Pa. Supreme Court: Minors May Be Involuntarily Committed for Drug, Alcohol Addiction

Pa. Supreme Court: Minors May Be Involuntarily Committed for Drug, Alcohol Addiction
By: Leo Strupczewski

The Legal Intelligencer
August 31, 2010

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has upheld the constitutionality of an act that allows for parents and guardians to have minors involuntarily committed for drug and alcohol treatment.

Writing that prior case law established the presumption that parents act in the best interest of their children, the court, by way of a 6-1 majority, ruled that parents’ rights to make decisions on the care of their children are “paramount” to the constitutional rights of their children.

That, along with the decision that the therapeutic nature of drug and alcohol treatment altered the bar for due process claims, helped lead the court to its ruling.

“We stress that we are dealing with a process in which a parent or guardian is seeking medical treatment for their child,” Justice Debra Todd wrote. “This statute is civil in nature and involves therapeutic treatment for a brief duration — as well as the hope of recovery and a brighter future for the child.”

Justice Thomas G. Saylor dissented from the majority, writing that he was concerned with the risk for errors in making commitments, the possible length of the commitments and the manner in which the assessment is completed.

“I am not insensitive to the possibility that familial ties may be strained by pitting children against their parents or guardians as adversaries in a judicial setting and hence, I would not conclude that adversarial testing of the petitioner’s veracity or motives is constitutionally required — particularly as the petition itself becomes largely irrelevant once an assessment is ordered,” Saylor wrote.

“I would hold, though, that, in view of the substantial involuntary commitment periods authorized by Act 53, and the possibility of erroneous deprivations due to the brevity of the assessment process, the 14th Amendment entitles a minor to a more thorough evaluation concerning the need for inpatient treatment than the relatively scanty procedures outlined in Act 53.”

Marsha Levick, chief counsel for the Juvenile Law Center, had argued at oral arguments in September 2009 that the act was unconstitutional on its face.

Reached for comment, she said the decision was a “great disappointment.”

“The lack of protection [for juveniles] is worrisome,” Levick said. “Having said that, I’m not sure where else we can go.”

She later added: “You can read Saylor’s dissent and we certainly take solace that at least one justice who heard the case agreed with what our arguments were.”

Kemal A. Mericli of the Office of the Attorney General, who had argued the act was constitutionally viable, could not be reached for comment.

According to Todd, a juvenile, referred to only as F.C., was committed to a residential treatment program after his grandmother filed a two-sentence petition and he admitted during an assessment that he used marijuana daily and alcohol occasionally.

His grandmother’s petition read “[F.C.] will not go to school and I believe he’s doing drugs and he’s running away. And he’s stealing.”

The minor had volunteered to attend an outpatient program.

After the trial court ordered the commitment, F.C. appealed the decision and challenged the constitutionality of Act 53, which permits such commitments. The court ruled it was constitutionally viable, as did a unanimous panel of the Superior Court of Pennsylvania.

Authoring the Superior Court panel’s decision, Senior Judge Robert E. Colville wrote that due process is “concerned with the procedural safeguards demanded by each particular situation in light of the legitimate goals of the applicable law.” Considering that fact, Colville wrote for the panel, the procedures used under Act 53, namely, not providing juveniles an opportunity to dispute the allegations lodged against them and subjecting them to assessment outside the presence of counsel, are “fundamentally fair” when weighed against the goal of providing treatment to minors.

In her analysis of the case, Todd agreed with Colville’s reasoning.

The justice cited the 1979 U.S. Supreme Court decision Parham v. J.R.

Though F.C. argued Parham required a “careful analysis” of a minor’s background before making a commitment decision to meet due process standards, Todd wrote the case recognized minors enjoy “certain rights,” but that the “significant right of the parent or guardian to make decisions regarding care is paramount.”

Further, Todd wrote, Act 53 requires a parent or guardian to file a petition, a medical professional to conduct an assessment and a formal hearing, with a right to counsel for the minor, before a juvenile may be involuntarily committed by the court.

Those requirements must be met every 45 days to determine whether a juvenile should still be committed, according to Todd.

F.C. argued the state’s Mental Health Procedures Act and additional Act 53 procedures in the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas offered extra protections to juveniles that should be extended in all Act 53 proceedings.

