Police Emergency Commitment Powers in Cases of Persons Experiencing Mental Health Crisis in “Public Spaces”: Review of the Commitment Process in England and Wales, in Comparison to the Practice in the United States of America (USA)

摘要

Police emergency commitment powers for detention of persons in the community perceived to be seriously mentally ill for further specialist examination in a designated facility have always raised interest in medical and legal circles on both sides of the Atlantic. The objective of this article is to detail the police commitment procedure in England and Wales, as dictated by the mental health act of 1983 (MHA 1983) amended in 2007 (MHA 2007);and compare this with similar legal provisions as prevails under current state mental health statutes in the United States of America (USA). The comparative review of the commitment processes in England and Wales to that of the USA reveals that the process in England and Wales seeks to primarily ensure that persons with mental disorder (PWMD) in crisis are directed to a specialist hospital for evaluation and appropriate specialist care. In the USA such persons in a good number of cases may end up in the criminal justice system due to application of the “dangerousness” standard. Additionally whereas in England and Wales the commitment law is uniform in law and application, the federal system in the USA is such that the commitment law may have minor variations depending on the individual states. The minor variation in state commitment laws may engender a situation where the commitment law in England and Wales may seem relatively equitable and just towards PWMD in crisis, compared to the state commitment laws in the USA.