Cramer v. Gillermina R.

• Decision Date: 06 November 1981
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: James M. CRAMER, as District Attorney, etc., Petitioner and Respondent, v. GILLERMINA R., Objector and Appellant. James M. CRAMER, as District Attorney, etc., Petitioner and Respondent, v. Michael L., Objector and Appellant, James M. CRAMER, as district Attorney, etc., Petitioner and Respondent, v. Linda C., Objector and Appellant. Civ. 25613, Civ. 25604 and Civ. 25605.

Page 69

178 Cal.Rptr. 69

125 Cal.App.3d 380

James M. CRAMER, as District Attorney, etc., Petitioner and Respondent, v. GILLERMINA R., Objector and Appellant.

James M. CRAMER, as District Attorney, etc., Petitioner and Respondent, v. Michael L., Objector and Appellant, James M. CRAMER, as district Attorney, etc., Petitioner and Respondent, v. Linda C., Objector and Appellant.

Civ. 25613, Civ. 25604 and Civ. 25605.

Court of Appeal, Fourth District, Division 2, California.

Nov. 6, 1981.

Hearing Denied Jan. 20, 1982.

Charles E. Ward, Public Defender, Littleton M. Gunn and Stephen P. Levine, Deputy Public Defenders, for objectors and appellants.

George Deukmejian, Atty. Gen., Harley D. Mayfield and Jay M. Bloom, Deputy Attys. Gen., for petitioner and respondent.

OPINION

THE COURT. ^*

Appellants are all severely mentally retarded individuals institutionalized at Patton State Hospital.

Michael was originally committed to Patton on November 19, 1979, by the Superior Court, San Diego County, pursuant to Welfare & Institutions Code section 6500. ¹ He is a 34-year-old with an I.Q. of 39. Because a section 6500 commitment automatically expires annually, a petition for recommitment was filed by the district attorney on November 13, 1980. On the same day, the superior court issued an ex parte, temporary "hold" order placed on Michael. As a basis for this order, the district attorney presented records from Patton, including diagnostic reports and evaluation from different doctors and psychiatrists. They reveal that Michael becomes intermittently aggressive and violent, making him a danger to both himself and others. On February 19, 1981, Michael was recommitted following a formal, judicial hearing on the petition. Michael contends the interim hold order violated his constitutional rights. ²

Linda's story is much the same. She is a 24-year-old with an I.Q. of 32. Her retardation stems from unknown causes. She was diagnosed as schizophrenic and autistic at the age of two. Originally she was voluntarily admitted to Patton. She also claims to have been involuntarily confined on a hold order from December 11, 1980, until February 19, 1981. ³

Gillermina is a 16-year-old female with an I.Q. of 6. Her mental retardation is attributable to a post natal head injury. Although the record is somewhat sketchy, Gillermina was voluntarily admitted to Patton in 1979. It appears that she was placed on a hold from May 15, 1980, until January 22, 1981, at which time she was formally recommitted on a petition filed by the district attorney. The district attorney presented the same type of information to obtain a hold order with respect to Linda and Gillermina as with respect to Michael.

Appellants make identical contentions: (1) that a mentally retarded individual is entitled to a judicial, probable cause hearing prior to any formal hearing on a recommitment petition; and (2) that such individual is entitled to credit for time spent in the institution from the date of the temporary hold order until formal recommitment takes place. The trial court determined that appellants were entitled to a nonadversarial probable cause hearing, and that either judicial or administrative review of the written reports and evaluations compiled at Patton satisfied this standard. On this basis, the hold orders were issued. Further, the trial court determined appellants were not entitled to credit.

I.

Appellants' first point is now moot, since they have been recommitted following a formal hearing. However, we elect to exercise our judicial discretion to decide this case because the issues are of public interest, and will inevitably continue to escape review both as to appellants and the public at large. ⁴ (Baber v. Superior Court, 113 Cal.App.3d 955, 959-960, 170 Cal.Rptr. 353.)

Moving to the merits, appellants argue they were involuntarily detained pending recommitment in violation of both procedural due process and equal protection under the California Constitution, article I, section 7. The threshold consideration in each instance is whether a person has been deprived of "life, liberty, or property." The People erroneously assert that because appellants' recommitment is technically civil, rather than criminal in nature, these constitutional rights are not implicated. Not so. Our Supreme Court has repeatedly explained that "the interests involved in civil commitment proceedings are no less fundamental than those in criminal proceedings and that liberty is no less precious because forfeited in a civil proceeding than when taken as a consequence of a criminal conviction." (In re Gary W., 5 Cal.3d 296, 307, 96 Cal.Rptr. 1, 486 P.2d 1201; Conservatorship of Roulet, 23 Cal.3d 219, 224-225, 152 Cal.Rptr. 425, 590 P.2d 1.) Most recently, the Supreme Court stated that, "An involuntary civil commitment in a state hospital for the mentally ill is a commitment which requires the application of criminal due process standards. (Conservatorship of Roulet (1979) 23 Cal.3d 219, 224-225, 152 Cal.Rptr. 425, 590 P.2d 1.)" (In re Hop, 29 Cal.3d 82, 89, 171 Cal.Rptr. 721, 623 P.2d 282.)

