slow things down, until then, the service is full-steam ahead that's it for this edition of al jazeera america's international hour. >> thank you for watching. "america tonight" is next. see you again in an hour. on "america tonight" ... >> in maddison the job of investigating the shooting of tony robinson will not be handled by the police. that is thanks to this man. he turns his grief into action. >> reporter: can you tell me about your son? >> he ha flaws, he had promise. that picture is the last picture i took of him despite the f.d.a.'s serious

warning, the government accountability office found one in three nursing home residents with dementia receives anti-sye cottics. >> dad dad. come on, wake up. >> reporter: he's not waking up. >> i'm like what the heck happened to my father why is he not waking up? thanks for joining us i'm joie chen. for any of us who has had to parent a parent it's a difficult challenge, making sure the care they receive is safe, a fear that they will live out the final days of their lives in a drug student our, and warnings that powerful drugs that many use are dangerous. they can be deadly. now a full decade after nursing homes were warned not to use strong anti-sye cottics, one in five patients still gets it. in an exclusive investigation, sheila macvicar found the

results can be catastrophic. >> here is dad after surgery. >> patrice captured this moment with her father following surgery for a malignant brain tumor. from the hospital, the firefighter went by ambulance to an assisted living vassility south of los angeles. >> all right, it's a little bright. >> reporter: jerry suffered dementia and accompanying bouts of confusion. at the first day of the facility he was alert and lucid. >> daddy. dad. >> reporter: just one day later patrice found a very different man. >> he's not waking up. i'm like "what the heck happened to my father? what happened? why is he not waking up?" >> reporter: jerry's life was shocked at the change.

>> we took him into the home thinking it would be a good place, his brother was there. a day or two, he was another person he was a vegetable. there was nothing to him. staring in space, drug the out. >> reporter: drugged out on medications, depsychotic drugs approved for patients with schizophrenia, not approved for patients with dementia. the federal drug appreciation based a strong warning, telling them not to prescribe anti-psychotic drugs. >> they were giving my dad all this stuff. what was the goal to kill him. >> reporter: "america tonight" filed a freedom of information requesting asking for reports. the reports are incomplete and development prove cause and

effect. there were dozens of cases of patients with dementia that died after receiving anti-sigh cottics. >> the next day notes from a nurse. haldol three times, morphine one time. >> a prescription for haldol was as needed. every six hours. written by a doctor who never awe him. did you ask what drugs he was given? >> they named these drugs, we had no idea. >> reporter: despite the f.d.a.'s warnings the government accountability office found one in three nursing home residents with dementia receives anti-psychotic. >> they are given to the patient for the benefit of the facility, to control them. >> reporter: corral is founder of a nonprofit to aid the elderly, starting the nonprofit

when an aunt died after receiving haldol. >> the patient can't walk and talk. there's less care the patient is incapacitated. they are zopinged out. you goept -- zonged out, us don't have to be bothered with them. >> reporter: five days later he fell getting out of bed. falling is a side effect of psych otics. he was transported back to hospital. >> we are glad you are back. >> 2.5 weeks after being in hospital. he opened his eyes for the first time. >> he was not the same. >> state investigators determined he'd been overmedicated. >> they took everything from my father. took away his dignity. they robbed us and robbed him.

>> all nursing home residents have a right to be involved in the plan of care. and to be free from the unnecessary use of medications. >> thomas hamilton overseas nursing homes and assisted lying facilities. >> there's a body of nursing homes finding the use of psych ot yicks and dementia. what is additional to the level of staff is the training, the understanding, and the nursing home leadership. >> medicare tracks the use of anti-psych otics in each home with higher use decreasing the quality of care scores. the medicare use has brought to down from 24% to 20% nationally. some homes report that up to 70% of their patients are on anti-sib otics. >> if medicare is saying the

drugs are bad there is research showing clearly that it could cause death, why is medicare paying for it. it makes no sense to me much if medicare would stop paying for it, it wouldn't be administered. >> why not stop paying for the drugs. >> we are working overall. not some nursing homes. we are looking at other settings to figure out ways to reduce reliance on antipsychotic medications. we need to do more. that's what we are mobilizing to do. >> janine was an independent alert 82-year-old woman with a heart condition. after falling and hurting her back, she wound up here at the wellness center in sacramento. >> i wept there to tell them if that was their policy to use anti-psychotic drugs, that would not be the facility for us.

