Former Connecticut Man Flees Ambulance, Missing in Berkshires

     NORTH ADAMS, Mass. (AP) _ A 21-year-old man being transported by ambulance to a hospital for mental health treatment opened a door of the vehicle and ran away and has been missing for days in the Berkshires, police said Thursday.
     Gregory Hillman, who grew up in Darien, Conn., was being taken from a hospital in Pittsfield to a more secure facility about 20 miles away in North Adams on Monday after he left suicide notes for his family and staff at his group home in Great Barrington, his father said.
     When the ambulance arrived at the North Adams hospital, Hillman ran off, police said.
     Police have been searching the area and issued a regional missing person alert. Hillman is white, 5-foot-10 and slim with brown hair. He was wearing a striped gray hooded sweat shirt and tan pants.
     A family home in nearby North Pownal, Vt., was checked, but Hillman wasn't there.
     Hillman's father, Peter Hillman, said his son is of no harm to anyone else. His focus now is on finding his son, but he has questions about why a man with a history of mental health problems apparently was unrestrained by County Ambulance of Pittsfield.
     Gregory Hillman had left a note saying he planned to drown himself in the Atlantic Ocean, his father said.
     ``How someone in that condition was able to just open the door and run out of an ambulance is an incredible question that we may be living with the rest of our lives,'' he said.
     The president of County Ambulance in Pittsfield, Brian Andrews, said Thursday he had no knowledge or record of such an incident.

     (Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
     APNT 07-02-09 1903EDT<