Legal system key to mental commitments
 No comments posted.
By ROD STETZER mailto:rod.stetzer@lee.net
Monday, December 3, 2007 11:31 AM CST
Editor’s Note: Wisconsin’s mental illnesses commitment law is seen as a model by other states. The Chippewa Herald’s two-part series, Slipping Through the Cracks, today examines how the law works.
State law funnels families who are struggling to force a loved one to accept mental health help into the legal system.
Wisconsin’s courtrooms remain the endpoint for the emergency detention system, or the so-called “three-party petition” provision for cases not settled with voluntary commitments.
The process can go a lot smoother and perhaps even be avoided if it starts in, say, the living room instead of ending in a courtroom.
“It’s really, really frustrating for families,” said Marvin Schneider, who worked for 36 years for the Chippewa County Department of Human Services before retiring in November as an administrator.
He suggests families who are coping with a loved one who appears to have a mental illness should get counseling for themselves. Then they can take a “tough love” approach to get their loved one to seek help.
“Generally, families are very powerful. Especially if you can get all of the family united and in the same place,” Schneider said.
Failing that, however, families would have to take the legal route.
Emergency detention
Law enforcement agencies deal with emergency mental health detentions, which can last up to 72 hours.
Lt. Mike Farley of the Chippewa Falls Police Department said the department had 126 mental health investigations from Jan.1 to late November.
Of those, he said 46 were found to have no grounds for emergency detention, 35 were for emergency detention, 25 were voluntary hospitalizations, and there were 20 diversions.
Farley said family members, emergency rooms and concerned individuals call the department looking for help with a person who may have a mental illness.
“For a lot of people, we’re the stopgap after normal business hours,” Farley said.
He said a person can be committed for an emergency detention if he or she has threatened harm to themselves or others. The threat must be deemed to be credible, he said.
Farley explained that, under a diversion, police officers work with the Chippewa County Guidance Clinic, a part of the county’s Human Services Department.
A crisis worker is brought to do an evaluation of the person who may need mental health help. What’s called a community-based safety plan can involve treatment other than committing a person to mental illness to a psychiatric unit.
“If a person can be treated outside a hospital, that’s what the law requires,” Farley said.
The program has been in effect for about 15 months.
“It’s actually reduced the number of emergency detentions we have to do and we’ve also seen a decrease in repeat customers,” Farley said.
Three-party petition
Another way under Wisconsin law to have a person committed for mental illness is the three-party petition.
Schneider said the petition signed by at least three people has to allege that the person is mentally ill, mentally disabled or drug dependent.
“When we say drug dependent, that doesn’t include alcohol. Alcohol is covered in another section of the statutes,” he said.
The petitioners must be adults who know the individual, and have reason to believe the person is dangerous and mentally ill.
To show that, the petitioners can use a person’s threats of suicide or serious threats of bodily harm to others. These can be threats made over a period of time.
Schneider said acts of omission of taking care of oneself can also be used to argue the person should be committed. An example would be a person who wanders through snow without wearing shoes.
The petition is either submitted at the Human Services Department or with the county corporation counsel, James Sherman.
After meeting with a Human Services Department case manager, the petitioners then meet with Sherman. He decides if they meet the criteria under state law and whether the matter should go to court.
If it does, Schneider said a judge has two options.
-- The judge can sign the petition and have the person taken to a hospital.
“That person cannot be detained more than 72 hours. That does not include weekends or holidays,” Schneider said.
During those 72 hours, there needs to be a show cause hearing, where the court asks a treating psychiatrist to testify. The petitioners are requested to be at the hearing and possibly testify.
-- The second option is for the judge to set a hearing date if he or she is not convinced the person needs to be committed.
Either way, the court determines if the petition is valid. If a judge finds probable cause that the person is mentally ill, the judge can order the person to go to a hospital for up to an additional 14 days from the first day of detention.
Schneider said the judge then appoints two examiners who look at three questions:
-- Is the person mentally ill?
-- Is the person dangerous?
-- Is the illness treatable?
The person named in the petition is required to have an attorney, and cross-examination is allowed.
“If the subject requests it or wants it, they are entitled to a jury trial,” Schneider said.
The maximum length of commitment is six months. To be medicated against their will, the person named in the petition must be found to not be competent.
If the person is found to be still dangerous after six months, he or she can be recommitted a year at a time with subsequent commitments.
|
Archives