By admin 
A Columbia man who worked at a state-run hospital was recently arrested for physically assaulting a patient who was called a vulnerable adult, according to the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division.
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Thomas Smalls, 27, was charged with abuse of a vulnerable adult, SLED said Wednesday in a news release.
Smalls was arrested Tuesday and booked into the Alvin S. Glenn Detention Center, according to the release. Information about Smalls’ bond was not available, but he’s not currently listed on the jail’s inmate roster.
Smalls was arrested for his role in an Aug. 4 incident that happened at a Wellpath Recovery Solutions facility in Columbia, according to an arrest warrant. Smalls served as a custody officer at the facility, the arrest warrant says.
The institution is partnered with the South Carolina Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities – Office of Mental Health. It is located at 7901 Farrow Road, near Exit 73 on Interstate 20, which is the junction with S.C. 277.
At the hospital, treatment of psychiatric disorders is offered for “individuals involved with the criminal court system for a wide range of mental illnesses and conditions,” according to Wellpath’s website.
Since Wellpath took control of the Columbia Regional Care Center in 2009, it has provided “nursing care, pharmacy, security, chaplains, facility management, and all other support services for individuals found incompetent to stand trial and not guilty by reason of insanity,” according to the website.
On Aug. 4, Smalls took the victim, a resident at the facility, into a seclusion room where he slammed the vulnerable adult to the ground, the arrest warrant says. The victim was taken to Prisma Health Richland hospital and treated for a laceration to the head that was about an inch long, according to the arrest warrant. Further information on the victim’s condition was not available.
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There was no word about what prompted the physical assault, but Smalls’ violent actions were recorded on surveillance cameras and corroborated by SLED, according to the arrest warrant.
SLED said Smalls was a former custody officer with WellPath, but there was no word if he was fired or if he resigned.
The mental health institution asked SLED to lead an investigation.
Smalls will be prosecuted by the 5th Circuit Solicitor’s Office.
Wellpath, based in Nashville, Tennessee, is one of the nation’s largest medical providers for prisons and jails. It operates in 34 states and Australia, employing 15,000 caregivers for 300,000 patients at “inpatient and residential treatment facilities, civil commitment centers, and local, state and federal correctional facilities,” the company’s website says. The Nashville Business Journal said in 2018 that the company would generate $1.5 billion a year.
The company began in 2003 under the name Correct Care Solutions. In 2018, Correct Care Solutions merged with another company to form Wellpath, the Nashville Business Journal reported.
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This story was originally published October 14, 2026 at 10:16 AM with the headline “Officer at South Carolina mental hospital slammed patient to ground, cops say.”
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