The High Court has made A.M. a ward of court and continued his detention in the Central Mental Hospital, ruling that wardship was the appropriate route to protect his welfare because admission under the Mental Health Act 2001 was not feasible in the circumstances.
In a judgment delivered on 27 March 2017, Mr Justice Kelly said the Health Service Executive’s evidence established that A.M. required detention in the hospital’s High Secure Unit. The medical evidence described A.M. as unable to manage his affairs or live independently and as needing a highly structured, secure setting. A.M. opposed wardship on legal grounds but did not challenge the medical evidence. No replying affidavit was filed on his behalf.
The central legal question was whether the HSE should instead have pursued detention under the 2001 Act. The judge found that the Act did not allow A.M. to move directly from detention at the Central Mental Hospital under his prison sentence to detention in the same hospital under the Act. The proposed route would have required his admission to another approved centre before a transfer back to the Central Mental Hospital could be sought. The court accepted uncontroverted evidence that no other approved centre was prepared to admit him, even temporarily.
A.M.’s lawyers had outlined a proposed sequence involving an application for admission to an approved centre, medical examination, an admission order and a later transfer review. Mr Justice Kelly called that procedure unrealistic in light of the evidence and said the suggested interim detention order would have had no legal basis outside wardship proceedings.
The judge held that the Mental Health Act and the High Court’s statutory wardship jurisdiction operate alongside each other. Which route is appropriate depends on the circumstances of the case. He concluded that the HSE had appropriately invoked wardship here and that the order was necessary to allow A.M. to remain in the only facility the evidence identified as capable of providing the required level of security and care.
The court made A.M. a ward of court and continued the detention order pending further order. It directed a review for 26 June 2017 at 11am and allowed any party to apply if circumstances changed before then. The judgment records that wardship detention must be reviewed at least every six months and that the order did not authorise restraint unless separately sought and supported by evidence.