Dr. John Leonard Michael Young is a distinguished psychiatrist and educator who has accrued more than 40 years of experience in his field. Joining the Yale University Medical School in New Haven, Connecticut, in 1978, he first served as a resident in psychiatry for three years before becoming a postdoctoral fellow in 1981. In 1982, he began serving as an assistant professor of psychiatry and was promoted to assistant clinical professor in 1989. Remaining in that role until 1992, he then served as an associate clinical professor for 12 years before being promoted to full clinical professor in 2004 – a position he still holds today.
Alongside his academic pursuits, Dr. Young was an attending psychiatrist at the Whiting Forensic Division at Connecticut Valley Hospital in Middletown from 1988 to 2009. Likewise, he joined the Congregation of the Holy Cross and was ordained as a priest of the Roman Catholic Church in 1971. He is a diplomate in psychiatry with added qualifications in forensic psychiatry by the American Board of Forensic Psychiatry.
In addition, Dr. Young has sat on the ethics committee of the Hospital of St. Raphael since 1982, having also been a supervisor of the Pastoral Center in New Haven from 1979 to 1986. Dedicating his time equally to Saint Mary’s Hospital, Connecticut Mental Health Center and Yale-New Haven Hospital, he has also been a journal reviewer for the Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and Law, as well as the American Journal of Bioethics. Furthermore, he has contributed numerous editorials, articles, commentaries and book reviews to medical journals. In December 2020, he will publish an additional commentary on forensic psychiatry in mental health prisons.
Civically involved as well, Dr. Young has contributed much of his time and expertise to the Hill Health Center in New Haven and King’s College in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, on their boards of directors. A past trustee from 1972 to 1990 and again from 1992 to 2001 of his alma mater, Stonehill College, he has also consulted for the law revision committee of the Connecticut House of Representatives in the state capital of Hartford.
In light of his outstanding feats, Dr. Young has earned several accolades. In 2018, he was the recipient of the Howard Zonana Alumni Award for Contributions to Forensic Psychiatry and he received the Roger Coleman Award from the Connecticut Psychiatric Society in 2006. Earlier in his career, Stonehill College bestowed upon him the President’s Medal in 1980 and he was a Stanford University Medical Alumni Association Scholar in 1976.