Todd wrote, however, that the U.S. Supreme Court has held there is no constitutional right to a formal hearing for a minor when a parent or guardian thinks there’s a need for medical treatment and that a “minimal informal” procedure is enough.

Further, Todd wrote, parents or guardians filing petitions with the court do so subject to penalty of unsworn falsification to authorities.

“[W]hile the provision of additional protections for minors as exemplified in other statutes and in Allegheny County may be salutary, they do not render Act 53 itself unconstitutional,” Todd wrote. “In this light, appellant’s argument for additional protections is more properly made to the General Assembly

Bill Looks to Curb Medicating State Foster Kids

Bill Looks to Curb Medicating State Foster Kids

http://cbs4.com/local/florida.legislators.legislation.2.1629212.html

Bill Is Named For 7-Year-Old Gabriel Myers

TALLAHASSEE (CBS4) ― Florida lawmakers are scheduled to discuss a measure
Tuesday designed to curb the prescription of mental-health drugs to children in state care. Senate Bill 2718, also known as the Gabriel Myers Bill, would allow officials to more closely monitor the powerful psychiatric drugs dispensed to Florida foster care children.

The proposal is largely based on the findings of a task force formed after Gabriel locked himself in a bathroom and hung himself with a shower cord last April in his Margate foster home. Gabriel was on Seroquel, used to treat bipolar disorder, and other psychiatric drugs linked by federal regulators to potentially dangerous side effects, including suicide, but the risks may not have been adequately communicated to his foster parents. The drugs are not approved for use by young children. But doctors often prescribe them ‘off-label,’ for purposes for which the drugs have not been approved.

Sen. Ronda Storms (R)-Brandon, who filed the bill, said prescribed drugs have replaced talk therapy and are over-prescribed to subdue unruly children.

The proposed law would require the state Department of Children and Families to assign volunteer guardians to oversee each child’s mental health care. It prohibits foster children from being the subject of clinical drug trials and raises the age at which children are allowed to take these drugs from 6 to 11 in many cases.

It would also give children some say in the drugs they take because it would require foster children to agree to the use of the psychiatric drugs and would require caseworkers to explain to children, in a manner they can understand, why the drugs are necessary and what risks they carry.

The measure would also require an independent review before psychiatric drugs can be administered to children 10 or younger. The bill also requires children to have a mental health treatment plan that includes counseling for children prescribed such drugs.

The state’s growing use of adult medication on emotionally and mentally troubled children has sparked debate for years. Florida has approximately 19,000 children in state care and of those about 3,200 are in Miami-Dade County, according to DCF spokeswoman Flora Beal.

Gabriel’s death prompted a statewide investigation that found 13 percent, or 2,699, of all foster children are on such drugs, according to a DCF study. That compares with only an estimated 4 percent to 5 percent of children in the general population.

A state appointed panel recently reviewed all cases and released a report that found that the policies requiring parental consent or a second opinion were not uniformly followed. Gabriel Myers was on psychotropic medications without the required consent, the panel concluded.

Lawsuit filed in Taycheedah inmate’s death

Treatment used alleged to worsen mental state
Poor mental health care as well as a slow response from guards and medical staff contributed to the suicide of a mentally ill prison inmate, a lawsuit alleges.

James Gende, a Waukesha attorney, filed the suit Monday in U.S. District Court in Milwaukee on behalf of Angela Enoch’s estate and surviving family members.

Enoch, a mentally ill teen who had been in and out of institutions and foster care, died in June 2005 when she was 18. She used a ripped seam from a pillow to strangle herself in an observation cell of the segregated unit at Taycheedah Correctional Institution, the state’s largest prison for women near Fond du Lac.

“I think the system turned her into a throwaway child,” Gende said Tuesday. “The treatment she received while incarcerated by the Department of Corrections was a substantial cause of the deterioration of her mental health status, which resulted in her successful suicide.”

The suit, which names Gov. Jim Doyle, Corrections Secretary Matt Frank, and 20 corrections employees as defendants, seeks a jury trial and damages of $10 million. Enoch’s mother, Roxanne Enoch of Hayward, is named along with Enoch’s two minor sisters as plaintiffs.