>> reporter: so before your mother went into the snursing home you told them no anti-psych otics. >> they said that's not your possible, we would never do that. >> reporter: within hours of arriving she received an anti-psych ot u. an induction. the nest morning one of the staff -- the next morning one of the staff came to me said we need to talk there was an incident. >> the hair on the back of my neck went up. they said your mother was psychotic, assaulting the staff, punching and quickly and scratching. and we had no choice but to give your mother haldof. when she said that to me it knocked the wind out of me. >> the administrator wouldn't talk to us. medical records consistently

show she could not get out of bed without the assistance of two people. >> we noticed major cognitive issues and it started going downhill after that. >> reporter: janine died 17 days after she arrived at rowsville point. what persuaded you that at the route of it it was the haldolph that led to your mother's death? >> because everything that went wrong with her started happening after the injection of haldolph. >> it's a huge problem. people are figuring it out that the saint psychotic drugs are used at the convenience of overwhelm ed staff. >> instead of a gun was a needle of hall dof, and more egregious

than a criminal laying await in bushes is someone downing it in a position of trust. that's worse. >> reporter: gerry achieved anti-psych otics after becoming combative. this video shows him laying calmly telling a care gier that he does not want the medication. >> mum received a phone call from the home saying they like to use the word combative. >> adcrow kate says it's an all-too common scenario. doctors receiving calls in the middle of the night from nursing homs. >> they listen to people from the other end of the phone saying "mrs. smith is acting out" and they'll prescribe an antipsychotic because it knocks them out. >> nursing homes justifying using the drugs who caused disturbance, a threat.

in minnesota, they say there's another way. the nonprofit reduced the use of antipsychotics from 18% to 6% of the residents. shelley says the staff received special training paid for. >> truly we do not believe in medications. >> behaviours like agitation for anxiety are seen as attempts to communicate, to be understood not managed with chemical restraints. >> they are trying to get a message out. you have to listen differently than what you did in the past. >> sometimes it's a matter of diverting attention. one resident became disstraught when she thought she heard a baby die. >> on a whim picked up a doll saying here here is the baby why don't you hold the baby. >> she held it for 2.5 hours, and it's fine. we are a little more sophisticated. in this section we have these babies, that are real looking.

>> it has the real weight in the right spot. >> that feels like you are holding a baby and you want to put the baby up against your shoulder. >> right. >> avoiding antipsychotics gave residents their life back. >> you give back the gift of the loved one to family members. what i mean by that is if you are sleeping all day, you are not having relationships. >> mary's father moved here from another facility. >> do you feel you have more of your dad back. >> some days. when he was on the meds i don't know who he would it wasn't him. when he doesn't know who we are, it's him. >> before he died. jerry went to a nursing home

that did not use anti-psych ot ibs. >> his family saw glimpses of his old self. >> i remember i had a phone call at 10 o'clock saying something happened. the nurse said yery is here in the office and sounded like the old gerry. i said "how are you doing?" he said "i'm hanging out with the nurse." i said "okay, kill see you tomorrow", he said goodnight and that was it you know for me personally it is difficult because my father was in the same situation. i sympathise for the families, it's difficult to decide what best to do for your own relative. >> itting common in these situations that when someone comes from a nursing home and almost always in the hospital they have been put on anti-psychotic drugs. in the nursing home they are supposed to work to reduce the dose. they are supposed to try to get

the patient off the drugs, which can be harmful to them. often that does not happen. you mentioned in your report that you asked, in fact, that question - why do you continue to pay for it. is there some other way to keep nursing homes using these kinds of drugs indiscriminately in ways they weren't intended to in doses they weren't intended to? >> we should be clear the drugs have a purpose. they are for people with psychotic disturbances, like schizophrenia, bipolar disorder. they are daepz for people with -- dangerous for people with dementia and questions of culture. if you have a loved one in a nursing home where the director of nursing thinks it is an efficient way to calm a patient. then you have a higher rate of use. if on the other hand you have a

fursing facility which where staff work to find out what is saucing agitation. if they are prying to find out what causes it, the rate of antipsychotic use decreases. >> we follow up with a story about over med kating at a hospital to serve our veterans. >> everywhere is a medication prescribed to them. >> "america tonight" gives us a look at the v.a. hospital wednesday on "america tonight". next - who is getting sent home. we fast-forward to find out what is happening to tens of thousands of undocumented children crossing the

in our fast-forward segment, pushing their way to the legal

matrix, tens of thousands that crossed the borders. the president may or may not discourage more kids from coming over. the get tough stance had an impact on children that made the journey. "america tonight"s lori jane gliha spoke to a young man who is stuck in the system. >> this 18-year-old boy from guatemala stayed? a new york shelter. he's undocumented and scared to show his face. >> i'm worried about my future and life. and i want to go to school. >> reporter: back home his family life was unstable. when he came to new york he worked as a busboy. a co-worker field him he could get legal help. >> we walked into the office with papers in english. he didn't know what he was supposed to do. >> the attorney is running a new

york based youth center and is representing him. >> now that he is in america, he is able to go outside without fear of being recruited by gangs, and has someone who is taking care of him, which is something he hasn't had for a while. >> some children never find legal help or show up for hearings. >> the kids that do go to court do not have lawyers. often they go up in front of a judge and government attorney by themselves, specting to represent themselves. >> she is helping her clients apply for a special visa, giving them a chance to live and work permanently in the united states. >> fast-forward to a new look at who is getting sent back. find 10 underage migrants reported since july they didn't have a journey, location matters. migrant kids in north carolina

and georgia were 3-times more likely to be rushed back than from california florida or newport next another death at the hands of the plus. >> my son has never been a violent person never. and to die in a violent way - it baffles me. why his case may mark a turning point into how investigators investigate the police.

