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"Formal hearings" are a technicality. Many hospitals now have courtrooms built into them, so the doctors don't have to go anywhere. You don't attend your hearin

"Formal hearings" are a technicality. Many hospitals now have courtrooms built into them, so the doctors don't have to go anywhere. You don't attend your hearing or receive any notification of it. Court petitions go right from the doctor to the judge to the hospital and you're in for it. It's their professional, expert opinion vs. the ravings of an ignorant crazy person in crisis. You're guilty until proven innocent, and good luck finding attorneys who are into that kind of thing. The longer you've been in the system and on their radar, the more likely you'll have a track record for them to dig up and show as evidence. Saying you can't be held without a formal hearing is like saying the police can't search you without a warrant. Completely and irrefutably true by the letter of the law. I'm not sure if you've ever tried to "decline compliance" with psychiatric treatment, but that will also go on your record every time, and sooner or later there will be a solid case built to court-order your "treatment", because you're just so bothersome to the system.

cjohnson318 3y ago
It's my understanding, through talking with heath professionals, that people typically come into the psych ward after having an interaction with police, and then they're let go after 72 hours. I know others that have admitted themselves, and then left after 72 hours. A lot has changed since One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest; hospital administrators have almost zero interest in keeping people any longer than they have to, since many people do not have health insurance, and sometimes present a risk to hospital staff. We have no legal way of forcibly removing people from society, for their own safety and the safety of others, until they have an interaction with police, or commit an actual crime, and then they go to jail.

cjohnson318 3y ago

It's my understanding, through talking with heath professionals, that people typically come into the psych ward after having an interaction with police, and then they're let go after 72 hours. I know others that have admitted themselves, and then left after 72 hours. A lot has changed since One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest; hospital administrators have almost zero interest in keeping people any longer than they have to, since many people do not have health insurance, and sometimes present a risk to hospital staff. We have no legal way of forcibly removing people from society, for their own safety and the safety of others, until they have an interaction with police, or commit an actual crime, and then they go to jail.