Hansen v. Haugh

• Decision Date: 07 March 1967
• Docket Number: No. 52185,52185
• Citation: 149 N.W.2d 169,260 Iowa 236
• Parties: Jerry Leroy HANSEN, Appellant, v. C. H. HAUGH, Warden, Men's Reformatory, Anamosa, Iowa, Appellee.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

Page 169

149 N.W.2d 169

260 Iowa 236

Jerry Leroy HANSEN, Appellant, v. C. H. HAUGH, Warden, Men's Reformatory, Anamosa, Iowa, Appellee.

No. 52185.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

March 7, 1967.

Larry J. Conmey, Anamosa, for appellant.

Robert R. Beckman, County Atty., Robert D. Bernstein and Michael S. McCauley, Asst. Attys. Gen., for appellee.

GARFIELD, Chief Justice.

Like the trial court, we refer to plaintiff as petitioner and to defendant as respondent. Petitioner is confined to the security hospital, part of the men's state reformatory at Anamosa of which respondent is warden. On August 18, 1965, petitioner filed in the Jones district court his petition for a writ of habeas corpus claiming his confinement to be illegal because he had not been convicted of a crime and should have been committed to a state mental health institute rather than to the security hospital at Anamosa.

After taking extensive evidence by both sides, hearing arguments of counsel and studying the briefs, the district court denied the writ and petitioner has appealed. We affirm the decision.

The appeal has been submitted upon a transcript from the district court, consisting mainly of the petition, the briefs and the decision and order. The appeal largely presents law questions. The court's extensive findings of fact are not challenged and we set them out as the facts in the case.

'1. Petitioner was indicted for murder in the first degree, the victim being an elderly lady who had been sexually assaulted and beaten to death by petitioner. The case was tried to a jury in the District Court of Pottawattamie County. On December 7, 1961, the jury returned a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity.

'2. On December 15, 1961, the judge before whom the trial was held determined on overwhelming evidence that petitioner, if discharged from custody, would be dangerous to the public peace and safety. The judge's findings take grim note of the fact that in 1958, more than three years before the killing, a staff therapist at the Mental Health Institute at Independence, who had examined petitioner, reported that he, 'at the depths of despair, is fully capable of killing other people.' The judge, pursuant to Code Section 785.19, ordered that petitioner be committed to 'the Department for the Criminal Insane of the Men's Reformatory at Anamosa,' to be held there 'until such time as he becomes sane and is no longer considered dangerous to the public peace and safety.' Since then, petitioner has been so confined under the authority of the judge's order.

'3. This 'department' of the Reformatory is in fact a maximum security mental hospital located within the outer walls of the Reformatory.

'4. In Code Section 246.15, which requires the maintenance of this mental hospital at the Reformatory, and in several other sections, this hospital is labeled 'department for mentally ill.' In Sections 783.3, 783.4 and 783.5, this hospital is labeled 'department for the criminal insane.' In Section 218.92 this hospital is labeled 'the hospital unit for the mentally ill.' Commitments are made to this hospital under Section 785.19, which authorizes commitments to 'the insane hospital.' The Iowa Board of Control, the respondent Warden, the Superintendent of this hospital, and others refer to it as 'the Security Hospital,' which name will be used by this Court.

'5. Petitioner, at the time of hearing in this case, October 20, 1965, was still mentally ill and would still be dangerous to society if discharged from custody.

'6. The Men's Reformatory at Anamosa is a penal institution.

'7. The Security Hospital is a part of the Men's Reformatory and, like the rest of it, is under the general control and authority of the respondent warden. The actual management and operation of the Security Hospital, however, is under the control of its Superintendent, Dr. Hege, a psychiatrist. In the minds of Dr. Hege, Chairman Wilson of the Board of Control and others the Security Hospital is a hospital, not a prison. The inmates are treated as patients, not as prisoners.

'8. The Security Hospital is physically separated from the rest of the Men's Reformatory by a twenty-five foot high stone wall.

'9. Except for a small handful of severely regressed individuals, the inmates of the Security Hospital are quartered in a large dormitory-type ward, not in cells. (Petitioner has, at various times, been kept in a cell due to hostile behavior.) The hospital inmates pretty much have complete freedom of the hospital, including indoor and outdoor recreational areas.