“We are in the process of reviewing the lawsuit and conferring with our legal counsel and it would be premature to comment on the matter at this time,” John Dipko, a Department of Corrections spokesman, said Tuesday. “However, we take any suicide that occurs in our prison system very seriously and we re-evaluate our practices and policies in each instance to see if there are any actions that could have prevented the death and if there are any changes that need to be made.”

ACLU, Justice Department also cite Enoch case
The lawsuit comes on the heels of a pending class-action lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union and a separate U.S. Department of Justice investigation, both of which allege grossly deficient medical and mental health care at Taycheedah.

The prison, which has about 730 inmates, has the highest ratio of mentally ill offenders of Wisconsin’s 19 correctional institutions, state Department of Corrections officials say. About two-thirds of its inmates have mental health needs.

The ACLU suit notes that the suicide rate among inmates in segregated units is 10 times the rate of those in the general-population units in Wisconsin prisons. In segregation, inmates typically spend 23 hours of each day alone in a cell, and are given about one hour outside of it to exercise.

Corrections officials say they have been working to improve mental health care at the prison and now give a closer review of inmates considered for segregation.

Enoch’s death is recounted in both the ACLU and Justice Department complaints. But the latest 20-page lawsuit offers new details alleging how Taycheedah’s response to Enoch’s mental illness ultimately led to her death.

“That because of her severe mental illnesses, Enoch was placed in solitary confinement in (Taycheedah’s) Segregation Unit,” the suit alleges. “… Solitary confinement results in exacerbation of previously existing mental illnesses. It is also likely that individuals, like Enoch, will suffer permanent harm due to their solitary confinement.”

Suit alleges prison failures
Enoch entered Wisconsin’s juvenile court system at age 12 and was charged with her first adult crime at 14. She had a history of assaults, as well as self-destructive and suicidal behavior.

She had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, personality disorder, mood disorder and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Despite a court order to give Enoch her prescription medications, Taycheedah staff “failed to take the necessary action in administering (her) prescribed medications in the days immediately preceding her death of June 19, 2005,” the lawsuit alleges.

The suit also alleges it took staff six to eight minutes to enter Enoch’s cell after observing her strangling herself.

“(Taycheedah) staff’s reaction to Enoch’s self-strangulation was unreasonably delayed and in violation of their standard operating procedures for response to an emergency situation, which was a substantial cause of Enoch’s death,” the suit reads.

Among the violations of law, the suit alleges wrongful death, cruel and unusual punishment, violation of equal protection, and violations of the federal Rehabilitation Act and the American with Disabilities Act.

The suit also alleges gender-based disparities. Female prisoners are not afforded the same level of psychiatric care available to male offenders at the Wisconsin Resource Center, a specialized mental health facility administered by the state Department of Health and Family Services through a partnership with the Department of Corrections.

“If Angela had been a man, she never would have been in that segregation unit,” Gende said. “She’d have been in a mental health facility.”

The Department of Corrections’ Committee on Inmate/Youth Deaths reviewed Enoch’s suicide, Dipko said. However, the committee’s findings are confidential under state law, he added.

In Doyle’s proposed two-year budget, the state Building Commission has approved an $11 million proposal for a 45-bed female inmate treatment facility at the Wisconsin Resource Center. His budget also includes a request for 33 additional permanent positions for medical and mental health care at the prison, at a cost of $2.7 million.

Wendy Harris can be reached at 920-993-1000, ext. 526, or wharris@postcrescent.com. Gannett Wisconsin Newspapers contributed to this report.

Trial opens; Boy Scouts accused of hiding pedophiles

The Oregonian
Trial opens in Portland, with Boy Scouts accused of hiding pedophiles
By Aimee Green, The Oregonian
March 17, 2010, 9:13PM

Attorney Kelly Clark, who represents a 37-year-old man who as a boy was sexually abused by an assistant Scoutmaster, told Multnomah County jurors Wednesday: “You will see a different face of the Boy Scouts of America” in coming weeks.
BRENT WOJAHN/THE OREGONIAN

A civil trial that opened Wednesday in Portland will show that the Boy Scouts of America knew it had child molesters in its leadership for decades but kept the problem quiet, according to an attorney for one of the victims.

The case, expected to attract national attention, centers on a Portland man who confessed to Scout leaders that he had molested 17 Scouts but was allowed to continue joining boys in Scouting activities.

