has not had an easy life.” He “corresponds to a 10-year-old child,” he emphasizes, citing a psychiatric report.
Jonathan admits to punching and shoving a security guard in the face who was working at the last resource where he was housed before Unit 44.
This officer forced him to take a COVID-19 test. Back then, in December 2021, all residents had to leave the site before they could re-enter it.
Here Jonathan lost his temper.
The emergency responder then fell down the stairs, but fortunately was not injured, the lawsuit states. Police officers arrived. “Touch me and I will hit you,” the young man threatened.
Today, at the joint suggestion of the prosecution and defense, he is receiving a lenient sentence, namely a suspended sentence with probation.
Judge Antoine Piché orders him to “follow the recommendations of his treatment team” at the Rivière-des-Prairies hospital and to “actively participate in his treatment plan.”
The judge seems very aware that he is talking to a child in a man's body.
“Try to find ways to channel your energy when it's bubbling inside of you,” he told her in a gentle voice.
“Thank you,” Jonathan replies, still emotional.
Since the criminal case has concluded, the legal aid lawyers have completed their work.
But they can't bring themselves to abandon him.
“We won't let you go, my man!” Roy promises me and gives him a manly hug as he leaves the place.
Me Benmouyal promises to visit him soon.
Later that month, the lawyer kept his word. But when he asks the treatment team to meet Jonathan in Unit 44, he is refused entry.
What is behind this rejection? What doesn’t his treatment team want me to see? he asks himself. Finally, we organize a meeting for him… in a hospital meeting room, far from Unit 44.
That day, Jonathan was accompanied into the room by two of the unit's workers. His face lights up when he sees the lawyer. The two teachers leave her alone.
“I’m in hell,” the young man repeats. This is the worst resort I have ever lived at in my life. » He feels “in prison,” he emphasizes. He complains that he has nothing to do. The screams of the other residents drive him crazy.
“I haven’t had any complaints since June. “I’m trying hard, but I’m tired,” he admits, before starting to cry his eyes out.
“I can't stay here all my life. »
The lawyer encourages him as best he can: “If you want to go out, you mustn't lose your temper. »
“I know,” replies the child in the man’s body.
Nothing go somewhere
Gray Monday morning at the end of November. I Catherine Lapointe arrives in the parking lot of Rivière-des-Prairies Hospital with coffee and donuts.
Jonathan accompanies her to the children's park adjacent to the facility.
He's been having dark thoughts for the last few weeks. He had to go to the emergency room because he feared he might kill himself.
The lawyer tirelessly contacts her treatment team to find a living environment that better suits her needs.
“Your psychiatrist is exceptional,” she boasts to him. Also your psychopedagogue. »
According to Me Lapointe, the treatment team was never the problem.
The experienced lawyer has more questions than answers.
How is it that the state cannot place a “child of the system” who has grown up in an environment where he can be happy while receiving the appropriate support to ensure the safety of everyone?
After the deinstitutionalization of psychiatric patients that began in the 1960s to the late 1980s, are we witnessing a new institutionalization due to a lack of resources in the community?
The lawyer emphasizes that Jonathan cannot spend the rest of his life in a hospital.
A 2019 psychiatric report cited in a court hearing recommended a placement source that could provide “stable emotional and relational support…given his significant vulnerability at this level”; a place with “the greatest possible autonomy” taking into account their care needs.
His crimes “are part of his difficulties related to his intellectual impairment and personality disorder,” said the doctor, who pointed out the importance of being valued in activities and being able to keep busy on a daily basis.
In Unit 44, Jonathan complains about having nothing to do.
“He doesn't have to experience what he is currently experiencing in terms of accommodation: people in crisis, naked in the hallway, very disorganized, who sometimes want to attack him, incessant noise, screaming, violent interventions, etc. He can't take it anymore . He feels robbed of his life. He’s scared,” Mr. Lapointe recently pleaded with his treatment team.
At the CIUSSS du Centre-Sud-de-l'Île-de-Montréal – which includes Jonathan's treatment team – we decline to comment on this specific case. However, the CIUSSS confirms that Unit 44 is “currently the only environment” in the area “that meets the support needs of adult users with an intellectual disability or autism spectrum disorder accompanied by a severe behavioral disorder and poses significant accommodation challenges”. La Presse.
No one is forced to stay in Unit 44, explains its spokeswoman Marianne Paquette, emphasizing that it is not a “psychiatric care unit”, but rather “an appropriate and safe environment for vulnerable users”.
Jonathan's accommodation needs were “reviewed” a year and a half ago, his treatment team assures his lawyer Me Lapointe. “The demand for a new environment is still active,” he was told.
In other words than this bureaucratic language, we understand that he should live somewhere else, but we cannot find another place for him.
After being released from prison, people in care living with an intellectual disability or autism spectrum disorder and a very severe behavioral disorder have nowhere to go, La Presse revealed in its investigation published in March 2022.
The CIUSSS had selected a site near the Cité-des-Prairies youth center to build a permanent facility for this clientele. The project was submitted to the Société québécoise des Infrastructures, an organization responsible for analyzing all public infrastructure projects. However, the project was not accepted by Quebec.
The CIUSSS continues to “hope that the project to develop an intensive rehabilitation resource adapted to adult users with a severe behavioral disorder and presenting major accommodation challenges will be realized”, states its spokesperson Marianne Paquette, specifying that “ Discussions with the Ministry of Health and Human Services continue their work, in particular with the aim of obtaining financing for the realization of this project.”
Last summer, Jonathan began visiting a cousin who lives in a village in Lanaudière for short stays. He says he feels comfortable there. He dreams of moving there, far, far away from the stress of the metropolis. But above all, the incessant noise of Block 44 and the cold of a hospital.
* Fictional first name