State hospital worker who punched patient gets break from state judge

In a remarkable turn of events, a Marion County Circuit Court judge has rejected a plea deal between prosecutors and a mental health worker who punched a patient at the Oregon State Hospital in Salem, instead dismissing the criminal charges entirely.

The action frees Eric M. Banks of prosecution he has faced since November 2022 and drops a charge he agreed in February to accept.

Banks, employed as a temporary mental health worker, was charged with fourth-degree assault and first-degree official misconduct after punching a patient in March 2022. 

Banks, now 43, told the judge he acted in self-defense after the patient followed him into a secure employee room, threw a tray and rushed him.

He pleaded no contest in February to the misdemeanor assault charge and agreed to serve 18 months of probation. The plea meant that he did not admit guilt but accepted that prosecutors had enough evidence to prove he was guilty. Prosecutors agreed to drop the pending charge of official misconduct. 

Under the plea deal, the charge would have been dismissed later if Banks followed certain conditions. But Marion County prosecutors wanted his professional license in Oregon revoked permanently.

He appeared by video from Texas for a Feb. 10 court hearing. At the time, he was working in a hospital there, according to his attorney.

Banks told the judge that he wanted to take his case to trial but decided to give up that right for financial reasons.

“I don’t have the money for the trial fees,” he said.

Judge Audrey Broyles wasn’t having it.

The judge dismissed the case in February and outlined her reasoning in a recent interview, providing details not previously available about how she viewed the case.

The Banks case highlights the challenges that employees face at the overcrowded state hospital in dealing with violent, mentally ill patients.

She wrote in her Feb. 18 order that dismissing the charge against Banks was “in the interests of justice.”

Broyles said that conditions at the hospital were dangerous for staff and the patient who Banks punched had a history of violent behavior. 

The judge noted that Banks had no previous issues in the 20 years he’s worked in the mental health system and no criminal history. 

It’s unusual for a judge to reject a plea deal between prosecutors and a defendant.

In the interview with Salem Reporter, Broyles said she could count on one hand how many times she’d done so. 

But she found testimony compelling from a charge nurse at the hospital about conditions at the hospital, the patient’s aggressive behavior and Banks’ professionalism.

The judge also said suspending Banks’ professional license in the state would have been “a complete travesty.”

“That just seemed atrocious to me,” Broyles said. “That shocked my conscience.”

The state hospital cares for around 500 people with mental illnesses and disabilities. 

The hospital has been overrun with patients for at least two decades. A Salem Reporter investigation in 2021 found that the facility had been increasingly dealing with violent patients and staff quitting, prompting administrators to bring in the National Guard.

At the time of the March 2022 confrontation, Banks worked as a temporary mental health technician, traveling to fill in at medical facilities. He came from Texas to Salem under a contract to help fill a staffing shortage at the state hospital.

During the February hearing, Banks and Marion County Deputy District Attorney Aila Wallace provided the judge differing accounts of the altercation.

At the time, a patient was upset that Banks “may have bumped into him,” according to Wallace.

The patient was accused of calling Banks, who is Black, a racist slur. When the patient moved to throw a salad at Banks, the worker struck him several times with a fist, the prosecutor said.

She said the assault continued until someone intervened.

Banks was ordered out of the hospital and told not to return.

“The community should feel safe within facilities like these, particularly with vulnerable populations, and the public needs to know that the people working there have demonstrated good judgment, have acted with restraint and are in the best possible position to care for others,” Wallace said at the hearing.

Banks said he was in a kitchenette at the hospital getting something for a patient while another patient was in the doorway.

He said he told the patient that the door he was standing in was to be closed at all times.

“I guess he was upset that I spoke to him and told him what to do,” he said. “He threw a tray at me, hitting me in the face, and then he rushed me.”

He said hospital leaders taught him that workers have the right to defend themselves. 

“(The) only thing I did was defend myself,” he said. “I’ve been in this field since I was 22 years old, and I’ve never harmed a patient.”

He said he didn’t realize the hospital job he was taking in Salem was at an institution caring for those deemed criminally insane. Had he known that, he said, he likely wouldn’t have taken the assignment.

“I love to help people. My job is to help people, not hurt them,” he said.

Sonya Edmonds, a charge nurse at the hospital when Banks worked there, said at the hearing that Banks provided “therapeutic communication” with patients and helped them with their daily needs.

Edmonds said in her 20-plus years as a psychiatric nurse, the state hospital is one of the most dangerous places she’s worked. 

She considered the patient struck by Banks to be among the most dangerous at the hospital.

“I have never gone to a place where I prayed when I walked out of my front door, and I thanked God when I left my shift after 12 hours that I left in one piece. And especially with a person like (the patient), because he lives to taunt. It’s almost like that’s what he wakes up to do,” she said.

She recalled times when that patient threatened her and called her the same racist slur. 

“Eric always did a phenomenal job in showing as much restraint as possible with the population that we were dealing with,” she said.

Broyles noted in court that the state hospital has grown increasingly dangerous in recent years. She described the facility’s work conditions as “impossible.”

Broyles has years of experience with Oregon’s mental health system.

Until last year, she was tasked with deciding the fate of Marion County’s most mentally ill people charged with crimes. She now shares that responsibility with other judges.

Broyles continues to oversee Marion County’s Mental Health Court and cases of people found guilty except for insane. She said she understands that such patients are “extremely challenging.”

In an interview, Broyles said she doesn’t believe Banks committed a crime. She also said revoking Banks’ license “wasn’t proportionate to the incident.”

“I’m just sensitive to things that I feel are not fair and that will have lasting consequences beyond what happens in court to otherwise decent people,” she said.

Banks couldn’t be located for comment but his attorney, Erin Mee, said Banks was grateful for the outcome.

“The initial investigation that led to his arrest overlooked key evidence, and it should serve as a caution to all of us in the community to avoid a rush to judgment before all parties can have a chance to present their side of the story in a court of law,” Mee said in an email.

RELATED COVERAGE:

Contracted state hospital worker punches patient following racist slurs, hospital reports say

Contact reporter Ardeshir Tabrizian: [email protected] or 503-929-3053.

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