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Credit: Tom Sofield/LevittownNow.com
Romy Ulysse said her family knew her brother needed help. And they wanted him to get it.
The Bristol Township family had done everything they thought they could to get help for the 24-year-old man, Dudley Ulysse, since he received a severe mental health diagnosis in 2018.
Public records and accounts from those who know him paint Dudley as a local who had excelled at Harry S. Truman High School and played football there and in college. He was smart, kind, and had a bright future ahead of him. Friends spoke highly of him recently. Prior to July, he had no criminal history in Bucks County.
Earlier this summer, he was acting strange and erratically, including threatening violence. He mowed a neighbor’s lawn and had no memory of it, Romy said.
The family said Dudly ended up at Lower Bucks Hospital for mental health help and there were problems getting him placed. They said the police had pushed for the young man to get treatment along with the family.
Dudley made news when LevittownNow.com published a story about his arrest on serious charges related to damage he is alleged to have caused at Lower Bucks Hospital during his wait for mental health treatment. Public court papers leave out much of the context on why he was at the hospital and, as they are designed to do, focus on what led to the charges being filed.
After Dudley’s arrest by police, he was detained at the Bucks County Correctional Facility and then Norristown State Hospital. He remained in custody as of Sunday awaiting a preliminary hearing, according to a court docket.
Romy said her family was partly in the dark about what was happening with Dudley while he was at the hospital and didn’t learn of his arrest until well after it happened. She noted it wasn’t that the family hadn’t been trying to get information, but that the hospital wasn’t telling them.
“We still don’t know everything that happened. We don’t have all the answers,” she said of the day her brother was arrested.
After the fact, the family learned the hospital had reported problems with Dudley while he was there for treatment and had even contacted law enforcement prior to the incident that led to his arrest.
For Dudley’s family, they feel his July 13 arrest could have been avoided and that the hospital didn’t provide him the best care.
In the past, Romy explained, her brother had been released from care and walked away from the hospital where a friend spotted him in Bristol Borough and picked him up.
Dudley had been to doctors and even involuntarily committed under Section 302 of the Pennsylvania Mental Health Procedures Act.
His family and about 40 local residents and activists stood along Bath Road outside Lower Bucks Hospital on Friday evening to protest the charges against Dudley, his treatment at the hospital, and calling for reforms to improve the way people with mental health issues are treated in Bucks County.
The group held signs and chanted:
“People over profit!”
“Shame on you, Michael Motte!” (Motte is the hospital CEO.)
“Mental illness is not a crime”
“Justice for Dudley.”
At the Friday rally was the Redner family who lost their 27-year-old firefighter and medic son George Redner to suicide in 2015 after he was released from Lower Bucks Hospital after being taken there for mental health reasons.
“I’m sick of the incompetence and gross negligence,” George Redner’s father George directed at the hospital. “Shame on you.”
Credit: Tom Sofield/LevittownNow.com
Romy said she feels her brother’s arrest “could have been avoided.” She also said that the county jail was not the right place for him to get help either.
“Our mental health system doesn’t offer enough help,” she said.
The Ulysse family met with District Attorney Matt Weintraub recently to make their voices heard and said they are advocating for more options for people like her brother.
“We sympathize with all parties affected by this unfortunate incident, and we will continue to work closely with local officials toward resolution,” Lower Bucks Hospital spokesperson Michelle Aliprantis said. “Our goal is to move forward together, as a team, to continue to make Lower Bucks Hospital the best place for quality and compassionate patient care.”
Aliprantis noted that the hospital, which is owned by large firm Prime Healthcare, is “deeply committed to the safety and the wellbeing of all our patients” and will “always take swift and appropriate measures to ensure that patients who are receiving care in our hospital feel comforted and secure.”
A petition has been launched urging prosecutors to drop the charges against Dudley and a Go Fund Me has been set up due to the financial hardship the incident has caused.
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