Colorado News Collaborative: A troubled Western Slope mental health care center falsified assessments of its patients’ conditions for at least nine years in an effort to make its treatment programs seem more effective and secure funding from the state, whistleblowers say.

The state overlooked what former workers describe as a long practice by the Grand Junction-based Mind Springs Health of intentionally writing bogus patient evaluations. The three departments tasked with regulating Colorado’s mental health safety net system failed to notice the allegedly falsified reports during a recent multi-agency audit of the center, and over years of lax oversight. 

“You’ve got to wonder how closely these so-called regulatory agencies are really looking,” says Sunny Sullivan, one of 29 current and former Mind Springs workers who have come forward to tell the Colorado News Collaborative (COLab) what they see as legal and ethical breaches.

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