Court Opinion

ID: 9442429
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 18:47:27.746776+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:29:05.778199
License: Public Domain

WASHINGTON, Circuit Judge
(concurring).
I think that the evidence recited in the opinion of this court was sufficient, under the view T take of the applicable law, to require the submission of the case to the jury, and that the judgment of the District Court should accordingly be reversed.
I agree with much that is said in this court’s opinion. That opinion, however, appears to me to impose too broad a measure of liability in cases of this sort. The statute here involved, regulating detention of insane persons, is relatively detailed. Certificates of two physicians, affidavits of two responsible residents, action by the head of the police department of the District — ■ all are called for. D.C.Code, § 21 — 327 (1940 ed.). Without doubt these provisions are desirable and normally workable. But the Congress could hardly have intended that every failure to comply with the requirements of the statute — even the most minute — should ground an action for damages, possibly in a very large amount, against every person connected with the incident, including a physician acting in good faith.
The statute makes no mention of civil liability. I cannot believe that the effect of the act is to impose full liability for every deviation from the prescribed procedure, regardless of the exigencies of the occasion and the possibility that the action taken was in fact beneficial to the patient. Nor do I believe that such a result should be inferred, absent an express congressional directive. “The common law recognized the power to restrain, summarily and without court process, an insane person who was dangerous at the moment. The power was to be exercised, however, only when ‘necessary to prevent the party from doing some immediate injury either to himself or others’ (Anderdon v. Burrows, 4 Car. & P. 210, 213, 172 Eng. Reprint 674, 675) and ‘only when the urgency of the case demands immediate intervention.’ ” Warner v. State, 297 N.Y. 395, 79 N.E.2d 459, 462-463. The New York courts have held that this rule is still the law in that State, and co-exists with statutory provisions rather similar to those under discussion here. Warner v. State, supra, citing with approval Emmer-ich v. Thorley, 35 App.Div. 452, 54 N.Y.S. 791. I would apply that rule in this jurisdiction, while stressing that the defendant must plead and prove that the emergency was real and immediate, and that the measures taken were reasonable under all the circumstances. Thus, in the instant case the questions for the jury to decide would be whether defendant had counseled or aided an arrest which did not comply with the statutory procedure, and, if the answer be in the affirmative, whether such an emergency existed as to require that action. I would further permit a defendant to prove in reduction of damages that he was acting in good faith, that the patient was in fact in need of hospitalization, and that the hospitalization was beneficial. See Warner v. State, supra, 79 N.E.2d at page 464.
The views just expressed would in my judgment take cognizance of the practicalities of the situation, without denying proper effect to the statutory provisions. Were hospitalization a punitive measure, there would be basis for attributing to Congress an intent to impose broad liability in damages for every departure from the statutory procedures. But as it is curative and protective, it seems unlikely that the Congress intended to penalize action when a physi-*526cían in good faith finds a real emergency to exist and where he shows himself to have been correct in that belief.
The liberty of the individual must, of course, be fully protected. I believe that the measure of liability outlined above will give that protection, and at the same time not place an undue burden on the physician.
Professional men should be required to conform to the high standards of their calling, both as to care and skill, and as to ethics. But we should take care not to penalize them for assuming the responsibility and taking the action which membership in their profession and the welfare of the community require.