Sheriff bills state for expense of search for hospital escapee

The Spokane County Sheriff’s Office will submit a $37,000 bill to the state for the cost of hunting down escaped Eastern State Hospital patient Phillip A. Paul.

The manhunt, which involved a team of deputies and the Sheriff’s Office helicopter, was launched after Paul walked away from a hospital field trip at the Spokane County Interstate Fair, said Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich.

Paul was captured Saturday afternoon in rural Klickitat County.

“We’ll bill the governor, and she can work out where she wants to send the bill,” Knezovich said.

Since being found not guilty by reason of insanity in a 1987 killing of a Sunnyside, Wash., woman, Paul has spent most of his life in the state mental hospital in Medical Lake.

Paul was one of 31 patients from the hospital’s forensic ward taken on a field trip to the fair Sept. 17 under the supervision of 11 hospital staff members. The hospital did not notify authorities of Paul’s escape until two hours after he disappeared.

The resulting search cost the Sheriff’s Office and Spokane Valley police $20,834.88 in overtime, $8,652.87 in regular salary, $7,873.41 in costs associated with the sheriff’s helicopter and $133.88 on meals, according to a summary of expenses released Thursday by Knezovich.

Knezovich said that while his office is funded for such cases, the expenditures associated with tracking down Paul arose because of “questionable Eastern State Hospital policies and procedures.”