The herald., 1897-05-08
A NEW LAW
Will Cost Plenty of Time
and Money
AN INSANE PERSON
May Challenge the Finding OF a
Judge
n PREMIUM ON INSANITY
A PREMIUM ON INSANITY
a DEFENDANT LOST TO MEMORY
IN JAIL
Verdict of $500 in the Chicken Suit.
Another "Parkhursting" Ap-
peal - Goddard Divorce.
New Suits Filed

There are three persons at present
IN the county jail under arrest on the
charge Of being insane, and there is no
way open by which they may be COM
mitted to the state asylum at High
lands, If they really are insane, or of
cischarging them from custody. In
fact, there is practically a deadlock in
the several departments of the superior
courts SO far as the examination and
commitment Of insane paints is con-
cerned.
This is the initial result Of the new
!unacy law, passed by the last legis-
lature, and which for ambiguity of ex-
preston and meaning and foolish con-
struction will compare favorably with
any other bill passed during the ses-
sion.
The state board provided for by the
new law has not yet furnished this coun-
ty-whatever may have been done else
where-with the necessary blanks, and
so the machinery of the law cannot be
set in motion, and to make commit
ments under the old law is, of course,
Illegal. So, for the nonce, people may
become insane with impunity, and on
that specific charge they may rest as
sured they will not suffer commitment.
There are other reasons, however, why
1t is not possible to examine and COM
nit patients.
The new law provides. amorG many
other things, that within sixty days
after the passage of the act the board of
supervisors of each county shall pro-
vide at the receiving hospitals a suita-
BILE room or rooms for the detention,
board, care and treatment of the al
legged insane. These rooms and their
furnishings shall be subject to the ap-
proval Of the state lunacy commission.
The bill was approved March 31st, and
so before the end of the current month
this accommodation will have to be pro-
vided. AT present there is nothing of
the kind. A person may not be de-
tained in this receiving department less
than one and not more than twenty
days. Certificates of lunacy must show
that it is the opinion of the medical eX-
aminers that the alleged insane person
is actually insane, and must be made
by two physicians, graduates of an in
corporated medical college, and who
have filed with the state commission
a certified copy of the certificate of a
superior judge, showing such qualifi-
cations. The blanks necessary for max
ing out the necessary certificates not
having come to hand, the judges of the
superior court met together and agreed
upon a form and drew up list of ply
sicans capable of serving as medical
examiners.
A judge may, in his decision, require
other proofs in addition to the certificate
of the medical examiners that person
is insane, and upon the demand of any
relative or near friend, acting on be-
half of the insane person, the judge shall
issue an order directing the hearing of
the applica ton before him. But if the
person ordered to be committed, or any
friend, is dissatisfied with the final or
der of commitment he may, within five
days from the making of the order by
the judge, take an appeal, as it were,
by demanding that his sanity be tried
by jury before the superior court of
the county. 1t is to be presumed that,
save in violent cases, quite large num-
ber of the persons charged with insanity
will be sane enough to demand jury
examination. In such case two-thirds
Of the jury may decide and return a
verdict. Before any such jury trial.
however, the person demanding it must
deposit, or give bond, to be approved
by a superior judge, for the costs of the
jury trial, if the order of commitment
be sustained, unless, in the opinion of
the judge, the alleged insane is poor and
such a person ia defined as "a person un-
able to maintain himself and has no
one legally liable and able to maintain
him"
After the certificate of the properly
appointed medical experts has been
challenged by the judge and the deci-
sion Of the judge has been challenged
by the insane person himself, and jury
not of his peers but capable in every
way to serve upon the panel-has exa-
mined into the intracacies, of the dis
ease, of which they must of necessity
be absolutely incapable of forming
anything approaching an accurate
opinion, and found the man or woman
to be actually insane, then the patient
will go to Highlands sure But upon
being sent there the application, the
certificate of lunacy of the medical exa-
miners, the order directing a further
hearing if any such is made, a typewrit-
ten statement of any and all testimony,
the decision of the judge and the order
of commitment must all be presented to
the superintendent of the asylum to
which the person has been committed.
That gentleman, if he is so disposed,
may tell all the gentlemen who have
been exercising their gray matter in
determining whether the person was in
sane or not to go thunder if, in his judg-
ment, the person is not insane.
Once lodged inside the asylum, how
ever, it is made obligatory that verbatim
copies of the above documents shall be
forwarded by each superintendent to
the State Lunacy commission, and the
relative or guardian of the person to
whose care and custody any insane per-
son may be committed, is also compelled
to file the papers named above in the
county clerks office, and transmit a
certified copy to the State Commission,