Mental Health Law
LAW 675 – Fall 2013
(All page citations refer to Law and the Mental Health System
– Slobogin, Rai & Reisner 5th Edition)
Week 1:
Mental Disorders – pp. 1-42
I. Introduction
II. Perspectives on Mental Disorder
A. The Interface of Law and Mental Disorder
B. What is Mental Disorder?
C. Diagnosing Mental Disorder
III. Treatment of Mental Disorder
A. Introduction
B. Biological Therapies
C. Non-Biological Therapies
Week 2:
Expertise
I. Introduction – pp. 422-426
II. Admissibility of Clinical Opinion Testimony
A. Normality – pp. 426-450
B. Responsibility – pp. 458-464
C. Propensity – pp. 468-482
Week 3:
Civil Commitment – Police Power – pp. 701-747
I. Introduction
II. The Basis for State Intervention
A. Introduction
B. Police Power Commitment
- Handout – Lewis Carrol excerpt
- Video – Hurry Tomorrow
(documentary on Metropolitan State Hospital, 1975)
Week 4:
Civil Commitment – Parens Patriae
I. The Basis for State Intervention (cont’d)
C. Parens Patriae Commitments – pp. 747-751; 759-782
- Handout – New Yorker Article, Aviv, God Knows Where I Am
Week 5:
Civil Commitment – Procedures
IV. Procedures
A. General Considerations – pp. 796-806
C. Adjudicatory Hearing Procedures – pp. 815-820
- Handouts
- Conservatorship of Roulet
- L-P-S excerpts
Week 6:
Children
V. Commitment of Other Populations
E. Children – pp. 906-922
I. Special Educational Benefits
A. Scope of Guaranteed Benefits – pp. 1190-1215
- Handout – In re Roger S
Week 7:
Right to Treatment
O’Connor v. Donaldson – pp. 751-759
II. Theoretical Underpinnings of the Right to Treatment – pp. 1111-1131
IV. The Right to Community Services – pp. 1164-1188
- Handout – The Brethren (excerpt on O’Connor v. Donaldson pp. 369-383)
Week 8:
Discrimination
V. Housing
A. Constitutional Protections – pp. 1312-1321
II. Employment Opportunities
B. Qualification and Reasonable Accommodation – pp. 1249-1279
- Handouts
- Unzicker Poem (To Be a Mental Patient)
- ADA Amendment Act
Week 9:
Insanity Defense – pp. 540-585
I. Introduction
II. Criminal Responsibility
A. The Insanity Defense
B. The Automatism Defense
Week 10:
Other Criminal Law Doctrines – pp. 585-632
II. Criminal Responsibility (cont’d)
C. Expert Testimony on Mens Rea
D. Other Defenses
E. Abolition of the Insanity Defense
Week 11:
Sentencing – pp. 642-699
III. Sentencing
A. Capital Sentencing
B. Non-Capital Sentencing
Week 12:
Competency and Right to Refuse Treatment
I. Introduction – pp. 923-925
II. General Considerations – pp. 925-938
IV. The Right to Refuse Consent and Consent to Psychiatric Treatment
– pp. 963-999
A. Psychotropic Medication
B. Electro-Convulsive Therapy and Psychosurgery
Week 13:
Competency to Proceed – pp. 1004-1051
V. Competency in the Criminal Process
A. Competency to Proceed
Week 14:
Decisional and Dignitary Competency – pp. 1052-1098
V. Competency in the Criminal Process (cont’d)
B. Decisional Competency
C. Dignitarian Competency