Citation

Hooper JF, McLearen AM, Barnett ME. Int. J. Law Psychiatry 2005; 28(6): 604-612.

Affiliation

Taylor Hardin Secure Medical Facility, 1301 Jack Warner Parkway, Tuscaloosa, Alabama Department of Psychiatry, United States.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2005, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.ijlp.2004.09.007

PMID

16139888

Abstract

The most complex and risky decisions made by forensic psychiatrists revolve around the decision to release insanity acquittes from custody. This decision has several levels of risk, including the potential liability to the psychiatrist as well as the possible risk to the community. A single bad outcome, even if not predictable, can have disastrous results, not only for victims, but also for the releasing facility. Since predicting violence has so many problems, we chose to look at completeness of treatment instead, so we could say to the Court, "We don't know about violence, but we do know that he has vastly improved." Since many NGRI (Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity) patients spend years in the hospital, they are also expensive. They have rights, as well; therefore the complex assessment must be done as quickly and as accurately as possible. We have developed a spread sheet program to compare these multiple factors, and have compared it against the clinical decisions we have made in more than 100 discharges. We believe this gives a framework for decision-making that will increase the consistency of this process.