Scott Gregory Hawkins - Update

Last week, I spoke out on the tragedy of Scott Gregory Hawkins, a transfer junior at Sacramento State, who was beaten to death with a baseball bat in his dorm room. Scott was a history buff who had hoped to become a history teacher or history professor. He was a religious individual who had volunteered in a number of activities to help others, including working with inner city kids, working on an Indian reservation on the Idaho-Nevada border, and working in a mission school in Chile.

Scott also had Aspergers, believed to exist along the same spectrum as autism. Among other things, individuals with Aspergers evidence severe difficulties in social interaction. According to one of his dorm-mates, Scott "wasn't the best socially" and "didn't have many friends." Nevertheless, "he seemed pretty normal to me. He was just shy. A very smart kid, though."

His father mentioned that his Aspergers "sometimes made him a target for bullies."

This update, from The Consumerist:

Not only did the UC Davis Medical Center send a $29,186.50 bill to the parents of college student who was beaten to death by his roommate, they also sent a letter letting them know that their son was considered indigent and was no longer welcome at the hospital if he needed further treatment. He doesn't, of course, because he is deceased.

Apparently he also had insurance, and the hospital should have sent the bill to his insurer. 

"I can't believe that in any country besides the U.S., any civilized country, that the parents of a murdered boy would receive this bill for $29,000 and such an insulting letter," Gerald Hawkins, the victim's father, told ABC 10 in Sacramento, CA.

The hospital has apologized.