Case Title: In re R.L.

Citation: 163 Vt 168, 657 A.2d 180

Docket Number: 93-051

State: vermont

Court: Vermont Supreme Court

Date: 1995-01-13T00:00:00Z

Document:
IN_RE_RL.93-051; 163 Vt 168; 657 A.2d 180

[Filed 13-Jan-1995]

NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to motions for reargument under V.R.A.P. 40
as well as formal revision before publication in the Vermont Reports. 
Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Vermont Supreme
Court, 109 State Street, Montpelier, Vermont 05609-0801 of any errors in
order that corrections may be made before this opinion goes to press. 


                              No. 93-051


In re R.L.                                   Supreme Court

                                             On Appeal from
                                             Waterbury Family Court

                                             December Term, 1993



Dean B. Pineles, J.

Jeffrey L. Amestoy, Attorney General, Montpelier, and Janet Bull, Assistant
 Attorney General, Waterbury, for appellee Vermont Department of Mental Health
 and Mental Retardation 

Alexander Scherr and Bessie A. Weiss and Louise M. Pierson, Paralegals (On
 the Brief), Vermont Legal Aid, Waterbury, and Jeffrey A. Meyer of Shearman &
 Sterling, Washington, D.C., for appellant R.L. 

M. Jerome Diamond, Montpelier, for amici curiae American Civil Liberties
 Union (Vermont Chapter), Vermont Advocacy Network, Vermont Developmental
 Disabilities Council, and Vermont Protection and Advocacy, Inc. 


PRESENT:  Allen, C.J., Gibson, Dooley, Morse and Johnson, JJ.


     GIBSON, J.     R.L. appeals the family court's involuntary
hospitalization order and its denial of his request for an order directing
the Vermont State Hospital (VSH) to accept him as a voluntary patient.  R.L.
claims that 18 V.S.A.  7703(a) authorizes involuntary treatment only where
voluntary treatment is "not possible," and that, in his case, the State
failed to show that voluntary treatment was not possible.  The family court
denied R.L's request because it concluded that R.L. was required to exhaust
the grievance procedures available at VSH prior to seeking judicial review of
his request for voluntary admission.  Although we conclude that the family
court erred by invoking the exhaustion doctrine, we affirm on other grounds. 

 

     R.L. was admitted to VSH for emergency examination on August 10, 1992. 
After the State filed its petition for involuntary treatment, and prior to
the commitment hearing, R.L.'s counsel proposed a settlement, requesting that
VSH admit R.L. as a voluntary patient.  Counsel for the State referred the
matter to the hospital treatment team.  The hospital treatment team felt that
R.L. was not an appropriate person for admission as a voluntary patient, and
denied the request.  At the commitment hearing on August 21, 1992, R.L. asked
the court through counsel to order VSH to admit him as a voluntary patient. 
The court declined to do so.  It concluded that VSH had discretion to accept
patients for voluntary treatment, and found no abuse of discretion by VSH in
denying R.L. voluntary admission.  The court also found that R.L. was a
person in need of treatment and ordered him committed to VSH.(FN1)  R.L.
thereafter moved for reconsideration of his request for voluntary treatment. 
The court denied the motion, reasoning that R.L. was required to exhaust his
administrative remedies before judicial review of the hospital's decision was
available.   This appeal followed. 

                                  I.

     We first address the family court's ruling that the exhaustion doctrine
prevented it from reviewing the hospital's refusal to admit R.L. as a
voluntary patient.  Requests for voluntary admission to VSH must be directed
to the hospital, and must include the written consent of the applicant.  18
V.S.A.  7503(a), (b).  Admission on an involuntary basis for emergency
examination does not preclude application for voluntary status.  See id. 
7508(d)(1) (patient admitted pursuant to emergency examination must be
released within seventy-two hours unless, within that period, patient has
been accepted for voluntary admission).  Even after involuntary commitment
pursuant to court order, a patient may request a transfer to voluntary
status.  Id. 

 

 7709 ("At any time, a patient may, with the permission of the head of the
hospital, have his status changed from involuntary to voluntary . . . .")
(emphasis added). 

     A patient who is denied voluntary status by the treatment team may
request review of the decision by the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the
hospital, and if not satisfied by the CEO's decision, the patient may appeal
to the Commissioner of Mental Health and Mental Retardation. See Vermont
State Hospital, Policy and Procedure Manual F-8 (rev. Jan. 1993).  The manual
provides criteria for evaluating a patient's suitability for conditional
voluntary status.  Id. F-10. A patient has a right to representation and to
present argument to the CEO, or to any independent fact-finder appointed by
the CEO.  Id. F-8.  The decision of the CEO must be in writing within a
reasonable time, and this decision is appealable to the Commissioner, who
must also rule within a reasonable time.  Id. 

     The family court concluded that it was prohibited from reviewing the
hospital's denial of R.L.'s request for voluntary admission because R.L. had
not exhausted the hospital's grievance procedures.  As a general rule, where
an agency has jurisdiction to decide an issue, a court will not interfere
with the agency's decision unless and until all administrative remedies have
been invoked or exhausted.  See Morean-Usher v. Town of Whitingham, 158 Vt.
378, 381, 610 A.2d 1108, 1110 (1992).  After the agency renders its decision,
the court generally has the authority to review the decision: 

       The agency has jurisdiction over the matter and the court only
       monitors the agency's decisions.  The court's jurisdiction stems
       completely from the agency's jurisdiction and the court's role in
       that particular administrative program.  The role may be extremely
       limited according to the prescribed standard for review; indeed the
       court may be given no function in the particular administrative
       program where the action is unreviewable.

2 C. H. Koch, Jr., Administrative Law & Practice  10.26 (1985).  Under the
exhaustion doctrine, the reviewing court's jurisdiction over the agency
decision is appellate in nature.  By invoking the exhaustion doctrine in the
present case, the family court assumed, incorrectly, that 

 

it had appellate jurisdiction to review the actions of the Commissioner of
Mental Health and Mental Retardation. 

     Section 454 of Title 4 grants the family court exclusive jurisdiction
over a number of proceedings, including mental health proceedings "filed
pursuant to chapters 179, 181, and 185 of Title 18."  See 4 V.S.A.  454. 
It is a court of limited jurisdiction and its jurisdictional grant must be
strictly construed.  See Allen v. Allen, ___ Vt. ___, ___,