On a broader scale, the case is one of the first to bring into open court hundreds of confidential files that the 100-year-old organization kept on Scout leaders and others suspected of sexually abusing boys. Though the Scouts, based in Texas, have been sued dozens of times over allegations of sexual abuse, most cases have been settled out of court, keeping files from becoming public.

Patrick Boyle, the Washington, D.C.-based author of “Scout’s Honor: Sexual Abuse in America’s Most Trusted Institution,” said Wednesday that this case may be only the second time such files have been used in a trial.

“It’s very embarrassing to them,” Boyle said.

The case that opened Wednesday in Multnomah County Circuit Court was brought by Kelly Clark, a Portland attorney who specializes in child sex abuse cases, and involves a former assistant Scoutmaster named Timur Dykes. The lawsuit, brought by a victim of Dykes listed in court documents by the pseudonym Jack Doe, seeks at least $14 million from the Boy Scouts of America and the Cascade Pacific Council in Oregon.

The Scouts, Clark said in opening statements, knew it had pedophiles in its organization yet allowed Dykes and others to continue to associate with its members. He held up file folder after file folder from Boy Scout headquarters that he said proves the organization knew of at least 1,000 suspected child molesters from 1965 to 1985.

“Those decisions led naturally, predictably and foreseeably to the abuse of boys like” my client, he said.

Attorneys for the two Scouting organizations said in their opening statements that their clients weren’t at fault.

Boy Scouts of America attorney Charles T. Smith said he would call experts who would testify that sexual abuse of children wasn’t a problem specific to the Scouts but one that occurs throughout society. He also told jurors that child molesters are difficult to track and that the organization kept confidential files on them in an effort to protect children.

“These people move,” Smith said. “They go from state to state. And they change their names or their birth dates or they do something to try to slip back in.”

The trial, expected to last four weeks, focuses on Doe, who was a Boy Scout when he was abused by Dykes in the 1980s. The Oregonian is not naming Doe, now 37, because he is a victim of sex abuse.

According to Clark, Dykes was 25 when he met a 9-year-old Doe in 1981. Later, Doe joined a Southeast Portland Scout troop where Dykes was an assistant Scoutmaster. The troop met at a building, in the 9900 block of Southeast Caruthers Street, owned by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The boys also often went to Dykes’ apartment to work on merit badges or spend the night, with their parents’ approval, Clark told jurors.

“All of the parents trusted Timur Dykes because he was a Scout leader,” Clark said.

The apartment, Clark said, was like a playground for boys.

“He had ferrets,” Clark said. “He had snakes, including a boa constrictor. … He had a knife collection. He gave (Doe) french fries for breakfast on a regular basis.”

In January 1983, the mother of a Scout who said he had been molested by Dykes went to Gordon McEwen, a Mormon bishop who headed the local Scouting program, Clark said. McEwen confronted Dykes, who confessed to abusing 17 Scouts.

Nonetheless, Dykes was allowed to continue to spend time with the boys in the program, Clark said. McEwen contacted the parents of the 17 Scouts but “did nothing to warn the other parents of boys within Timur Dykes’ reach and grasp,” Clark said.

Dykes was arrested that year on accusations of molesting boys. He pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree sexual abuse, received probation and was ordered to stay away from children. Yet, Clark said, he continued Scouting activities.

After his confession, Dykes molested Doe at least six times, Clark said. Four times, Doe awoke to discover he was on top of Dykes, who was aroused. Another time, Dykes pulled Doe’s hand into his shorts. During a recent deposition, Dykes admitted abusing Doe.

In July 1984, police pulled over Dykes while he was driving a van full of Scouts on a camping trip. Police discovered his 1983 conviction and arrested him. Doe’s parents learned of Dyke’s history and, alarmed, asked their son if he had been a victim.

“To protect his parents, he said, ‘No, Timur never touched me,’” Clark said. But the abuse deeply disturbed Doe, who started getting bad grades, using drugs and getting in trouble with the law, Clark said. Today, he suffers from depression, nightmares and flashbacks, Clark said.

Clark is also representing seven other victims of Dykes in lawsuits against the Boy Scouts. Those plaintiffs also sought damages from the Mormon church, and the church settled.

