Posted on 03/11/2002 7:41:50 PM PST by Beata
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Omnia pro aegroto
UNLIMITED FORCED DRUGGING OK’D BY COURT
AAPS Calls Ruling "Shocking & Inhumane"
03/08/2002
WASHINGTON -- Defendants can be forcibly drugged even though they haven’t been convicted of any charges and pose no danger to themselves or others.
That’s the ruling issued yesterday by the Federal Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in the case of United States v. Charles Thomas Sell. (see www.ca8.uscourts.gov/opndir/02/03/011862P.pdf) The 2 - 1 split decision establishes government power to forcibly medicate a person with mind altering drugs even before trial.
"It’s a shocking, inhumane decision. Now, all the government needs are allegations and a cooperative psychiatrist to forcibly drug any citizen," said Andrew Schlafly, General Counsel for the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS). That group filed an amicus brief opposing the government drugging.
"It’s unprecedented to allow prosecutors to drug peaceful defendants presumed to be innocent. Government cannot force citizens to pledge allegiance to the flag, but now can forcibly medicate them with mind-altering drugs," said Mr. Schlafly.
Dr. Sell, a St. Louis dentist, has been imprisoned for more than 4 years, including one- and-one-half years in solitary confinementafter being charged with Medicaid fraud. He has never been brought to trial.
While acknowledging that "the evidence does not support a finding that Sell posed a danger to himself or others" the majority opinion still found that "charges of fraud" alone are "serious" enough to justify forced medication. Further, the Court held that there are no limits on the quantity or type of drugs.
"There’s no good reason why Dr. Sell has been held so long without trial, and this decision will most likely prolong his imprisonment with no end in sight," said Mr. Schlafly. The dissenting judge pointed out that even if Dr. Sell were to be found guilty, his sentence would be no more than 41 months -- one year less than he’s already served.
A similar case is pending before the same court to allow the State to forcibly medicate a convicted murderer for execution.
"It’s appalling that the court will drug a man presumed to be innocent, even if it’s illegal to do the same thing to a convicted killer." Mr. Schlafly said that AAPS will seek to overturn the ruling.
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AAPS is a non-partisan, dues-supported professional association of physicians in all practices and specialties, dedicated since 1943 to protecting the sanctity of the patient-physician relationship from third-party interference.
Other Links
AAPS Amicus Brief in US vs. Sell
Doctors' Study: Medicare "Fraud" Crackdown Hurts Patients - 02/04/2000
Other Physician Prosecutions
There are a lot of meds out there, and tons of people are taking them. There are people who have bad reactions to them, it happens even with penicillin.
But I dislike people giving out the impression that these meds make one zombie like. If were discussing thorazine..ok. But zoloft and welbutrin are tolerated well by most people.
Now about the smoking...let me tell you a little about my experience. I tried to quit smoking and did ok for the first day. The second day, I was totally obsessing about having a cigarette. Smoking is for many people a compulsive thing, a nervous habit. I couldn't fight the urge every 20 minutes for a prolonged period of time. I had to keep my mind fully and completely focused upon something else so that I wouldn't think about smoking. It was exhausting and I gave up.
My mother used welbutrin when she stopped smoking, in addition to the patch. The meds helped her, not because they made her "not care", but because it was easier for her to control and deal with her thoughts. She didn't have to fight against them. As far as the rest of her life and functioning, there was mild relaxing effect, but not nearly to the extent to which it interfered with anything.
My mother also, for a short period of time, was prescribed valium. This was years and years ago. That med really did make her not care about anything. Her sisters came over, saw the house a mess and my brothers running wild while mom sat blissfully on the couch and demanded she stop taking the med.
I think meds can be helpful. They can also be abused. Just like anything else.
I have also seen the effects on a number of people, and everything is fine. People react differently to all sorts of things.
You certainly have the right to decide for yourself not to take medications. Personally, the only thing that keeps me going day to day is the hope that I won't feel this way forever. I'd rather be run over by a truck tomorrow than spend the rest of my life this way.
I'd rather people who feel like I do get good, balanced information. Hysterical talk about "chemo-lobotomies" helps no one.
I was wondering when the "Taking drugs is okay" crowd would show up.
I do not support drug abuse.
You are entitled to your opinion.
Personally, the only thing that keeps me going day to day is the hope that I won't feel this way forever. I'd rather be run over by a truck tomorrow than spend the rest of my life this way.
Having suffered episodes of moderately severe depression for nearly twenty years I know how that feels. But logic may be the one thing that suffers most in a person who is depressed. I finally went to a friend who I trusted for his implicit honesty, intelligence and superb training in Chinese medicine hoping he had some advice or treatment that would help. He simply said "There's no reason to be depressed." and brusquely left the room. I thought he was being a jerk. It took me two years to understand why he had said that.
