Arizona Republic from Phoenix, Arizona • Page 139

SE8 SOUTH BDEAST 7S The Arizona Republic WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 11, 1989 Ahwatukee Apache Junction Chandler Gilbert Guadalupe Mesa Sun Lakes Tempe Police seeking i victim's lover in Mesa slaying Mental ills grip woman, family says Ronnie Argenti Once wanted to marry Armstrong. Maria Armstrong Diagnosed as a paranoid By Tina Daunt The Arizona Republic For years, Ronnie Argcnti was attracted to a beautiful, dark-haired woman he met when he lived in Willmgboro, N.J. The 29-year-old Mesa man told his family that he loved the woman and wanted to marry her. He said that he knew she had problems but that he felt he could ease her mind. However, the night before he was bludgeoned to death with a sledgehammer and stabbed at his Mesa apartment, he told his sister that he was wrong the woman was beyond Gary UhkThe Arizona Republic The Padre Band practices its marching formation.

The band will play a song written for the coronation of Britain's King George VI. Tempe band going to inauguration Will perform in parade for George Bush tional LS people, including including administrators from the school district and the school and chaperons. "It's not only a band trip, but will be a good civic trip for them as well," said Clement, adding that tours of the Smithsonian Institution and the Capitol and a special meeting with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz, are planned. "We are all pretty excited about going," said Shelli Apfel, a senior and the band's drum major.

"We're worried about it being cold, but that's underwritten by our excite Argenti's family said Armstrong's beauty had faded. Her body was thin, and dark circles shadowed her brown eyes. She could not sit still, and rarely slept. "Her mind was keeping her awake," said Argenti's sister, Robin." Armstrong still was using drugs heavily, Robin Argenti said. But there was something else.

The family had learned that Armstrong had been committed several times to a mental institution in New Jersey after dropping out of high school her junior year. She had been diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic, said Seiko Armstrong, the woman's mother. "I couldn't get any help for her," Seiko Armstrong said weeping. "She was so sick, but (after she became) an adult, and I couldn't force her to stay in a mental hospital. "Sometimes, I would get her to hit me.

I'd call the police, and they would take her to jail and then to the hospital." The hospital would keep Armstrong for one or two months and then release her, her mother said during a phone interview from New Jersey. "Every time the door would open a little bit, I would think I was getting help," Seiko Armstrong said. "Then the door would slam shut. "She didn't want to be there, but she needed help. She didn't know hat she was doing half the time." Then came Argenti's offer to take care of Armstrong.

"He told me he wanted to marry her and he wanted to have kids," Seiko Armstrong said. "He wanted to help her. "I tried to explain that he couldn't help her, but he was so sure he could." Cantrcll said Argcnti was in love with a memory. "He was in love with the wayJie used to be" before she became mentally ill and addicted to drpgs, Cantrcll said. "He thought she could be the way she was before." his help.

Now, Mesa Police Sgt. Mike Hayes says officers are searching for the woman, Maria Catherine Armstrong, 24, whom they consider the prime suspect in the case, although she has not been charged with the slaying. Argenti's decomposed body was found Nov. 14 on a couch at an apartment in the 500 block of East McKellips Road. Police believe he was killed Nov.

9 as he slept on the couch. The Argcnti and Armstrong tryst started on Memorial Day weekend, the man's family said. Argcnti, an Apache helicopter mechanic at McDonnell Douglas Helicopter Co. in Mesa, returned to Willingboro to visit friends. While he was there, he saw Armstrong for the first time in several years.

"She was real messed up," said Glenn Borochaner, Argenti's stepbrother. "She was into drugs. "He thought if he could get her away from the crowd she was hanging around with, he could help her." Argcnti bought Armstrong an airplane ticket and told her to come to Arizona, Borochaner said. In June, Armstrong called Argcnti from Tucson to tell him that she had arrived. Argcnti drove down to pick her up, and the woman moved into Argenti's apartment.

