Ruling May Force State Hospitals to Free Some Mentally Ill Offenders

The California Supreme Court on Thursday opened the way for the potential release of scores of mentally ill and previously violent offenders who have been confined to state hospitals after serving their prison terms.

The justices, in a brief order, let stand a state Court of Appeal ruling in Los Angeles last October striking down a new law that permitted involuntary hospitalization of such offenders as a condition of parole. The appellate panel found the statute was unconstitutional because it permitted extended confinement of an offender without proof he was currently dangerous.

According to officials, about 150 offenders have been confined under the invalidated law. A state prosecutor said that attempts now would be made under other civil commitment statutes to obtain confinement for offenders who can be shown to be currently dangerous.

“That’s really all we can do right now,” said state Deputy Atty. Gen. Bruce M. Slavin. “No one can predict the future conduct of the individuals who are released. But the public safety was what this program was designed to protect . . . . And now we’re not going to have that program to do so.”

Slavin also noted that any offenders who are released would be subject to reconfinement if they violate terms of their parole.

The justices were unanimous Thursday in their rejection of pleas from state and local prosecutors and mental health professionals to review the appellate decision, which, if not overturned, remains binding throughout the state.

Threat to Safety

The prosecutors, backed by the California Psychiatric Assn., said in briefs that the appellate ruling posed a threat to “the health and safety of the people of California.”

The Legislature, the prosecutors said, had asserted a “compelling interest” in public protection by requiring treatment as a condition of parole for offenders whose mental illness caused or contributed to their crimes and who remained ill when due for release.

The justices’ refusal to hear the case drew praise from Rowan K. Klein, a Los Angeles attorney who represented one of several offenders who successfully challenged the law. Klein said he would seek immediate release for his client, Andrew Fraser Gibson, but said the order by the court posed no serious danger to the public.

“While the state cannot continue to confine offenders under an unconstitutional scheme, there are alternatives under other laws--but there has to be a showing of present dangerousness,” Klein said. “The statute that was struck down improperly presumed that anyone (mentally ill) convicted of a violent felony was inherently dangerous. It improperly gave the state the power to treat them different from you and me.”

The Legislature passed the law in 1985 over objections by civil libertarians. It was drafted to fill what was seen as a loophole created when the state’s determinate-sentencing law took effect in 1977. Before then, offenders convicted of violent crimes could be held in prison if they were found to be a danger to the community. But with determinate-sentencing, they were entitled to release upon serving their terms.

Condition of Parole

The new law allowed officials to commit severely mentally ill prisoners convicted of violent crimes to a mental hospital as a condition of parole. Prisoners who objected could obtain a jury trial on the question of their mental state. Confinement could be obtained for periods of one year and could be renewed annually if the illness continued.

In a subsequent lawsuit in San Luis Obispo County, attorneys for Gibson and three otheroffenders facing involuntary confinement challenged the statute as unconstitutional. Last October, in an opinion by Appellate Justice Richard W. Abbe, a state Court of Appeal ruled the law invalid, finding it violated the right to equal protection by allowing confinement without proof of dangerousness--a requirement found in other laws that allow involuntary commitment of other mentally ill persons.

“It is unreasonable and arbitrary to exempt mentally disordered offenders from a requirement of proof of dangerousness applicable to all other persons subject to involuntary commitment,” Abbe wrote in an opinion joined by Appellate Justices Steven J. Stone and Arthur Gilbert.