Title: Ex Parte Alabama Dept. of Mental Health
Citation: 819 So. 2d 591
Docket Number: 1001673
State: Alabama
Issuer: Alabama Supreme Court
Date: October 26, 2001

819 So. 2d 591 (2001)
Ex parte ALABAMA DEPARTMENT OF MENTAL HEALTH AND MENTAL RETARDATION et al.
(Re Eddie Nichols, as administrator of the estate of Medhi Daversani, deceased v. State of Alabama Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation et al.)
1001673.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
October 26, 2001.
*592 G.R. "Rick" Trawick, Alabama Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation, for petitioner.
Kenneth J. Mendelsohn and Thomas E. James, of Jemison, Mendelsohn, James &amp; Chancellor, P.C., Montgomery, for respondent.
MADDOX, Retired Justice.
This petition for a writ of mandamus presents a single question: Are investigative reports made by persons employed by the petitionersDepartment of Mental Health and Mental Retardation ("DMHMR"), Kathy Sawyer as Commissioner of DMHMR, and Virginia Rogers as the former Commissioner of DMHMRto act as police officers, pursuant to the provisions of § 22-50-21, Ala.Code 1975, discoverable in a civil proceeding arising out of the death of a patient in a hospital operated by DMHMR?
The trial court, after conducting an in camera review of the various documents and investigative reports, determined that they were discoverable. The petitioners ask us to direct the trial court to vacate its order holding that the reports are discoverable. This Court ordered answer and briefs in this case, and those have been filed. After examining the materials before us and considering the arguments of the parties, we are of the opinion that the trial court did not err in ordering the discovery of the investigative reports; therefore, we deny the petition.
On July 3, 1998, a staff member at Bryce Hospital, a mental-health facility operated by DMHMR, discovered patient Medhi Daversani in his bathroom with a bedsheet tied around his neck. Resuscitation efforts were unsuccessful; Daversani died. The investigation into his death was assigned to the bureau of special investigations ("BSI"), the investigative division of DMHMR. After its investigation, BSI filed a report in which it concluded that Daversani had committed suicide.
Eddie Nichols, as administrator of the estate of Medhi Daversani, sued DMHMR and the other petitioners, and filed numerous interrogatories, requests for admission, and requests for production, including a request that DMHMR produce the BSI reports relating to the investigation of Daversani's death. DMHMR objected to the production of the documents, citing § 12-21-3.1, Ala.Code 1975, which DMHMR contends makes the BSI reports not subject to a civil subpoena except upon proof, by substantial evidence, that the requesting party will suffer undue hardship if the documents are not produced and that the records, photographs, or witnesses are unavailable from other reasonable sources.
On April 25, 2001, the plaintiff filed a motion to compel the production of the BSI reports, and on May 8, 2001, after a conference call with the parties, the trial court, in consideration of the matters addressed *593 in the conference call, ordered DMHMR to file with the trial court all the materials Nichols had requested so the court could conduct an in camera inspection of the materials. On May 18, 2001, DMHMR filed its response to the motion to compel, along with an affidavit of Richard E. Von Koerner, and a copy of DMHMR Policy No. 80-10. The affidavit states, in substance, that BSI investigators are police officers and the policy states that DMHMR's case reports and files are confidential and are not to be released except under circumstances and in the manner provided in the policy. DMHMR, citing § 12-21-3.1 and § 22-50-21, Ala. Code 1975, argues that the BSI reports are protected from discovery.
On May 22, 2001, the trial court issued an order; that order stated, in part, that "[d]efendants have submitted for an in camera inspection various documents including investigative reports related to the death of Medhi Daversani." It further stated that "[t]he court has reviewed the documents and is of the opinion that said documents are relevant and discoverable," and it ordered DMHMR to provide the plaintiff with copies of the documents within 14 days. On June 5, 2001, DMHMR filed a motion to reconsider, again citing § 12-21-3.1 and § 22-50-21, Ala.Code 1975. DMHMR argued in its motion that the trial court "did not have before it any evidence that the Plaintiff will suffer any undue hardship if these documents are not produced and that these witnesses, records and photographs are unavailable from other sources." On June 15, 2001, the trial court denied the motion to reconsider. On June 19, 2001, the petitioners filed this petition for a writ of mandamus directing the trial court to vacate its order.