Soon the two began to fight, family and friends said. "Ronnie used to come to work with scratches and bruised," said Svana Cantrcll, an electrician at McDonnell Douglas. "She used to attack him, but he would never strike back." Members of Argenti's family, mostly Phoenix residents, were concerned. "I took one look at her, and I knew something was wrong," said Joan Borochaner, Argenti's mother. "She had a dead look in her eyes." ment.

Mii'f'Y'K VIMS. fi Z- "iS, 1 By David Cannella The Arizona Republic The Marcos dc Niza High School marching band will represent Arizona in the inaugural parade for President-elect George Bush on Jan. 20, and at least one band member is particularly aware of the significance of the event. Senior Ulriki Kummcr, a clarinet player, will represent not only the Tempe high school and Arizona, but, unofficially, her homeland of West Germany. Kummcr, an exchange student from Tempe's sister city of Regcns-burg, will be among the 95-mcmbcr Padre Band to march down Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington.

"I had no idea what the parade means, because I had never heard of it," she said. "But now, I'm of the feeling that I'm very proud to be a part of it. I have to think what this means to me and I'm just very proud and excited about it." The band will leave the Valley on Jan. 18 and will return Jan. 23, said band director John Gcmcnt.

They will be accompanied by an addi 'V fc'f The 1.6-mile parade will feature 95 organizations, including 70 bands. Seventy floats will add color to the traditional inaugural parade. Because of limitations on when and where bands may play, the Padre Band will perform only one song, Crown Imperial, Clement said. "It's a special song we're learning just for the parade," he said, adding that it was written for the coronation of King George VI of Great Britain. "This is a once-in-a-lifctime opportunity for these kids," Clement said.

"This is their chance to participate in history." The band was chosen from among 300 applicants. Hopeful of being picked, they began a fund-raising drive early this school year, Clement said. "We knew we couldn't wait until I -1 Band director John Clement calls the appearance "a opportunity for these kids." wc heard to begin raising money," raising." he said. "So we've been out selling About $40,000 of the expected everything we can, putting on $65,000 needed to cover expenses for carnivals and doing all kinds of fund the trip has been raised, he added. St-ePOUCE, page 8 Rate increases at east Valley hospitals Tainted tailings removed 6 hospitals hiked rates during 1988 in southeast Valley Most Date of recent Date DHS last Amount of DHS Hospitals Increase effective approval Increase Increase approval Chandler Regional 12 Jan.

1989 Ycis March 1988 10.9 Wq Desert Samaritan 14.6 Jan. 1989 No Jan. 1988 5.9 No Mesa General 7.1 July 1988 No July 1987 5 Yes Mesa Lutheran 12.2 Jan. 1988 No Jan. 1987 6 Yes Tempe St.

Luke's 15 June 1988 No June 1987 14 No Valley Lutheran 13.1 Jan. 1988 No Jan. 1987 6 Yes Source: Anion Department ot Health Services State officials By Neal Savage The Arizona Republic Tons of cyanide-contaminated mine tailings dumped near Apache Junction two years ago have been hauled away, and state Department of Environmental Quality officials now are checking soil samples to ensure that all the tainted material is gone. "We wanted to have all (he tailings removed by the end of the year, and that was done," said the department's Art Hlcch, project director. The waste includes tailings that were moved to the Apache Mine site from the defunct Metal Refiners Ltd site in Mesa in December 1986.

Residents who live near the mine, about three miles north of Apache Junction, observed the dumping and complained to city and Pinal County officials who urged state officials to remove the soil. Dlcch said that during a period of about a week ending Dec. 23, the Magma Copper Co. hauled 1,980 tons of waste to its mill in Superior, where the tailings arc being crushed and mixed with a slurry containing hydrogen peroxide. The peroxide turns cyanide into a harmless cyanate, which then is dried and stored.

