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Are people only allowed to be forcibly held under MHA if they are a danger to others not just themselves?
People who are happy and contented don't attempt suicide do they?
People can be held if they are a danger to themselves or others.
Nobody said she was banned from social intervention. Kentish did suggest that it was unrealistic to expect she would get any though.
Her case seems to be a CRASBO, (Criminal Anti- Social Behaviour Order) rather than an ASBO - so at least the normal burden of proof was required, although her convicions were under the Public Order Act, which is basically "harrassment, alarm and distress", which are hard to get legal aid for, and hard to convict on if there is a competent lawyer involved.
I personally find it difficult to believe that her behaviour is more distressing to others than to herself, and I can't see how the (CR)ASBO sorts anything out - because a distressed person isn't always going to do rational things.
When our prisons are already overflowing with damaged human beings, we have to be wary of new ways of cramming them either more.
People don't deliberately self harm unless they are in some mental distress do they?
But she has already attempted to harm herself.
(Emphasis mine)
From the act (quoted above)
"he ought to be so detained in the interests of his own health or safety or with a view to the protection of other persons."
My bad - lazy shorthand - should have said that Kentish did suggest it was unrealistic she would get the kind of help I proposed.
The police are unlikely to intervene before she poses a risk to herself - how would they know she was near a river/carpark/trainline?
So most probably their intervention would come at the stage when a section would be appropriate.
And, given the history, it (a MH intervention) could be apllicable when she goes near a river/carpark/trainline.
Not sure if you understood what I am saying here. I am saying that she needs help and should get it. I am genuinely at a loss to see what could be debateable about that.
I am not saying I have the exact answers because I don't, I am not a mental health professional but I am someone who has had to deal with a friend who was suffering from mental health issues. We got him the help he needed.
Another person i was working with recently had some sort of a breakdown and was picked up wandering by the police, taken to a psychiactric unit, sectioned, assessed and treated, first as an in-patient, now as an out-patient.
This is what I am suggesting. Believe me mate if someone is depressed enough to think about, let alone attempt suicide, they are not going to stop to think rationally about the consequences of breaking their asbo.
Of course she should be offered help, I don't recall denying that. But the ASBO isn't used as a first line treatment for people in her position - I am making the assumption that a lot has been tried with her already.
If they are at risk to themselves, as evidenced by previous history, then I would a think an assessment could be made. It won't. Just as she wouldn't be arrested before an incident.
I've made my substantive point about creeping imprisonment for non-illegal behaviour.
I'm done with this thread.
In prisons when someone who is/or who could commit suicide arent they put on 24 hr watch or similar ?
Obviously if someone is prepared to take their own life they must have some kind of mental problem, so treat that problem in which ever way they can.
one of the best places going for topping yourself?
as has been proved time and time again?
there are never enough staff to do a 24hr watch on thousands upon thousands of prisoners.
and growing daily by the sounds of things.
Sorry, no thats not what I meant. What I was saying is that people who are in prison who could harm/kill themselves are put on watch......meaning that there is something wrong with them. So this woman should have help to stop her not just move the problem.
Kentish is saying we dont know if she has a mental illness, im saying totally the opposite because anyone who tries to take their own life on more than one occasion has mental health issues of some kind......surely
Kentish is suggesting that she has a "personality disorder" and that it is untreatable.
But we don't know that - and imho the term is used to get difficult non-psychotic patients off a psychiatrists caseload.
There has to be a reason for someone to behave in this way - and there must be a more humane way to respond to it, than criminalisation.
But methinks that the CRASBO may have been an easy way for magistrates to dispose of a difficult and disturbing case that made them uneasy.
nah......should I ?
I dont think she should be sent to prison you know. Where I was coming from is that prisons get a doctors view as to wether the person is suicidal so if a doctor thinks they are then surely they have some kind of mental unstability ?
sheesh, why did I bring prison into the equasion..but it was late-ish last night wasnt it
I agree