Police Talked to Patient Before Fatal Stabbing : Ventura: The victim’s family is irate that officers released the suspect after he entered another home prior to the killing.

Relatives of a 90-year-old Ventura woman who was fatally stabbed after a patient escaped from Ventura County Medical Center were furious Saturday when they learned that police talked with the slaying suspect shortly before the stabbing, but let him go.

Neighbor David Brom also questioned police response in the Friday incident, saying officers should have realized that the patient was dangerous after Brom called 911 to report that he had entered Brom’s house.

Kevin John Kolodziej, 25, had escaped from bed restraints at the county hospital on Friday morning, about an hour before Velasta Johnson was slain in her home in the 200 block of Agnus Drive, police said. Kolodziej was arrested at a neighbor’s house shortly after the slaying and was being held in lieu of $250,000 bail at the Ventura County Jail. His arraignment is scheduled for Tuesday.

The suspect, whom police described as a transient from Virginia Beach, Va., had been in the hospital’s third-floor intensive care unit since Jan. 5, when he was discovered in a Ventura motel parking lot with stab wounds, Ventura Police Sgt. Roger Nustad said. The chest, stomach and throat wounds were determined to be self-inflicted, Nustad said.

James M. Farley, a prominent criminal defense attorney who lives near Johnson’s residence, also criticized the police and hospital.

“My question is: Why didn’t they hold him? . . . Something preventive should have been done,” he said, citing a state law that allows a person to be held for 72 hours of evaluation and treatment if authorities believe they are dangerous to themselves or others.

Jackie Thetford of Ventura, the daughter of the slain woman, said her family will look into filing suit against the hospital and the police.

Thetford said Nustad, the family’s contact with the Police Department, did not tell relatives that police officers had found and released Kolodziej before the slaying.

“I just read that in the paper today,” Thetford said. “I want an explanation from the police.”

A press release from the police says: “He walked out of the hospital on his own and had not been medically released. Officers were called to try to locate him and did. There was no legal hold on him and the officers encouraged him to return to the hospital. He was last seen walking back to the hospital. Approximately one half hour later, the police department received a call regarding a stabbing victim.”

Ventura Police Chief Richard Thomas refused to comment on the slaying.

Thetford also blasted the hospital.

“This is nonsense . . . that a nurse would see him walking out in straps and gown and doesn’t know whether to call security or not,” Thetford said. She was referring to a hospital employee who said she had seen Kolodziej leaving the hospital in tattered hospital garb shortly before the slaying. The worker said she did not call hospital security because she frequently saw mental patients in the area.

“Something has got to be done,” Thetford said. “They cannot let these . . . (people) run loose and kill old people, and there’s nothing but old people on that street. They don’t have a chance.”

Patricia Rumpza, the county hospital’s associate administrator, on Saturday issued the same statement as the day before: “We cannot, under federal regulations or California law, comment on this case.” Another hospital worker said officials had ordered all employees not to discuss the case.

Brom, who lives in the 3200 block of San Pablo Street, said he was walking about 7 a.m. Friday when a hospital worker asked him if he had seen a barefoot man in green pajamas.

“She told me, ‘If you see him, you might be a little careful, he’s a little mean,’ ” Brom said. He returned home about 20 minutes later and was talking with his wife when Kolodziej walked into the kitchen, Brom said.

Brom said he recognized Kolodziej from the woman’s description and his first reaction was “to get this guy out of my house.” Brom said Kolodziej, who didn’t seem threatening, said he asked if he could take a shower.

He led Kolodziej out of his house, trying to persuade the man to go to the Ventura County Mental Health facility nearby. “He said, ‘No they can’t help me over there,’ ” Brom said.

When Brom told Kolodziej that people were looking for him, the man answered: “I better get going,” Brom said.

After Kolodziej walked away, Brom called 911 to report that the man being sought by hospital workers had entered his house. “I’m positive I told them he had come into my house. You can check the 911 tapes,” Brom said Saturday. “That’s why I don’t understand when they say they had no legal hold on him.”

The police refused to provide tapes of Brom’s call to 911, saying it was against department policy.

Minutes after Brom called 911, he saw two police cars down the street. He said he approached the officers, and they asked if he was the man who had called the police.

The officers told him that they had found Kolodziej in a nearby garage and asked him to return to the hospital.

On Saturday morning, Brom said, he spotted another escapee from a nearby institution. When he saw a man in leg restraints shuffling down Loma Vista Road about 9:30 a.m., Brom said, he called the Ventura County Mental Health facility. “They said, ‘Yes, we know, someone’s coming to get him,’ ” Brom said. Moments later, he watched hospital workers take custody of the patient.

Neighbors of the slain woman were concerned about what they felt to be negligence on the part of the hospital and police.

“I don’t understand about no legal grounds,” said William Montgomery, who lives across the street from the residence that Johnson shared with her husband, Clyde. “For one, he’s not allowed to be out of the hospital, and two, he’s in someone’s kitchen. There’s a lot of things I wonder about the Police Department.”

Velasta Johnson’s funeral will be Thursday at Our Lady of the Assumption Catholic Church in Ventura.

Thetford said Clyde Johnson, her father, is “doing pretty good.”

“I know he’s going to have to grieve.”