Pursuant to Ind. Appellate Rule 65(D), this

Memorandum Decision shall not be regarded as precedent or cited before any court except for the purpose of establishing the defense of res judicata, collateral estoppel, or the law of the case.

ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT : ATTORNEY FOR APPELLEE : DARREN BEDWELL ANNA OBERGFELL Marion County Public Defender Wishard Health Services Indianapolis, Indiana Indianapolis, Indiana



## IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF INDIANA

IN THE MATTER OF THE CIVIL ) COMMITMENT OF: F.L., ) ) Appellant

- Respondent, ) ) vs. ) No. 49A02

- 1202

- MH

- 130 ) WISHARD HEALTH SERVICES, MIDTOWN ) COMMUNITY MENTAL HEALTH CENTER, ) ) Appellee

- Petitioner. )

APPEAL FROM THE MARION SUPERIOR COURT The Honorable Gerald S. Zore, Judge Caus e N o. 49D08

- 0411

- MH

- 1286
October 1, 2012 MEMORANDUM DECISION
- NOT FOR PUBLICATION
BARTEAU, Senior Judge2 STATEMENT OF THE CASE F.L. appeals an order of civil commitme nt requiring him to receive outpatient
treatment from Wishard Health Services , Midtown Community Mental Health Center (“Wishard”). We affirm

. ISSUE
F.L. raises one issue, which we restate as: whether the trial court ’s order is supported by sufficient evidence

.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY F.L. has been diagnosed with chronic sc hizoaffective disorder and alcohol dependence. He lives in subsidized housing and receives disabi lity payments. For the past three years, F.L. has been the subject of an ongoing order of civil commitment, pursuant to which he has received outpatient psyc hiatric services from D r. Thota Rao , a Wishard employee

. F.L. rejects his psychiatric diagnoses, telling Rao that “noth ing is wrong with him” and that he has the “right to drink alcohol.” Tr. p. 13. F.L. frequently refuses to take his prescribed medicat ions, and Rao characterizes him as having “no insight into his illness.” Id. at 12. On December 7, 2011, F.L. , by counsel, filed a request for a hearing on his ongoing civil commitment. The trial court held an evidentiary hearing, during which Rao

re quested an extension of F.L.’s civil commitment, asserting that F.L. needed ongoing outpatient psychiatric services. He proposed to give F.L. a different drug for his schizoaffective disorder and a new medication to address F.L.’s alcohol dependency.
The trial court issued an order determining that F.L.: (1) is mentally ill; (2) is a danger to3

others and is gravely disabled; and (3) is in need of continued outpatient care from
Wishard. The trial court ord ered Wishard to file a report on January 24, 2013 . This appeal followed.
DISCUSSION AND DECISION
In civil commitment proceedings, a petitioner must prove by clear and convincing evidence that the individual is mentally ill and either dangerous or gravely disabled, and
that commitment of that indi vidual is appropriate. Ind. Code § 12

- 26

- 2

- 5(e) (2007). When reviewing an order of involuntary civil commitment, we look only to the evidence and reasonable inferences therefrom most favorable to the trial court’s judgment. I n re Involuntary Commitment of A.M. , 959 N.E.2d 832, 834

- 35 (Ind. Ct. App. 2011) . We may not reweigh the evidence or judge the credibility of witnesses. Id. at 835. Here, F.L. does not dispute for purposes of this appeal that he is mentally ill. Instead, he challenges the trial court’s determination s that he is gravely disabled and dangerous to others . The term “gravely disabled” is defined by statute as follows: “Gravely disabled , ” for purposes of IC 12

- 26, means a condition in which an individual, as a result of mental illness , is in danger of coming to harm because the individual: (1) is unable to provide for that individual’ s food, clothing, shelter, or other essential human needs; or (2) has a substantial impairment or an obvious d eterioration of that individual’ s judgment , reasoning, or behavior that results in the individual’ s inability to function independently. Ind. Code § 12

- 7

- 2

- 96 (1992).4

In this case, as noted above, F.L. rejects his diagnoses of schizoaffective disorder and alcohol dependency, and he has little in sight into his mental illness. Rao noted that
F.L. was “not taking care of himself ” in the year prior to the hearing in this case. Tr. p. 14. F.L. drank alcohol almost every day and did not take hi s medication. Furthermore,
F.L. wore the same clothes r epeatedly and frequently d id not take showers. With respect to meals, F.L. had no food in the apartment , and F.L. told Rao he occasionally swap ped
alcohol f or canned tuna . F.L. was admitted to Wisha rd Hospital for malnutrition during the year prior to th e hearing

. As for overall physical health, o n several occasions F.L. refused to go to the hospital when his liver enzymes were elevated, indicating his health was at risk. Even

more distu rbing, on January 15, 2012, Rao and several medical students visite d F.L. and
noted that he had an infection on his arm

. The infected area was red and leaking fluid, and dead skin was scattered on the floor. Nevertheless, F.L. refu sed to go to the hospital.
T he next day, Wishard staff convinced him to go see a nurse pr actitioner, and the nurse

s tated that she had never seen such a serious infe ction before.
Rao also noted that F.L.’s mental condition had been “deteriorating.” Id. at 21. During the January 15, 2012 apartment visit, wh en Rao suggested taking F .L. t o the hospital to treat the infection, F.L. became agitated and got “up [ in Rao’s] face.” Id. at 8.
Rao became scared at that point. Rao also note d that F.L. has become more agitated and paranoid due to his failure to take medication . The police w ere called to F.L.’s apartment several times in 2011

.5

Thus , F.L. is unable to adequately feed himself or to address his serious medical
conditions when he does not take his medication . He also has difficulty interacting with
oth ers and behaves in an agitated manner that has resulted in intervention by law
enforcement . This evidence amply demonstrates that F.L. has a substantial impairment
or an obvious d eterioration of his judgment, reasoning, and behavior that has resulted in

an inability to f

unction independently

. See A.M. , 959 N.E.2d at 836 (determining that the evidence supported the trial court’s determination of grave disability where the patient
denied any mental illness and refused to take her medications, and as a result engaged in agi tated and aggressive behavior); In re Commitment of A.W.D. , 861 N.E.2d 1260, 1265 (Ind. Ct. App. 2007) (affirming a determination of grave disability where the person’s mental illness rendered him incapable of addressing his other medical conditions) , tran s. denied

. This evidence is sufficient to establish that F.L. meets the definition of being gravely disabled. See Ind. Code § 12

- 7

- 2

- 96. F.L. points to evidence that he lives in his own apartment and can pay his bills as proof that he is not gravely dis abled . This is a request to reweigh the evidence, which we
cannot do. F.L. also cites to In re Commitment of Steinberg , 821 N.E.2d 385 (Ind. Ct. App. 2004), but that case is distinguishable. In Steinberg , a panel of this Court reversed the trial court’s determination that Steinberg was gravely disabled, noting that n o evidence was presented at the hearing to prove that he “was unable to provide for his
essential human needs or that he was unable to function independently.” Id. at 389. By contrast, in t he current case Wishard presented extensive evidence that F.L.’s untreated mental illness renders him unable to function independently.6

Finally, Indiana Code section 12

- 26

- 2

- 5(e) provides that a petitioner must prove that an individual is dangerous or gr avely disabled. Because the statute is written in the disjunctive, and there is sufficient evidence to support the trial court’s finding of grave disability, we do not need to address whether F.L. is dangerous to others. There is thus
sufficient evidence to sustain the trial court’s judgment.
CONCLUSION
For the reasons stated above , we affirm the judgment of the trial court

. Affirmed

. FRIEDLANDER, J., and VAIDIK, J., concur.