Teasel v. Department of Mental Health
| Decision Date | 18 September 1984 |
| Docket Number | Docket No. 69896,No. 15,15 |
| Citation | 355 N.W.2d 75,419 Mich. 390 |
| Parties | Allan TEASEL, an insane person, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. DEPARTMENT OF MENTAL HEALTH, Defendants-Appellees. Calendar419 Mich. 390, 355 N.W.2d 75 |
| Court | Michigan Supreme Court |
Gerald Hale Ladue, Birmingham, Donald E. Gratrix, Detroit, for plaintiff-appellant.
Frank J. Kelley, Atty. Gen., Louis J. Caruso, Sol. Gen., George L. McCargar, Thomas R. Wheeker, Asst. Attys. Gen., Mental Health Div., Lansing, for defendants-appellees.
We granted leave to appeal in this case to determine the authority of a circuit court to review the decision of officials of the Department of Mental Health ordering an involuntarily committed patient to be discharged from hospitalization.
An understanding of the plaintiff's history is necessary for a full appreciation of the basis for our decision. Because this case is before us on review of the trial court's denial of summary and accelerated judgment and the Court of Appeals reversal thereof, we are without a factual record developed in the trial court and must depend for that history and other facts of the case upon the plaintiff's well-pleaded allegations which, for purposes of our decision, are taken as true.
Allan Teasel was born in 1951 and was first hospitalized at the Hawthorne Center of the Michigan Department of Mental Health in July of 1961 when he was ten years old. He was referred to the Hawthorne Center following his suspension from school for "dangerous unprovoked aggression to peers". He was also "dangerously aggressive to siblings and peers at home and in the neighborhood and seemed for the most part a very confused and unhappy child". He was discharged from the Hawthorne Center on November 23, 1961, with the following recommendation:
In October, 1962, upon his parents' petition, Mr. Teasel was ordered by the probate court to be hospitalized at the Northville State Hospital. He remained a patient in that institution for 12 years and was discharged on December 9, 1974. It appears from the sketchy factual background contained in the pleadings before us that, during his commitment, Mr. Teasel actually resided from time to time "in the community [and] has alternated between being with his mother and being in a halfway house".
In June or July of 1974, Mr. Teasel was arrested and charged with four separate and unrelated offenses which we number for convenience of later reference:
1. Assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than murder, M.C.L. Sec. 750.84; M.S.A. Sec. 28.279, for having slashed a 15-year-old girl in the back on June 12, 1974, necessitating 80 stitches to close the wound;
2. Assault with intent to murder, M.C.L. Sec. 750.83; M.S.A. Sec. 28.278, for having slashed a 14-year-old girl in the back on June 25, 1974, necessitating 36 stitches to close the wound;
3. Assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than murder, M.C.L. Sec. 750.84; M.S.A. Sec. 28.279, for having slashed a 12-year-old girl in the back on June 28, 1974, requiring 80 stitches to close the wound; and
4. Assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than murder, M.C.L. Sec. 750.84; M.S.A. Sec. 28.279, for a knife attack upon a young girl on an unspecified date in the summer of 1974.
The first three of the foregoing charges were brought in the Recorder's Court of the City of Detroit and the fourth was brought in the Third Judicial Circuit Court. The first and third of the charges resulted in negotiated pleas of guilty on November 21, 1974, to charges of assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than murder and felonious assault (M.C.L. Sec. 750.82; M.S.A. Sec. 28.277), respectively, in return for the dismissal of the second of the enumerated offenses. On December 20, 1974, Mr. Teasel was sentenced to serve concurrent terms of imprisonment of 2 to 10 and 2 to 4 years. 1 He was then brought to trial upon his plea of not guilty to the fourth of the foregoing assault charges, and was acquitted by reason of insanity by the trial judge on March 28, 1975. 2
Plaintiff was released from prison in December of 1980. He was arrested in February of 1981 for carrying a concealed weapon, and again in June of 1981 for second-degree criminal sexual conduct. The criminal sexual conduct charge was brought because it was alleged that Mr. Teasel "walked nearby a girl who was on a lunch break from the store where she worked seated beside the store eating a sandwich when plaintiff suddenly bent down and grabbed her front ripping open smock, shirt, and bra". The concealed weapons charge was dismissed, apparently for lack of probable cause for the arrest.
The probate court order, filed on November 16, 1981, required that Mr. Teasel be hospitalized at the Clinton Valley Center. Officials of the defendant Department of Mental Health released him from hospitalization four days later, on November 20, 1981. 3
On January 4, 1982, while Mr. Teasel was incarcerated in the Oakland County Jail awaiting trial on the criminal sexual conduct charge, this lawsuit was filed in the Sixth Judicial Circuit Court. 4 In a complaint entitled "Complaint for Injunctive Relief", Mr. Teasel prayed for the following relief:
--An injunction compelling the Department of Mental Health to return him immediately to a state hospital for treatment until he was no longer "a person requiring treatment" as defined by statute;
--An injunction compelling the defendant to file petitions for plaintiff's commitment to a hospital facility;
--An order requiring the Department of Mental Health to show cause why the requested injunctive relief should not be granted; and
--Other appropriate equitable relief.
The Department of Mental Health moved for summary or accelerated judgment. 5 Before decision on the defendant's motions, Mr. Teasel filed an amended complaint naming the directors of the Michigan Department of Mental Health and the Clinton Valley Center as additional defendants. He alleged in the amended complaint that the newly added defendants:
--"[D]ischarged [the] plaintiff from hospitalization in violation of the court order, the statutes and constitution" because he was "still a person requiring treatment as defined by the statute"; and
-- "[F]ailed to review the clinical status of plaintiff to determine whether he was still a person requiring treatment" before discharging him from hospitalization.
After a hearing on the defendants' motions for summary and accelerated judgments, the circuit court denied the motions and ordered Mr. Teasel transferred from the Oakland County Jail to the custody of the Michigan Department of Mental Health to be hospitalized in a mental institution until further order of the court. 6
The Court of Appeals peremptorily reversed the decision of the trial court, vacated its order, and "granted" the motions for summary and accelerated judgments that the defendants had filed in the circuit court. The Court of Appeals treated the plaintiff's complaint for injunctive relief, which it identified as "Complaint for Mandamus", as a request for a hearing pursuant to GCR 1963, 820.1(7) and remanded the case "[t]o the Oakland County Probate Court for a full evidentiary hearing regarding the facts and circumstances surrounding the release of Allan Teasel by the Department of Mental Health". The probate court was also directed to "[m]ake findings whether there was evidence to support the release of Allan Teasel in the light of his full psychiatric history, [to determine] whether his release constituted an abuse of discretion and [to make] * * * other orders, if any be appropriate". 7
We granted leave to appeal. 417 Mich. 884 (1983).
The relief Mr. Teasel seeks, broadly stated, is hospitalization and treatment in a state institution until the condition of his health permits his discharge according to the terms of M.C.L. Sec. 330.1476; M.S.A. Sec. 14.800(476). Narrowly stated, the relief he seeks is an order returning him to the Clinton Valley Center for hospitalization until the individual defendants examine his clinical status and make an informed determination whether he is a person who is "clinically suitable for discharge" or requires further hospitalization as a "person requiring treatment" under Secs. 476 and 401, respectively, of the Mental Health Code. 8
Mr. Teasel claims entitlement to the relief he seeks on two grounds:
First, he asserts that the defendants discharged him from hospitalization in contravention of the probate court order of commitment and the Mental Health Code.
Second, he claims that neither the director...
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