Criminal justice and mental health systems are broken, homelessness advocates say
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — A man described as homeless is accused of stalking and raping a 93-year-old woman in Pittsburgh.
Ronny Hough is a homeless man with a long criminal history, ranging from public drunkenness to indecent exposure to the sexual assault of a 13-year-old girl. Recently released from prison and back on the street, he's accused of the shocking assault of a 93-year-old woman last Saturday.
Homeless providers believe the incident is evidence the criminal justice and mental health systems are broken.
"People are at risk," said Laurie MacDonald of the Center for Victims of Violent Crime. "People have been murdered, people have been raped, people have been terrorized."
In recent months, there have been a series of random assaults on Downtown office workers committed by people described as homeless who had been arrested multiple times prior.
Although homeless providers say the majority of homeless people suffer from some form of mental illness, addiction or a combination, in each case the offenders had seen little or no jail time and there was no evidence of them receiving mental health treatment.
"The system is broken," MacDonald said. "It's been broken for a very long time. They don't go to jail. They don't get the help they need."
Providers like Light of Life Rescue Mission Director Jerrel Gilliam say that left untreated, some of them with severe mental illness can become violent.
"That's where intervention is needed," Gilliam said. "And if untreated, they tend to get worse."
In October, police arrested Anthony Quesen -- who they also describe as homeless -- charging him with fatally stabbing Benjamin Brallier on the Montour Trail.
On Friday, police arrested Hough on the North Side. According to the police report, Hough stalked the woman in Downtown and onto a bus before following her to her home, where they say he "punched her, pulled her hair and caused her arms to bruise and bleed while forcing her to the second floor of her residence." The report goes on to say, "Hough threw her to the ground whereupon she struck her head. She alleged that while on the floor Hough had raped her."
While it appears Hough will be going back to prison for a long time, Gilliam says the mental health system needs the capacity to identify people like him, take them off the street and get them the help and treatment they need.
"To get into the system to be assessed and stabilized before they're let loose in our community," Gilliam said. "That's where we need to come together, have courageous conversations so we can have a safe society."
Hough was denied bail and will remain in jail until he faces trial.