When I did understand it my depression lifted in 30 seconds. It physically felt like a heavy blanket lifting up off of me. That was six years ago and I haven't been depressed since. Sometimes I feel it coming on. The pattern of thoughts begins but I recognize them and stop it. I know without doubt that I will never be depressed again. He did the only thing he could do. It was the most compassionate thing anyone has ever done for me.
Those two years of contemplating what he had said were pretty painful but worth it. Nothing, nothing, nothing (and I do mean nothing) will ever knock me down again. Not for long. Not the way it used to. Depression is a choice and I will never choose it again.
I smoke. I've quit a few times too. Smoking is also a choice. At present I choose to smoke. Taking responsibility for all our thoughts and feelings is all it takes to end all kinds of suffering.
Anyone who tells you that it will be easy is a liar. We spend 20, 30 or 40 years making a mess of our minds and then expect someone else to straighten it out with a few months of painless talk or a pill. It just won't happen. That tangle of knots will take time, effort, pain and a personal commitment to take complete responsibility for ones own experiences. Do you want to be of any use to the people in your life? Do you want to repay all the people who have loved you and helped you with self indulgence? If all you care about is yourself and your own comfort then go ahead, step out in front of a truck. Make all the people who love you but can't fix what is yours to fix suffer.
There's nothing to be depressed about.
And the proof for that is? Bear in mind that the SSRI makers aver in the package inserts that they do not know how their drugs work. But in France, they're marketed as thymoleptics, that is "emotional stunters." I personally prefer natura, the orginal vis sanans.
and I think it a requirement of justice that such a person be medicated to normalcy for their trial (or as close to normal as the medicine will get them).
Vide supra.
It's not the same thing at all as pumping a mentaly fit person full of LSD or something.
To write this, of course, is to ignore that LSD was marketed as a therapeutic drug in the treatment of alcoholism before its patent ran out. And they're now investigating whether it helps in obsessive-compulsive disorder.
A question for Rudder: Isn't LSD a 5HT2A and 5HT2c antagonist? If so, how does it defer from the "atypical" neuroleptics.
In the pudding. Do you really think that psycotic people are rational enough to stand trial? Do you think that they just take the drug then pretend to be rational afterwards? No. The fact is as I stated, they are not rational and fit for a trial unless the are properly treated.
The truely scary thing is that if one's belief that one is innocent is dxed as "psychotic," it's quite likely that haldol and the like would be able to get innocent people railroaded.
Do you personaly know anyone who is schizophrenic? Did YOUR sister marry somebody who wouldn't take his anti-psychotics? Don't presume to letcure me on this. The ones I know are not mindless zombies, they are fully capable of holding a job, writing songs, debating and everything else as long as they take their meds. Without them they are abusive, irrational, unemployable and dangerous.
Yes, there are side effect to taking them, and it would be wrong to force them on someone who doesn't need them, but those who are phycotic are not rational without them and can be a danger to both themselves and to the public. They are not capable of rational thought or of telling reality apart from delision that come from the chaotic storm in their synapes that NEEDS to be dampened for them to function as an intelligent adult. To put them on trial without the proper treatment of their condition would be a travesty of justice. Of course there should be safeguards to ensure that it's only done when absolutly required, but that is another issue.
Yes. Otherwise I wouldn't be typing this.
Did YOUR sister marry somebody who wouldn't take his anti-psychotics?
No. The better questions is if I've known anyone who suddenly discontinued them. As you must, or perhaps, should know, suddenly discontinuing any CNS agent that has been ingested for longer periods of time causes behavioral problems. Even nicotine. Even patients put onto anti-psychotics for Tourette's sydrome can become psychotic if they suddenly stop taking them. As such, the "psychosis" that you refer to as "needing" medication, is clearly iatrogenic, of addiction to their "medication" in the parlance of the DEA.
Don't presume to letcure me on this.
Right back at you, pal.
The ones I know are not mindless zombies, they are fully capable of holding a job, writing songs, debating and everything else as long as they take their meds. Without them they are abusive, irrational, unemployable and dangerous.
One I knew did the Clozaril drool, and was unable to sit down for longer periods of time. That made him unemployable.
From what you say here, as well as your freepmail to me, it seems clear to me that we are talking about two different things. You are fearfull of the over use of 'mild' drugs like Prozac etc. (and rightly so) in situation where they aren't really needed, and the problem can be delt with in other ways. In your cases the person is rational before treatment, but I'm talking about serious mental illness that is real, that if untreated, or if treatment stop, leaves the preson utterly irrational, devoid of all logic, civilation, morality. Not long ago some woman was pushed in front of a subway train by such a person.
In ages past these people would be locked up forever in a mental institution or deemed to be possessed of a evil spirit, but medication makes it possible for them to live a pretty normal life...if they use it.
Just because these drugs get ABUSED, doesn't mean that there are not cases wherer they need to be used.
Maybe all the people we labeled kooks for the wild conspiracy theories aren't kooks (with the exception of Pierre Salinger)??????
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