Medical Certificates, and Orders of Admission

Extract

A recent decision of Mr. Justice Coleridge, respecting the invalidity of a medical certificate of insanity, because the name of the street, and the number of the house wherein the examination took place, were not therein stated, has profoundly affected the serenity of the persons most interested in the strict observance of the statutes on lunacy. This decision, the legal correctness of which has not been disputed, invalidates a large number, perhaps the majority, of the documents under which, lunatics placed in confinement since the passing of the late Acts are detained. The case upon which Mr. Justice Coleridge's decision occurred was that of Mr. Greenwood, an aged gentleman of large property resident at Todmorden, He was unmarried but had several natural children, to one of whom, a daughter, he was much attached. It is stated that he had expressed a desire to bequeath some of his property to this daughter; whereupon his brothers caused him to be admitted into a private lunatic ! asylum named the Billingdon Retreat. He was confined in this asylum a day and a night without certificates. The day afterwards he was removed to a public house in a neighbouring town, at which he was seen by two medical men who examined him, and certified to his insanity; but they omitted in their certificates to state the name of the street, and the number of the house in which their examination took place. Through the intervention of personal friends, Mr. Greenwood was brought to London under authority of a writ of habeas corpus granted by Mr. Justice Coleridge. Here he was examined by various medical men expert and non-expert Among the former were Dr. A. Sutherland whose affidavit testified to his insanity, and Dr. Forbes Winslow and Sir Alexander Morrison, whose opnions and affidavits were quite the other way. When the case came on for discussion on Saturday the 10th of February last, Mr. Serjeant Wilkins on behalf of the alleged lunatic raised the question of the validity of the two medical certificates in which, as we have before stated, the name of the street, and the number of the house in which the examination took place, were omitted to be mentioned. Mr. Justice Coleridge reserved his judgment on this point of law, and on the 19th of February be gave his decision that the certificates were invalid in consequence of these omissions, and he ordered Mr. Greenwood to be discharged accordingly. Such is a brief outline of the train of circumstances which has sprung the mine upon the archives of admission papers treasured with such care in asylums and, hospitals for the insane; and copies of which are guarded with jealous solitude in the muniment rooms of Whitehall Place. The Circular of the Commissioners [Feb. 14, 1855] on Lunacy truly states, “This decision, although immediately applicable only to the particular case, has a wider and general bearing, and enunciates the principle upon which the superior Courts of Law will, it is presumed, judge all analogous questions of form.” It enunciates in fact the very simple and reasonable principle, that the validity of documents upon which an Englishman is to be deprived of personal liberty on the ground of insanity, must be in strict and not in loose accordance with the statutary enactments of the legislature. If these enactments have been made too intricate and complicated for use, the difficulty has not arisen with the persons whose I duty it is to interpret them, but with those by whom they were made. It has been stated, that Mr. Justice Coleridge evaded the onerous and disagreeable duty of deciding between conflicting opinions as to the sanity or insanity of Mr. Greenwood, by this decision on the point of law. That be shirked his straight forward duty by taking a side path. But it must be remembered that the point of law was not mooted by the Judge, but by the counsel for the alleged lunatic, and the Judge was compelled to decide upon it one way or another. If the opinion of Mr. Justice Coleridge is unsound in law it can be reversed. If his interpretation of the enactment is correct, but notwithstanding this has a tendency to consequences which will be of serious inconvenience to the public welfare, the only remedy lies in legislative interference and the amendment of the statute.