The Supreme Court has dismissed an appeal by Louis Blehein against the refusal of leave to bring proceedings against St. John of God Hospital over three periods of detention in 1984, 1987 and 1991. The Court held that the evidence did not establish substantial grounds for contending that the hospital acted in bad faith or without reasonable care, as required by section 260 of the Mental Treatment Act 1945.
Blehein’s proposed claim alleged, among other things, that detention orders were fraudulent and lacked statutory authority, that his detention amounted to false imprisonment, and that treatment with psychiatric medication violated his rights. These were claims in a draft summons; the Supreme Court was deciding whether he could obtain leave to bring proceedings, not determining those allegations at a trial.
The Court rejected his challenges to the statutory forms and medical certificates used for the admissions. It agreed that the relevant form, read as a whole, included an order for reception and detention. For the 1984 admission, the latest examination date recorded for one doctor was the day before the order, and the Court found this met the statutory timing requirement. It also held that the evidence did not establish that the order was made outside the permitted 12-hour period.
The Court said the hospital was not required to investigate matters underlying medical certificates that appeared to be in order. It found no sufficient basis for the allegations that the hospital had participated in a conspiracy to detain Blehein unlawfully. The Court also rejected his arguments concerning conditional release and advance notice or a prior hearing before detention under the statutory process.
A separate issue concerned whether the hospital had been designated by law as a place of detention. The High Court had allowed evidence on that point to be filed. Blehein later accepted that the hospital was designated and abandoned the issue, which the Supreme Court noted.
Blehein also sought to challenge the constitutionality of section 260. The Supreme Court declined to decide that issue on appeal because it had not been argued in the High Court and no exceptional circumstances justified taking it up for the first time. It said a constitutional challenge did not appear to require leave under section 260 and that the appropriate route was to begin separate proceedings by plenary summons. The Court did not rule on the merits of such a challenge.
The appeal against refusal of leave was dismissed. The judgment was delivered by Justice Catherine McGuinness on 31 May 2002.