Video Hearings Challenged In Mental Health Cases
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TALLAHASSEE (CBSMiami/NSF) – Public defenders this week asked the Florida Supreme Court to at least temporarily block judges in Lee County from holding videoconference hearings in cases about whether mentally ill people should be involuntarily committed to treatment facilities.
The dispute stems from a decision early this year for a Lee County judge and a magistrate to hold what are known as "Baker Act" hearings through videoconference technology, rather than appearing in person at mental-health facilities. Public defenders representing 15 people with mental illnesses filed petitions challenging the practice, but the 2nd District Court of Appeal in September allowed the remote hearings to continue.
A three-judge panel of the appeals court asked the Supreme Court to take up the issue, and justices scheduled arguments for Feb. 7. But in filings Tuesday, the petitioners requested that the Supreme Court issue a stay that would at least temporarily block the videoconference hearings until the case is resolved.
In part, the filings contended that mentally ill people are being treated differently than parties in other types of legal cases, where in-person hearings and trials are held.
"Most observers would agree that requiring a presumably mentally ill person to testify earnestly to a TV screen, and then asking that patient to accept the decision of the TV as the carefully considered judgment of a real court of this state, is neither constitutional nor dignified. This is especially true when only the mentally ill are required to do so," said a brief filed Tuesday by public defenders in Polk County who have stepped in to handle the appeal at the Supreme Court.
The petitions were filed against the state, and Attorney General Pam Bondi's office had not filed arguments in the Supreme Court as of Wednesday morning.
But in the September ruling, a majority of the three-judge panel at the 2nd District Court of Appeal said nothing bars Lee County judges from holding videoconference hearings in Baker Act cases --- though the panel expressed reservations about the practice.
"In sum, while we question the wisdom of holding these hearings remotely, we conclude that the decision to preside over a Baker Act hearing remotely via videoconference equipment is within the discretion of the court," said the ruling, written by appeals-court Judge Anthony Black and joined by Judge Douglas Wallace. "There is no ministerial, indisputable legal duty clearly established in the law which requires judicial officers presiding over involuntary inpatient placement hearings … to be physically present with patients, witnesses and attorneys."
But in a dissenting opinion, Judge Matthew Lucas wrote that "if there is any silence in the law on this issue, it must surely be ascribed to the fact that a judge or magistrate's personal attendance at trial has been the assumed norm as long as there have been courts and judges. In my view, a judge's physical presence is simply a constituent component or his or her ministerial duty to preside over a trial or evidentiary hearing."
The Baker Act sets up a process for determining whether people should be involuntarily committed for mental-health treatment. Part of that process involves judges or magistrates holding hearings to determine whether people meet criteria for being placed in mental-health facilities.
The News Service of Florida's Jim Saunders contributed to this report.
