PHOENIX — Investigators are working to figure out how a man at a Phoenix hospital died moments after he was visited by a "suspicious individual," police say.
Police said they responded to HonorHealth Deer Valley Medical Center near 27th Avenue and Deer Valley Road shortly after 3 p.m. Friday.
Hospital staff told officers a suspicious man came to the hospital and told staff he was there to visit the patient, leaving a short time later.
Soon after the man left, nurses checked on the patient and found him foaming from the mouth and unresponsive, police said. Medical staff tried to save the patient's life, but he did not survive.
The medical examiner will investigate the man's cause of death.
Police said the man leaving the victim's room was wearing a white cap, blue jeans and a T-shirt with multiple colors.
Former Salt River Police chief and now police and security expert Stanley Kephart describes hospitals at soft targets.
“Unfortunately, no place in society today is safe," said Kephart.
Kephart, whose security company IBIS2 is working with schools across the country to better identify who is coming on to campus, says the same technology can be applied to hospitals to prevent suspicious people from ending up in a patient's room.
“It’s stopping people before they get internal to the location and questioning further their right to be there or their need to be there," said Kephart.
12 News has reached out to HonorHealth for comment following Friday's incident but so far, we have not heard back.