'10. The Security Hospital is a maximum security hospital. Although the inmates enjoy considerable freedom of mobility within the hospital building and grounds, the periphery of the hospital area is securely guarded by high walls, bars on windows, and armed guards. This security prevents escape.

'11. There are no other maximum security hospitals in Iowa at the present time. If petitioner were placed in any of the State's Mental Institutes, he could escape and probably would. The only way he could be prevented from escaping from a Mental Health Institute would be to convert a room into a barred cell and keep him in it. Such confinement of petitioner would undoubtedly result in his rapid and total mental regression.

'12. The primary goal to be served by the Security Hospital is the protection of society from dangerous mentally ill persons. The secondary goal is to provide the patients with good psychiatric treatment. In the opinion of this Court, both goals are well served. Neither goal could be well served if dangerous mentally ill persons were committed to mental hospitals which are not maximum security, for the reasons pointed out in the preceding paragraph. Also, coping with dangerous mentally ill persons in a Mental Health Institute would adversely affect the Institute's therapeutic program for the rest of the patients.

'13. Prior to the decision of Judge B. J. Maxwell of this Court in Long v. Haugh, Warden, (April 14, 1965), discussed hereinafter, all inmates of the Security Hospital, including those who were civilly committed (like petitioner), were administratively treated like criminally committed prisoners of the Reformatory. They were 'mugged' and fingerprinted, and the results were sent to the F.B.I.; they were assigned regular prison numbers, which were stenciled on their clothes; and general prison rules and regulations were applied for the most part.

'14. On September 28, 1965, as a response to the Long decision, the Board of Control passed a resolution providing for the termination of such procedures, and that civilly committed patients be subject only to the rules and administrative procedures promulgated by the Superintendent of the Security Hospital. Pursuant to this resolution, the changes called for are now being effectuated--no more 'mugging' or fingerprinting; no more prison numbers; and Hospital, rather than prison, rules and procedures now apply. In essence, the Security Hospital is being separated from the rest of the Reformatory as much as is humanely possible under the circumstances.

'15. The Iowa Legislature has appropriated $2,605,000.00 for construction of a new maximum security mental hospital to be constructed at Oakdale, far from any penal institution. It is anticipated that this new hospital will be ready for occupancy in the summer or fall of 1967. Present plans are to move the Security Hospital staff intact to the new hospital. Patients such as petitioner would be committed to this new hospital for security and treatment. House File 684, Acts of 61st G.A.

'16. Transfer of petitioner to a Mental Health Institute would create a clear and present danger to society, because of his potential for violence to others.'

I. We note at this point we have uniformly held the trial court's findings of fact in a habeas corpus action not involving custody of a child are binding upon us if supported by substantial evidence. Our review is not de novo. Herold v. Haugh, 258 Iowa ---, 145 N.W.2d 657, 659, 661, and citations; Rose v. Haugh, Iowa, 147 N.W.2d 865, 868. Since, as stated, the above findings are not challenged we may assume they are adequately supported by evidence.

II. As the trial court observed, two issues are presented: (1) Does section 785.19, infra, authorize commitment to the security hospital, and (2) If so, are the statute and petitioner's confinement thereunder constitutional or do they violate due process of law?

Code section 785.19, under which the judge of the Pottawattamie court purported to act in ordering petitioner committed to the security hospital, provides:

'If the defense is insanity of the defendant, the jury must be instructed, if it acquits him on that ground, to state that fact in its verdict. The court may thereupon, if the defendant is in custody, and his discharge is found to be dangerous to the public peace and safety, order him committed to the insane hospital, or retained in custody, until he becomes sane.'

The trial court concluded and we agree section 785.19 authorized petitioner's commitment to the security hospital. We cannot accept the contention that the words 'the insane hospital' refer solely to one of the four mental health institutes at Cherokee, Clarinda, Independence and Mount Pleasant, respectively. The construction contended for is contrary to the meaning district courts and those charged with management of the security hospital have long ascribed to section 785.19.

If the legislature intended section 785.19 to authorize commitment of a defendant only to a state mental health institute or to be 'retained in custody' it could easily have so stated. It is not the function of courts to legislate and they are constitutionally prohibited from doing so. Article III, section 1, Iowa Constitution.

III. On the facts found by the trial court his conclusions of law, other than that section 785.19 does not authorize commitment only to a mental health...