"Get a Policeman"

The man seemed a little unsteady on his feet, but Taximan John Forney thought nothing of that. At night in Manhattan lots of people are unsteady on their feet. The man hailed Forney near Ninety-Sixth Street and climbed into his cab. He asked hoarsely to be taken to Bellevue. Forney changed his mind, then. Bellevue, the grim collection of buildings where innumerable sordid little dramas of the city have ended, is perhaps the most famed municipal hospital in the U. S. Many drunks are taken there, but they seldom go voluntarily. Forney decided there was something else wrong with his fare. Bellevue was 70 blocks away.

Hacker Forney started south, stopped at a red light. The man said, "For God's sake, I'm dying. Don't stop for the lights. Get me to the hospital."

That scared Forney. He stepped on the gas, ignored the red lights, dodged cross-town traffic as best he could, hoped no policeman would stop him. None did. The man told Forney to take him to the Psychiatric Division. When they pulled up to the door with a screech, the meter read 95-c-. The man struggled with his wallet.

"Don't bother with that now," protested Forney. "I'll get help."

He ran inside, told a nurse at the desk, "I've got a fare outside that's in bad shape. Get somebody to get him in here."

Said the nurse calmly: "Patients can't be admitted unless accompanied by a policeman." "But this man is dying!" "You'll have to get a policeman."

Forney ran outside. The face of the man in the cab was contorted, and he was groaning, writhing. Forney found a patrol man, but he advised Forney to drive to a police station. Forney did. The desk lieutenant called an ambulance. By the time it arrived, the man in the cab was dead.

The dead man was identified as one Joseph Siegel, who had been employed as a guard in Bellevue's psychopathic ward. Cause of death was heart disease (coronary arteriosclerosis). Last week every newspaper in Manhattan picked up the story of red tape that barred a dying man from a public hospital.

At week's end the hospital authorities announced that the nurse who rebuffed Hacker Forney had been suspended, pending an investigation. New York City's fiery, hen-shaped Mayor LaGuardia declared grimly that he expected the findings of the investigators to be communicated to him with all speed.

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