Charles Thomas Sell v. United States (539 U.S. 166)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 16, 2003 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 539 U.S. 166 · 123 S. Ct. 2174
- Decided
- June 16, 2003
- Term
- October Term 2002
- Vote
- 6–3
- Majority author
- Justice Breyer
- Issue area
- Due Process
- Disposition
- Vacated and remanded
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Liberal
Opinion excerpt
Justice Breyer delivered the opinion of the Court. The question presented is whether the Constitution permits the Government to administer antipsychotic drugs involuntarily to a mentally ill criminal defendant — in order to render that defendant competent to stand trial for serious, but nonviolent, crimes. We conclude that the Constitution allows the Government to administer those drugs, even against the defendant’s will, in limited circumstances, i. e., upon satisfaction of conditions that we shall describe. Because the Court of Appeals did not find that the requisite circumstances existed in this case, we vacate its judgment. A Petitioner Charles Sell, once a practicing dentist, has a long and unfortunate history of mental illness. In September 1982, after telling doctors that the gold he used for fillings had been contaminated by communists, Sell was hospitalized, treated with antipsychotic medication, and subsequently discharged. App. 146. In June 1984, Sell called the police to say that a leopard was outside his office boarding a bus, and he then asked the police to shoot him. Id., at 148; Record, Forensic Report, p. 1 (June 20,1997) (Sealed). Sell was again hospitalized and subsequently released. On various occasions, he complained that public officials, for example, a State Governor and a police chief, were trying to kill him. Id., at 4. In April 1997, he told law…
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