Vermont Superior Court judge Kevin Griffin ordered the hospital that has been holding Christina Schumacher, who had been held against her will for 5 1/2 weeks after her estranged husband killed their son and hanged himself, to release her “immediately.” “The court did not find, by clear and convincing evidence, that Respondent was a person in need of treatment at the time of admission or application, nor a patient in need of further treatment at the time of the hearing.”
© 2024 Mad in America Foundation
It is very distressing to see that the Donaldson case holdings, decided in 1975 by a unanimous U.S.Supreme Court, are not being followed in Vermont, and according to Jim Gottstein and others, hardly being followed throughout the U.S. It seems to me as an attorney that it would be fruitful to start bringing cases all over the country to get them to follow the law.
Report comment
I knew it!
So there it is – the discrepancy between the law and the practice. Money is the real law.
Report comment
I think this presents a false perspective to society. A woman is held against her ill and forcibly treated amid dubious concerns, she gets a three hour court hearing and then wins.
In reality, if there were no media coverage of this and/or she had a previous history of “mental illness”, she would have been in and out of that court (or not even there) in 5-10 minutes and lost. This gives society the false impression that courts are championing the rights of people caught up in the psychiatric system, when they surely are not.
Report comment
Presumably, she’s now free, I hope she is not too traumatized.
And you are right, Jeffrey. The fact the media looked into her case, and publisized it, may be the only reason she was set free. And it does falsely give the impression that the courts are properly looking into, and protecting the supposed “mentally ill.”
To this day, I still wonder how many people V R Kuchipudi and Humaira Saiyed had unnecessarily shipped to them, “snowed,” and killed between the time I reported such 2006 abuse and illegal detainment. And V R Kuchipudi’s arrest for similar maltreatment of many other patients in 2013.
http://www.justice.gov/usao/iln/pr/chicago/2013/pr0416_01a.pdf
No, the courts don’t take patient complaints of monsterours doctors seriously, but they should. I bet Kuchipudi poisoned dozens, prior to his eventual arrest. And I’m still hoping Saiyed will be arrested some day. But she’s still torturing patients, and falsely claiming a lady who now lives several states away is her “out patient.” Some doctors have lost their minds with their “power” to kill.
Please forgive my cynacism, I know many doctors are good. But when you cover up for the monsters, you are no longer truly virtuous either IMO.
Report comment
It was a very long document. and I just had time to skim the first few pages. But “tracheotomies” caught my eye. My god, did they cut open the throats of the people they grabbed? Is there any briefer news story about this you can share
?
Report comment
Yes, Ted, unneeded “snowings” and surgeries for profit – I saw the underbelly (hopefully) of Chicago’s medical community, and lived to tell the story. Here’s a brief synopsis:
http://chicagoist.com/2013/04/16/chicago_hospital_owner_doctors_arre.php
And my understanding is Kuchipudi is still practicing medicine. But the the IL Department of Professional Regulations has finally said they will look back into my complaint. Now that one of my former doctors has been arrested for doing the same thing, and worse to many others (I wasn’t subjected to the tracheotomy, thankfully, but I was admitted to the hospital with a non-existent “chronic airway obstruction”).
And if you can believe it, the hospital I was unnecessarily shipped to is still claiming Kuchipudi’s torture was “appropriate medical care.”
Report comment