Before our analysis proceeds, it is necessary to discuss briefly the statutory system appellants attack. A mentally retarded person may be committed to the State Department of Developmental Services if "he is a danger to himself or others." (§ 6500.) Generally, the district attorney will file a petition making this allegation, and the case will be set for a formal hearing. The hearing shall be set no more than 60 days after the filing of the petition, unless good cause is shown. ⁵ (§ 6503, amended by Stats.1980, ch. 859, p. 2917, eff. Jan. 1, 1981). The hearing must be noticed. (§ 6504.) Pending the hearing, the court may order that the alleged dangerous mentally retarded person be left in the custody of his parent, guardian, conservator, or a state hospital for the developmentally disabled. (§ 6506.)

Appellants claim a denial of equal protection because mentally ill individuals committed under the Lanterman-Petris-Short (LPS) Act may be entitled to a probable cause hearing after a three-day emergency commitment. (Doe v. Gallinot, 486 F.Supp. 983 (C.D.Cal.1979), aff'd on appeal, 657 F.2d 1017 (9th Cir. 1981).) Doe held that a person who is allegedly "gravely disabled" (§ 5150) may not be certified for 14 days of intensive treatment without a probable cause hearing. (§ 5250.) Neither a judicial nor adversarial probable cause hearing was mandated by Doe. Referring to the form of the hearing, Doe explained, "Due process is safeguarded only by a hearing at which a person or group of persons independent of the mental hospital conducts an evaluation to determine whether there is probable cause for detaining the person." (Doe, at p. 994.) Therefore, appellants' contention that Doe somehow entitles them to a judicial, adversarial probable cause hearing amounts to a misreading of Doe.

Assuming, however, we viewed Doe as through appellants' rose-colored glasses and as something other than a candle in the wind (see Note, "Who Says I'm Crazy?" A Proposal for Mandatory Judicial Review of Emergency Detention in California, 51 So.Cal.L.Rev. 695), appellants' equal protection argument still does not wash.

"The first prerequisite to a meritorious claim under the equal protection clause is a showing that the state has adopted a classification affecting two or more similarly situated groups in an unequal manner." (Citation omitted, emphasis in orig.; In re Eric J., 25 Cal.3d 522, 530, 159 Cal.Rptr. 317, 601 P.2d 549.) "A classification 'must be reasonable, not arbitrary, and must rest upon some ground of difference having a fair and substantial relation to the object of the legislation, so that all persons similarly circumstanced shall be treated alike.' " (Reed v. Reed (1971) 404 U.S. 71, 75-75, 92 S.Ct. 251, 253, 30 L.Ed.2d 225, 229, quoting Royster Guano Co. v. Virginia (1920) 253 U.S. 412, 415, 40 S.Ct. 560, 561, 64 L.Ed. 989, 990-991.)

Appellants are not similarly situated with the Doe plaintiff because they suffer from mental retardation, not mental illness. "Although courts and legislators in many instances failed to distinguish between the mentally and emotionally ill and the mentally retarded, there is no question that mental illness and mental retardation are separate and distinct conditions which require different treatment and/or habilitation." (Inst. Juveniles v. Secy. of Pub. Welfare, 459 F.Supp. 30, 48 (E.D.Pa.1978) (Broderick, J., dissent), rvd., Secy. of Pub. Welfare v. Inst. Juveniles (1979) 442 U.S. 640, 99 S.Ct. 2523, 61 L.Ed.2d 142.) "Mental retardation is an impairment in learning capacity and adaptive behavior Mental retardation is not an illness to be treated with drugs and therapies which have been developed for the mentally and emotionally ill." (Id.) The United States Supreme Court has also stressed the same factual distinction. (Kremens v. Bartley (1977) 431 U.S. 119, 135-136, 97 S.Ct. 1709, 1718, 52 L.Ed.2d 84.) The Legislature has recognized this factual distinction and created a coherent scheme for treating mental illness (§ 5150, et seq.) and a different scheme for treating mental retardation (§ 6500, et seq.). These schemes are not unconstitutional on equal protection grounds because the classifications are based upon accepted factual and medical differences between the mentally retarded and mentally ill. Moreover, the state has a substantial interest in the continuity of treatment programs for mentally retarded patients who have been committed over a longer term, which is simply qualitatively different than the treatment objectives for someone confined three days. (Doe, supra.) The procedures are different because the treatment objectives are understandably different. (See In re Eric J., at p. 531, 159 Cal.Rptr. 317, 601 P.2d 549.) ⁶

Appellants inexplicably shy away from any direct discussion of the procedural due process problem inherent in the recommitment ...