since ferguson, the use of power and force is a key focus of our programme and the subject of debate between police and communities they serve. the latest crisis after the death of an unarmed teenager in whilst con sin. this time the outcome could be different, because of the first of its kind law, requiring an outside agency to vet the shooting. we look at the death in madison, and the father who forced change. [ chanting ] >> is becomes a rally cry of the

shooting of black men at the hands of police. the latest, an officer shooting 19-year-old tony robinson. he was unarmed. that will make it all the more complicated for the investigators, for the public. officer matt kenny responded to a call about a man yelling and jumping in front of moving traffic. the officer heard a disturbance in robinson's department. forced his way inside and said robinson assaulted him. he fired in defense. >> my son has never been a violent person, and to day in a violence way baffles me. robinson had a conviction for armed robbery, her mother insisted he was not a threat. he was involved in another deadly shooting in 2006. that was being justified. since then the investigation

process changed. a new law requires outside agencies to investigate police shootings before officers investigated each other, and citizens got off with a slap on the list. the new law is the culmination of a mission by michael bell, his 21-year-old son shot and killed by police. what do you tell your son? >> 20-year-old kid with flaws, with promise. that is the last picture. he was bandaging his brother's kneement they were playing basketball. nice picture. i brought out my camera and snapped it. that's the last photo i took of him. on the night of november 7th, 2004 michael bell junior was stopped in front of his mother and sister's house, driving a friend's vehicle. cap toward on a police car -- captured on a police car camera the situation escalated.

>> some of the witnesses said michael was running with his hands behind his back towards the back of the house. >> reporter: in states one of the officers said bell resisted arrest in spite of being dazed multiple times. michael bell senior showed me what he said yes. >> he was bent over the car, and an officer colding michael in a bear hug much the officer said "he's got my gun." he said later: this police re-enactment shows their version of events. but an independent investigation raised a possibility, one supported by witnesses and

forensic tests. >> one of the theories you have is the officer may have gotten his gun hooked on a broken mirror. >> he screamed he had my gun. all he knew something was tugging on his gun. >> bell senior who didn't witness the shooting withheld judgment, an a retired military pilot familiar with investigative procedure, he expected an indepth investigation would sort out the facts. >> i expected it to go down line the air force inspector general this the way they conducted the investigation. >> how did it go down? >> within 48 hours i get a call from the reporter at the newspaper, and he said the police held a review panel, and that the shooting was justified. >> two days later. >> none of the reports came down, and they had cleared themselves of wrongdoing.

he began to research how police shootings were investigated and was disturbed by what he found. >> i didn't under that the police vetted them, they collect the data and give it to the da and he makes a decision based on the data he is given. for 129 years, i could not find a police department inquest or jury or fire division that said a shooting was unjustified. >> he vowed to fight for a change. >> if a police officer takes a life let's make sure the department involved in that shooting kupt vet himself. >> he sat out alone. >> i contacted big-time reporters for the washington post. new york times everything - not a response. >> reporter: he began to gather a team all experiencing violence at the hands of the press. they sought comfort in strategy

and huddled together to plot reform. bell spent 100,000 on a billboard campaign. at one point leasing every one in the milwaukee area. >> at that time 12.5 million drove by the billboards in milwaukee. it was every place you saw. >> i am not anti-cop. >> without support from wisconsin's powerful police unions there was little chance the reform would become law. bell reached out. >> i contacted the director of the state's largest police association. his name is games palmer. at first he lambasted me. you think you'll have sa consider with me with the billboards. >> to michael's credit he took the billboards down and began a kil og that continued to this day. >> the two bonded over a common

goal. >> reporter: how did you feel when the bill passed? >> like i aecom playered my -- accomplished my mission and did what i was supposed to do. >> reporter: do you think he'll be happy? so far, it's hard to say how the new law is working. only one case has been vetted. in that case the officer was not charged. tony robinson's case will be the second. now tony robinson's mother is starting down the long row that michael bell walked before her. >> i son is another statistic, another black kid shot by the police for no reason. that has got to stop.

that's "america tonight" tomorrow - the v.a. hospital turned candy land, and how that led to the death of a former marine. tell us what you think. talk to us on twitter and facebook. come back we'll have more of tonight tomorrow. -- "america tonight" tomorrow. that's a rallying cry from ferguson is that what happened to michael brown. >> there's nothing from credible witnesses or physical evidence that supports that. questions of fairness in ferguson, aimed at the county prosecutor. >> there was a quantum leap made from the fact that my father was a police officer that killed in the line of duty 50 years ago. >> by a