ROCK HILL, S.C. — A new health report says South Carolina is in desperate need of more mental health resources, and some families say the problem is so bad it’s actually putting people in danger.
That includes two families who have lost loved ones. They spoke with Channel 9’s Tina Terry about what they call the state’s broken mental health system.
Jason Whitesell still remembers 19-year-old Karson Whitesell as a bright light to those around her.
“She lit up the room wherever she went, a beautiful soul,” Jason said. “She was always giving,w anted to make the world a better place and she did that.”
Her dad said she had just returned from a mission trip in Africa when she was gunned down at a Fort Mill store called “The Peach Stand.” The killer, Christopher Mendez, was a complete stranger.
“Karson is loading drinks into a cooler, he calls out to her, she turns around and he empties the gun into Karson, killing her,” said solicitor Kevin Brackett. “Then he sits the gun down and sits there until the police come and arrest him and kill him.”
Brackett tried the case in the 16th Judicial Circuit. He says Mendez had bought the gun at a local store just before the shooting, despite having documented mental health issues.
“In June of 2017, he walked into an emergency room in Lancaster County and told the physicians there that he had these what are called homicidal and suicidal ideations ... he kept thinking about killing people and hurting himself,” Brackett said.
The solicitor says doctors sent Mendez to a facility for a medical commitment. Days later, Mendez had improved and went before a judge, who decided against committing him for further treatment. Instead, the judge ordered Mendez to fill a prescription and see a doctor back home.
“He comes back to our area, does not fill the prescription, he does not make that appointment, so after the medicine they were giving him in the Low Country wears off, he starts to deteriorate again,” Brackett said.
In court, Mendez’s father said the mental health system failed his son.
“What happened? What happened to the help that he asked for?” his father said.
Whitesell says he believes his daughter would still be alive today if the system had kept track of Mendez.
“I feel the simple let’s stop in and check on this individual to make sure they’re OK for themselves and their family and their community, none of that was done. It unfortunately has taken a life and has impacted many,” Whitesell said through tears.
“The mental health system is still failing, they are still failing,” says Renea Barber.
Barber’s husband, Tim, and her brother, Robbin Thompson, were shot and kiled in 2019. Tim and Robbin were picking up cabinets in Rock Hill when a Jimar Neely, a complete stranger, walked up to their vehicle and shot them.
In court, a clinical psychologist laid out Neely’s struggles with mental health, saying his mother went to court in 2018 reporting her son was hearing voices that encouraged him to hurt others. The doctor said “Neely was ordered to outpatient involuntary treatment.”
One document summarized Neely’s medical assessment from May of 2019, and it said Neely “denied suicidal or homicidal thoughts,” and “was not taking his medications.”
Less than a month later, Neely killed Barber and Thompson.
“I’m the face of the government that has to make sense of all this and try to explain to Jason and Renea why their loved one’s dead in the face of missed opportunities on the part of our mental health system,” Brackett said.
Matt Simon is a mental health expert and chief operations officer at New Hope Treatment Center in Rock Hill, and he pointed to the state’s low rating for mental health access.
“South Carolina consistently ranks in the bottom five to 10 states when it comes to access to mental health care for kids and adults,” Simon said.
Earlier this year, a Forbes report ranked South Carolina among the 10 worst states for mental health care, saying the state has the seventh-highest percentage of adults with mental health issues who could not see a doctor due to the cost.
Simon says the state needs a better system of case management and follow-ups for people with severe mental health illnesses.
“Expecting them to go somewhere or go somewhere multiple times a day or show up for all these appointments, they have a lot of life going on. That’s not always the best way,” Simon said. “Sometimes, if we’re talking about access to care, we have to bring the care to people. There is a template for that. There are pre-existing services out there. Unfortunately, South Carolina is playing catchup when it comes to actually investing in those services and seeing them scale.”
This year, Gov. Henry McMaster called on lawmakers to improve the state’s system. Barber is hoping for changes that keep others from going through what she has.
“How many people are going to have to lose their life until they get this mental health system right?” Barber said.
Neely was found not guilty by reason of insanity in 2022, but this year the Department of Mental Health asked a judge to release him from a state facility and allow him into a less-strict group home setting. The judge ultimately denied the request, but we asked the department for their reasoning. A spokesperson cited a law that says if the person is no longer in need of hospitalization, officials at the state hospital are allowed to ask a judge to release that person.
(VIDEO: Waxhaw woman killed in South Carolina, suspect in custody)
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