{"id":324252,"date":"2026-08-18T19:14:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T19:14:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/324252\/"},"modified":"2026-08-18T19:14:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T19:14:10","slug":"law-allows-peace-officers-st-josephs-hospital-in-syracuse-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/324252\/","title":{"rendered":"Law allows peace officers St. Joseph\u2019s Hospital in Syracuse"},"content":{"rendered":"

A newly signed state law will allow increased security measures to protect healthcare workers, patients and visitors. Hospital officials said assaults on staff have been increasing since the COVID-19 pandemic six years ago. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI have had my hair pulled, my property damaged and I have been inappropriately grabbed by patients. I have had patients threaten my life, threaten my family. I had a patient pull a knife on me while caring of them in their hospital room,\u201d said Lauren Giannetti, director of hospital behavior health programs at St. Joseph\u2019s hospital, during a press conference.<\/p>\n

Steve Hanks, chief executive officer and president for Trinity Health, which includes St. Joseph\u2019s, said they have seen a 60% increase in these violent incidents since 2020. Their staff is trained to deal with patients who have dementia, emerging from anesthesia, and who are under the influence of substances and not in control of their actions.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s not what I’m talking about here. What we\u2019ve seen is an escalation of what\u2019s, frankly, criminal activity. People being frustrated and sucker punch nurses, all sorts of incidents that are really mind boggling,\u201d Hanks said during a press conference Tuesday. \u201cPunching, kicking, biting, spitting. Over at St. Peter\u2019s, we had a nurse whose arm was broken by somebody who jumped off a stretcher, upset that he was being discharged.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the last 13 months, 165 incidents of workplace violence at St. Joseph\u2019s hospital in Syracuse resulted in 96 days of work lost; 153 of the incidents included physical violence while 12 were verbal, hospital officials said in May.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Sam, the security trained K9 which works with the security staff at St. Joseph’s Hopsital. (Emily Kenny\/Spectrum News 1)<\/p>\n

The legislation, which was signed by Gov. Kathy Hochul on July 24, gives trained security personnel at St. Joseph\u2019s Health and St. Peter\u2019s Health Partners engage in enhanced actions to increase safety measures. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt gives our qualified security personnel enhanced authority to intervene when situations become dangerous, like trespassers. They can take individuals into custody, begin the policing process to assist law enforcement while we wait for their arrival. Most importantly, it strengthens our ability to prevent situations from escalating before someone is harmed,\u201d Hanks said. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Joshua Laiacona, regional director of safety and security services at St. Joseph\u2019s, said they will be granted \u201cpeace officer status.\u201d They will look for former law enforcement personnel to fill these roles. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to be targeting retired law enforcement that already have the training and experience that we\u2019re looking for and that are in their window from when they retire where they can transition right into the peace officer role,\u201d Laiacone said. \u00a0<\/p>\n

He said currently there is a mix of armed and unarmed security personnel. The peace officers will also carry a firearm, but they are evaluating the use of tasers and body worn cameras. He anticipates it could be up to a year before they have deployed these peace officers due to the logistics they are working to sort out.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to get agreements in place with our local law enforcement partners, such as the [Onondaga County] Sheriff\u2019s Department and Syracuse [Police Department] and that is sometimes a lengthy process,\u201d Laiacone said. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Giannetti said she is grateful for these increased protections.<\/p>\n

“This law will allow our security teams to provide enhanced support that will directly impact patient care and colleague safety. They will be able to respond quickly, descalate dangerous situations and protect patients and staff. We are so grateful,” she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A newly signed state law will allow increased security measures to protect healthcare workers, patients and visitors. Hospital…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":324237,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[3478,288,257,8255,9,11,10,49,51,50,12],"class_list":["post-324252","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-app-local-business","tag-business","tag-central-ny","tag-emily-kenny","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-new-york-state","tag-new-york-state-headlines","tag-new-york-state-news","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324252","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=324252"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324252\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/324237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=324252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=324252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=324252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}