The central issue in this case is whether the provisions of § 12-21-3.1 apply to the investigative reports prepared by investigators employed by DMHMR.
Section 12-21-3.1 is entitled "Subpoena of law enforcement officers and investigative reports; disposition of criminal matters." The statute provides, as follows:
DMHMR contends that BSI, the investigative arm of DMHMR, should be entitled to the protection afforded by § 12-21-3.1, and that BSI investigators are "police officers" employed by DMHMR pursuant to the provisions of § 22-50-21, Ala.Code 1975. Section 22-50-21 provides as follows:
This Code section first appeared in the Alabama Code of 1896, § 2570, and was subsequently transferred to the Code of 1907, § 876; then to the Code of 1923, § 1461; then to the Code of 1940, T. 45, § 227; and finally to the 1975 Code.
This Court has held that "[b]ecause discovery involves a considerable amount of discretion on the part of the trial judge, the standard this Court will apply in reviewing his actions on a petition for writ of mandamus is whether there has been a clear showing that the trial court abused its discretion." Ex parte Clarke, 582 So. 2d 1064, 1067 (Ala.1991). This Court has also noted that "the trial court is in a better position to make discovery determinations than are we." Ex parte Employers Nat'l Ins. Co., 539 So. 2d 233, 235 (Ala.1989). In Ex parte HealthSouth Corporation, 712 So. 2d 1086 (Ala.1997), this Court stated:
712 So. 2d  at 1088 (emphasis added).
DMHMR strongly insists that the investigative reports are not subject to discovery because, it argues, Nichols has not shown, by substantial evidence, "that [he] will suffer undue hardship and the records, photographs or witnesses are unavailable from other reasonable sources," as provided in § 12-21-3.1(c), Ala.Code 1975.
In the materials before this Court at this time, we do not have all the evidence that was before the trial judge when she ordered production of the investigative reports. Although it appears to us, based upon a reading of the pertinent statutes, that investigative reports made by police officers employed by DMHMR might be privileged, we cannot hold, based on the materials presently before us, that the trial judge abused her discretion in ordering that the evidence she examined in camera was "relevant and discoverable."
In this case, as we have previously stated, the trial court stated in its order that DMHMR has "submitted for an in camera inspection various documents including investigative reports related to the death of Medhi Daversani." The "various documents including investigative reports related to the death of Medhi Daversani" that were before the trial court and that she examined in camera are not before this Court in this mandamus petition. In fact, the materials available to this Court on a mandamus petition are very limited, but the materials that are before us show that the trial court was apprised by DMHMR that BSI investigators are law-enforcement officials. In fact, it is undisputed that the trial court conducted a conference call and that it considered the *596 arguments of both parties, but apparently there was no transcript of that conference call, and nothing that was said in that conference call is available to this Court to assist us in determining whether the trial court abused its discretion in this case.[1]
Based on the foregoing, we hold that the petitioners have failed to show a clear legal right to the relief they seek. In reaching this conclusion, we see no necessity to decide, at this time, whether BSI investigators are "law-enforcement" officials entitled to the protection from discovery provided by § 12-21-3.1, Ala.Code 1975. We note however, that even if BSI investigators are law-enforcement officials under the provisions of § 12-21-3.1., the trial court could order the production of the reports if Nichols could show that, as the moving party, he "will suffer undue hardship and that the records, photographs or witnesses are unavailable from other reasonable sources," § 12-21-3.1(c). The petitioners, based on the materials before us, have not clearly shown that the trial court abused its discretion in ordering that the materials be produced. The petition for writ of mandamus is therefore due to be denied.
This opinion was prepared by Retired Justice Hugh Maddox, sitting as a Justice of this Court pursuant to § 12-18-10(e).
PETITION DENIED.
MOORE, C.J., and SEE, BROWN, HARWOOD, and STUART, JJ., concur.
[1]  Nichols, in his answer to the petition for the writ of mandamus, has included photocopies of several newspaper articles that relate to deaths that have occurred in state-owned and supported mental hospitals, and states that these deaths have been investigated only by BSI officersemployees of DMHMR. Some of the articles describe such procedures as being the "fox guarding the henhouse." We do not decide the legal issue presented in this case based on those newspaper articles, however. Any policy changes that may be required in investigating such deaths in state-owned or supported mental hospitals, in our view, are not the subject of this petition for the writ of mandamus.