AUGUSTA, Maine - Maine state lawmakers have rejected a proposal that would send violent or difficult-to-manage mental health patients to a special unit at the Maine State Prison in Warren.
The Portland Press Herald reports that the state's Republican-controlled Senate voted to block the legislation, L.D. 1577, on Wednesday.
But the Senate passed a plan that would send mental health patients to a state-owned hospital. Those patients could be sent to another facility that provides hospital-level care, if there are no beds available at the state-owned hospital.
State lawmakers and federal regulators have urged the state Department of Health and Human Services to find a place other than Riverview for the courts to send "forensic'' patients who've been found incompetent to stand trial or not criminally liable for their actions.