The state will pay Magma from Sc CYii3-Tttrrrj, pagtt compensation for the care; the cost of rising malpractice-insurance payments and medical supplies; the need to update equipment and facilities; and -the need to pay hospital staff competitive salaries. Hospital officials said the increases also are needed to deal with an economic crisis that has escalated with the growth of health-maintenance organizations, or HMOs, and Preferred provider organizations or POs, which receive discounts on hospital charges. "Our costs are not out of line. We're just trying to make sure we can keep our doors open," said Kaylor Shcmbcrgcr, administrator of Chandler Regional Hospital, which implemented a 10.9 percent overall rate hike in March 1988 that was not supported by the DHS. A 12 percent hike implemented Jan.

3, however, was supported. The average rate increase in the state is about 9.2 percent, and the national average is about 9 percent, DIIS officials said. Dan Summers, chief of health-care economics for the DHS, said there are three primary reasons DIIS recommends against rate increases: if the increases are a burden on the community; if the hospitals appear lo be making enough profit at current called boosts unjustified By Victoria Harker The Arizona Republic Six southeast Valley hospitals increased their rates in 1988 in spite of warnings from state Department of Health Service officials that the hikes were not justified and would be an unnecessary burden on the community. And two of the hospitals implemented additional rate hikes last week but only one received DI IS approval. In Arizona, each hospital is required to go through a mandatory rate-review process, although no state agency, including the DI IS, can deny rate hikes.

The DIIS, which reviews the requests either supports or does not support the proposed increases, but the hospitals are not required to abide by the agency's recommendations. The most common reasons given by southeast Valley hospitals for needing to raise their rates were a growing gap between the cost of caring for Medicare patients and the amount of the system. Resources in the system can flow back and forth between hospitals." He said Desert Samaritan will have less than 2 percent profit in 1989 even with a 14.5 percent increase that went into effect Jan. I that also was not supported by the DIIS. "(Yet) the system will reinvest $33 (million) to $40 million into Desert Samaritan (in 1989) to upgrade the emergency room and improve access to the hospital," Green said.

Hospital officials also complain about the shortfalls they face in treating Medicare patient. Medicare used to reimburse hospitals for the actual costs incurred while caring for a patient. In 1983, however, Medicare changed its reimbursement method, and hospitals now are paid a fixed rate for a particular diagnosis. If it costs the hospital more lo care for a Medicare patient, the facility must absorb the difference, said John Rivers president of the Arizona Hospital Association. John Strasser, corporate director of increases would have an "apparent unreasonable community impact." Both hospitals have large numbers of Medicare patients about 60 percent at Mesa Lutheran and 80 percent at Valley, she said.

"We certainly don't generate profits that are distributed to shareholders," Murro said. "They are not used for anything except to update and rebuild the facilities." The DIIS criticized Desert Samaritan and Mesa General for funncling profits to parent corporations or sister hospitals when they implemented 3.9 and 7. 1 percent increases, respectively, this year. When profits are taken from one facility to support a business or facility in another community or slate, it is unreasonable to expect the local community to pay higher charges DHS officials said. But Dan Green, spokesman for Samaritan Health Service, said that the local hospital also benefits from the larger corporation or system.

"Profits are also funnclcd back to Desert Samaritan from the system," Green said. "That is the advantage of rates; or jf hospitals provide inadequate financial information. The DHS considers profit margins of 4 to 7 percent reasonable, and their records show that, with the increases, southeast Valley hospitals had net profits ranging from 2 to 12 percent. All of the hospitals except Mesa General reported profit margins at 7 percent or lower, but the DIIS recommended against the increases for a variety of reasons ranging from inadequate accounting procedures to using profits from a local hospital to support a failing hospital in another state or city. Local and state hospital officials however, criticized the DHS' method of rate review, saying the department does not understand the complexity of the hospital crisis.

"There has been a lot of financial pressures and we have been taking measures to cut costs 'such as reducing staff," said Linda Murro, spokeswoman for Mesa and Valley Lutheran hospitals which implemented 12.2 percent and 13.1 percent increases respectively, in January 1988 in spite of DHS findings that the.