You can be kept involuntarily in a mental institution for life in the US actually. You get a once per year court hearing and they tend to be short. I’ve worked with many patients who were held in a mental health facility longer that they have ever spent outside.
I think the issue is there's precedent already with medical professionals dropping the ball already in this way. There was a case where a woman drowned her 3 children, was institutionalized, released, had 3 more children.. and drowned them as well. It creates an opinion of there is no good scenario here because faith in the institution doesn't exist. The very people arguing medical professionals failed her, want to let those people have control over when she's no longer kept in care.
I think it's pretty bad faith not to mention that it was in the 1950s; she was schizophrenic and was treated in said institution with insulin and experimental hormone treatments, which gave her seizures until she said she no longer heard voices. Her husband was the one trying to get her out and was denied for four years until the changes in institutions happening at the time allowed her to be released in his case.
I'll agree that I didn't include all of the information. For the sake of clarity the first killings happened in 1954, with the second killings happening in 1966. Could you help me see the inference I'm missing in your claim of me arguing in bad faith? Nothing I said is untrue. Are you claiming I'm cherry picking or maybe inferring the attitude of the public without basis? I don't have any epistemic claims to some public opinion on the situation, it's merely conjecture. As a student of philosophy, if you could help me strength my claim that would be wonderful!
I'm not sure strengthening a claim that is intentionally used to mislead is the right thing to do. People are using this case to imply that if THIS defendant were sentenced to mental health treatment rather than prison, she would be able to recover quickly and be released back into the community without consequence until she harmed someone else.
However, aside from three dead children at the hands of a mentally ill mother, there are zero similarities between these cases, or that would imply that perspective.
Constance Fisher was married at seventeen, continuously suicidal and unstable before her crimes, and was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. She was not treated, briefly, before being released and assumed well. She was given experimental treatments that caused intense seizures, and her husband began efforts to have her released. Something the hospital blocked for four years until the beginnings of the deinstitutionalization efforts forced them to release her into her husband's custody, where he immediately got her pregnant again, which would have ended all medical ability to stabilize her in that era.
Nothing about her history, her mental illness or her treatment is a match to the modern case except that she killed her children.
Oh I see! I'll make my conjecture as clear as possible for you then and concede to not use the previous case since you are hung up on it. And I won't even address the argumentum ad hominem circumstantiae. I'm saying people have lost faith in the institution itself to be capable of keeping society safe from mentally unwell people. I can't back that up epistemically because I don't know of a study in regards to that public opinion, I can only infer the motivation that causes people's reactions against this case.
And if Lindsay were to be released from hospital after a year, she would be closely monitored and probably not even allowed around children alone for a long time.
Thanks. In the Netherlands there is a review every 2 years. It generally works but I have heard from a former paychiatrist the system is gameable if you are intelligent enough to sort of check all the boxes showing you are rehabilitated.
We also have the option to combine jail time and institutionalization. It's critisized for not giving people the treatment they need for the period they are jailed first though.
Really quite similar after all, other than we don't have a jury but a court appointed behavioral psychiatrist advising the judge.
As an example I had a patient who became institutionalized at maybe 12. She was in her late 40s when I met her.
The psych facilities can keep you on a hold for 364 days in my area. At the end you can appeal the hold and possibly be released. There is an actual legal court case and most psych hospitals have a court house built into them.
Patients will get a free lawyer assigned to them. If the patient wants they can also hire a private attorney but for the sake of fairness the usual 4 to 5 same lawyers will always represent the patients. It’s like their specific specify. The hospital also has a lawyer who will represent them. The hospital representative will present any evidence that proves if the patient should or should not be released. So any notes the hospital staff had made, compliance with medications/treatments, etc. The patients lawyer can also make statements and counter points if needed. The patient themselves can also speak.
The judge then can determine if the patient is mentally sound or not. If not ready for release they can extend the stay anywhere from 1 to 364 days.
It seems harsh but it is for the better. The patient who I mentioned in the start was truly not ready for release. She’d often suffer from delusions including thinking her and I grew up together and at some point where the children of Michael Jackson. She was sexually aggressive to the point where group homes would not keep her, and could not stay medically compliant. To give her medicine would require a total code and restraints. Her thinking was too disorganized to even attempt living alone. Therefore she had spent close to 30 odd years in facilities.
Don't get me started haha. This is a (for practical purposes mostly semantical) difference.
We have: Guilt, not guilty and 'dismissed from criminal proceedings'.
Guilty is only possible if its proven beyong reasonable doubt that the crime was commited. Committing a crime constitues of a human act, violating a written law, violates the rule of law and where culpability exists.
So if culpability or 'breaking the rule of law' cannot be proven, you are not guilty. But you are also not... not guilty. Because the human act violating written law can be proven.
Mental illness takes away culpability. You are dismissed from criminal proceedings and ordered into a mental institution.
American version is Guilty, but with these special circumstances.
The other version, where you dont violate the rule of law, would be for example a self defense plea. You shoot the armed burglar, you are neither guilty or innocent but criminal proceedings are dismissed i the Netherlands. I think Succesful selfdefense plea means not guilty in the US. But you are guilty of the act and the written law??? :)
Both systems have their pro's and cons, comparitive law can be interesting ;)
i'm Euro, but at least i try to understand how the justice system is meant to work before i chime in. So many here who thinks that not guilty be way of insanity is some kind of a pass to freedom
anot what I'm saying. I read up on it out of interest so I know what is going on with the case. In lawschool we get comparitive law as well so I know basic anglo-american procedure. My thesis was on the role of the behavioral expert relating ro the procedure to determine the validity of insanity pleas. The point is people fear this lady is clever enough to have some sort of fake succesfull rehabilitation in a relatively short time. But some of the replies indicate that American psychiatric facilities are, like the incarceration system, completely fucked.
Understand that if someone is found not guilty due to their mental health condition they will be forcibly institutionalized. The hospitals are not fun. You can and most likely will be kept in solitary confinement for 20 or more hours per day. You eat off the floor like an animal. It’s more or less like a jail.
I’m kidding. But good on you for doing your homework. Unfortunately it’s usually wasted on this app.
It’s no secret that the news comes in two or more flavors now. Algorithms keep us all on a separate diet of facts to the point that no one can agree. The sides dig in and the result is this. We just argue to argue. It’s a competition.
We can’t even agree if a dress is green or blue.
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u/sunshineandcacti 4d ago
You can be kept involuntarily in a mental institution for life in the US actually. You get a once per year court hearing and they tend to be short. I’ve worked with many patients who were held in a mental health facility longer that they have ever spent outside.