Opinion ID: 205003
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 9

Heading: Mental Health Program and Prescribed Medication Conditions

Text: Mike raises two challenges with regard to the conditions requiring him to participate in a mental health program and to take the prescribed medication. The first is that the portion of the conditions stating that he must take the medication that is prescribed is overly broad because it is not explicitly limited to medication reasonably necessary for effective treatment. The second is that the conditions impermissibly delegate to his probation officer the decision of whether he must participate in inpatient treatment and take psychotropic drugs, requirements he claims implicate significant liberty interests. Mike failed to raise either of these arguments to the district court, thus, our review is for plain error. Mike's first argument is based on the holding in United States v. Cope, 527 F.3d 944 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 129 S.Ct. 321, 172 L.Ed.2d 232 (2008). In that case, the Ninth Circuit found that the requirement that the defendant `shall take all prescribed medication' [wa]s overbroad insofar as it is not clearly limited to medications that are reasonably related to sex offender treatment. Cope, 527 F.3d at 956. Due to this finding, the court vacated and remanded the condition to the district court. Id. We are unpersuaded by the holding in Cope. We believe that viewing the medication requirements at issue here in the context in which they were placed reveals that Mike must only take those medications that are related to his mental health programs. Cf. United States v. Phipps, 319 F.3d 177, 193 (5th Cir.2003) (determining the scope of a restriction by looking at the context in which it is placed); United States v. Cutler, 259 Fed. Appx. 883, 887 (7th Cir.2008) (same). As a result, we reject Mike's overbreadth argument. Mike's second argument raises two issues: first, can a court delegate the decision of whether a defendant must participate in residential treatment, and second, can a court delegate the decision of whether a defendant must take psychotropic medications. Starting with the first, as we noted above, it is error for a court to grant to the probation officer the discretion to determine whether the defendant will participate in residential treatment. Here, the special condition dealing with mental health treatment requires Mike to participate in a mental health treatment program, which may include residential placement, as approved by the probation officer. Thus, while the court clearly ordered participation in some type of program, it expressly left the decision of whether the program would be residential to the probation officer. [5] This was error. However, this error was not plain at the time of appeal, as this Court had not decided the issue and there appears to be a split in the circuits. [6] See, e.g., United States v. Juarez-Galvan, 572 F.3d 1156, 1160-61 (10th Cir.2009) (stating that an error is not plain when we have yet to address an issue and the case law from other circuits appears to conflict). As a consequence, we do not vacate the portion of the special condition that relates to the type of mental health program to which Mike will be subject. With regard to the second issue, we have not had occasion to address it. However, our earlier discussion on delegation sheds light on the matter. As stated above, a district court cannot delegate decisions that implicate significant liberty interests because such delegations allow the probation officer to determine the nature or extent of the defendant's punishment. It is well established that individuals have a significant interest in avoiding the involuntary administration of psychotropic drugs. See United States v. Bradley, 417 F.3d 1107, 1113 (10th Cir.2005); United States v. Williams, 356 F.3d 1045, 1057 (9th Cir.2004). As a consequence, district courts cannot delegate the decision of whether to force the defendant to take psychotropic drugs to the probation officer. Here, neither of the conditions relating to mental health treatment explicitly delegate such discretion to the probation officer. Therefore, we do not construe the conditions as doing so. Because of this fact, we do not find the portions of the conditions discussing the administration of medication to be infirm.