Paul Xochihua, an attorney for the Cascade Pacific Council, painted a much different picture. He disagreed with how Clark characterized McEwen’s response to Dykes’ confession, saying McEwen cooperated with a police investigation. Police also knew of McEwen’s plan to contact the parents of the abused children, he said.

“He will say he acted immediately,” Xochihua said.

Smith, the attorney for the Boy Scouts of America, said neither the local nor national organization was directly involved in the operation of Doe’s troop. That fell to the Mormon church. But, Smith told jurors, “Boy Scouts of America is not here to blame this on the church. Those decisions will be up to you.”

Boyle, the author, said Smith’s argument is one he’s heard before.

“‘We don’t run the local troop. We don’t choose the leaders,’” Boyle said. That argument has been successful in the past, he said. What’s more, Boyle said, the public has a lot of good will toward the Scouts.

“People are unwilling to punish the Boy Scouts,” Boyle said. “I draw a distinction with the Catholic Church, because a lot of people don’t like the Catholic Church.”

– Aimee Green

White House Boys / No charges filed

Investigation into child abuse at Marianna reform school brings no charges

By Ben Montgomery, Times Staff Writer
In Print: Friday, March 12, 2010

They have thought about revenge, daydreamed about swinging a leather strap at a feeble old man. Some have even driven back to Marianna, as grown men, with murderous intent.

One way or another, the former wards of the Florida School for Boys want the guard who beat them to pay.

But a 15-month investigation into decades-old abuse won’t result in criminal charges against Troy Tidwell or any other former staffers at the state’s oldest reform school, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement said Thursday.

“With the passage of over 50 years,” the 13-page FDLE report states, “no tangible physical evidence was found to either support or refute the allegations of physical or sexual abuse.”

The FDLE interviewed more than 100 men, relatives and former staffers about allegations of brutal beatings in the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s. Most of the statements were consistent, they found. Boys were given up to 100 licks with a heavy leather paddle in a putrid cinder block building called the White House. Many said their backsides bled, that they needed stitches, that they had to pick underwear from their lacerations. Eight said they had scars or suffered injuries.

Three former employees told investigators they either witnessed abuse or saw the effects, such as welts or bloody pajamas. The daughter of one deceased employee told the FDLE that her father came home one night and said, “That damn drunk son of a b—- beat another boy,” in reference to Arthur G. Dozier, after whom the school is now named. Her father later quit in disgust.

One former superintendent, Lenox Williams, told investigators he administered 10 to 12 licks. “That’s the number,” he said. “We didn’t go over that.”

He did recall hearing from a school physician that a boy had “gotten too many licks across his buttocks with that paddle.”

“He said there . . . were some, some lacerations,” Williams continued. “And it’s possible to do that with it if you choose to.”

The few men who claimed to have witnessed deaths at the school could provide few specifics and no names. Some former students said they were sexually abused, but they could not identify their abusers.

The investigators did not interview Tidwell; his attorneys declined their requests.

Forensic investigators did examine the inside of the White House and tested the walls for blood. “All areas tested had negative results.”

The FDLE gave its report to Glenn Hess, state attorney for the 14th Judicial Circuit of Florida. Hess declined to prosecute, citing the statute of limitations and the vague nature of some of the allegations.

The investigation was ordered by Gov. Charlie Crist after a number of men went public in 2008 with stories of abuse. The men, who call themselves the White House Boys, found each other online a few years ago. The school is the subject of a Times investigation, “For Their Own Good.”

Crist also asked the FDLE to investigate a small cemetery on the property. That investigation, concluded last year, found no evidence of foul play in the deaths of 31 boys believed to be buried on school property.

The White House Boys are critical of both reports, saying the FDLE has a conflict in investigating allegations against state employees and state agencies.

Robert Straley, 63, of Clearwater says he was beaten and sexually assaulted by Tidwell, a memory that he repressed for decades. “It seems like such an absolute travesty of justice that a person could do that and get away with it,” Straley said after reading the report.

Straley and more than 300 others are pursuing a claims bill in the Legislature seeking unspecified compensation.

“This isn’t over,” Straley said. “We’re not in it for the money.”

http://www.tampabay.com/news/investigation-into-notorious-marianna-reform-school-brings-no-charges/1079048