Exton Psychologist To Give Up Pennsylvania License As Regulators Allege Violations

Philadelphia Inquirer, March 28, 2000
By Bill Ordine

Patricia Mansmann continued to practice while she was suspended, officials said. She claims unfair treatment.

An Exton psychologist who has been under fire from former clients and Pennsylvania regulators for several years signed an agreement with the state yesterday to give up practicing psychology in Pennsylvania.

Patricia Mansmann, a psychologist with Genesis Associates, had been given a five-year license suspension that began in February '996, with the final two years on probation. State regulators found dozens of violations regarding therapeutic practices. In November, lawyers for the state said Mansmann continued to practice while on suspension.

In addition, Mansmann and social worker Patricia Neuhausel, who operate Genesis, have been sued by several former clients claiming that the two practiced unorthodox and harmful therapy. Some of those cases have been settled out of court.

In signing the consent agreement, Mansmann did not admit to the accusations made by state regulators and lawyers.

"Ms. Mansmann continues to maintain that the allegations are not true," said Cornelia Farrell Maggio, Mansmann's lawyer.

Maggio said Mansmann did not fight the accusations in front of the State Board of Psychology because she felt she would not receive a fair hearing.

"My clients were tried and convicted long before they arrived at the first courthouse for trial," Maggio said. She said Mansmann and Neuhausel were victims of a "witch-hunt" and unfavorable publicity.

A spokeswoman for the state department said Neuhausel was also expected to enter a consent agreement giving up her license when the board that regulates social workers meets in April.

In a list of allegations filed by the state in November, the Bureau of Professional and Occupational Affairs said that Mansmann practiced psychology when she was supposed to be on active suspension, and that she continued using some therapeutic practices that had triggered that suspension.

Among those practices was encouraging a woman client to cut off contact with her parents and siblings, to sleep in separate quarters from her husband, and to associate only with other members of the therapy group, known as the Network, according to the state. The woman client, who was identified only as "PR" in the state's charges, was told by Mansmann that she would die if she discontinued treatment at Genesis, the state alleged.

Maggio said that the female client had remained in treatment for ''years" after first complaining to the state about Genesis. She also said that the many suits filed against the therapy group were meant to merely extract money from Genesis.

In legal papers, the state alleged that Mansmann and Neuhausel solicited money from their clients for a defense fund to pay for the Genesis therapists' legal costs. According to those same documents, from approximately 1990 through 1996, there were approximately 50 to 80 people in the Genesis Network. That group stood at fewer than 15 by March 1997, the state said.