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Man pleads guilty, mentally ill in 2014 hospital shooting

Hospital Safety Insider, July 16, 2015

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A man who shot a shot and killed a mental health caseworker before being shot by a doctor returning fire in self-defense in a suburban Philadelphia hospital has pleaded guilty but mentally ill in the case, according to a report from The Reporter of Lansdale, Pennsylvania.

According to the report, Richard S. Plotts, 50, entered an open plea of guilty but mentally ill July 14 in response to charges of murder in the first degree, attempted murder, and illegally possessing a firearm in the July 24, 2014, shooting at Mercy Fitzgerald Hospital in Yeadon, Pennsylvania. Killed during the shooting inside the Sister Marie Lenahan Wellness Center on Mercy Fitzgerald Hospital's was Plotts' mental health caseworker, Theresa Hunt.

A psychiatrist at the hospital, Lee Silverman, is being credited with stopping the gunman and saving his own life because he pulled out a gun he keeps in his desk drawer and returned fire after being grazed by a bullet in the temple and thumb himself.

Plotts, who apparently has a history of gun arrests, violence, and mental health problems, and had shown up an hour early for an appointment with Silverman was shot several times, but survived and had to be wrestled to the ground, according to the report.

Read the full article here.

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