Reply #51: Yes, exactly. Massachusetts has (or had ) an involuntary committal law

[Mairead]

that can be and has been abused:


Susan Rockwell who specialized in civil rights law at Howard University, was detained for two and a half days at Cape Cod Hospital. "I was very aware how much my rights were being violated," she says. "It was very degrading knowing what they were doing to me and not being able to do anything about it."

Upset about a dying friend, Rockwell went to Cape Cod Hospital to attend a support group meeting. She was anxious and a bit disheveled, wearing a soiled down coat that belied her achievements as a law school graduate and former librarian.

Based on her appearance and a brief conversation, an emergency room doctor ordered attendants to put her in a four-point restraint. Denied her pleas to call her psychiatrist - who says she would have argued against forced treatment - Rockwell was injected with drugs and rushed to the psychiatric ward. She woke up the next day in a locked room. A kind nurse brought her a cupcake with a candle; it was her 45th birthday.

http://www.boston.com/globe/specialreports/1997/may/spotlight/day2.htm


If they can do that to a lawyer who's merely feeling sad and stressed out, what could they do to the rest of us?