United States v. Evans

427 F. Supp. 2d 696, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 40549, 2006 WL 1030240
CourtDistrict Court, W.D. Virginia
DecidedApril 20, 2006
Docket1:02 CR 00136
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 427 F. Supp. 2d 696 (United States v. Evans) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, W.D. Virginia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Evans, 427 F. Supp. 2d 696, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 40549, 2006 WL 1030240 (W.D. Va. 2006).

Opinion

OPINION AND ORDER

JONES, Chief Judge.

In this criminal prosecution, the government has moved for permission to involuntarily medicate the defendant in order to render him competent to stand trial. For the foregoing reasons, and subject to the strict conditions set forth herein, I will grant the government’s motion.

I. Background.

The defendant Herbert G. Evans is charged with forcibly interfering with a United States Department of Agriculture employee and threatening to murder a magistrate judge. Evans suffers from paranoid schizophrenia and it is agreed that he is incompetent to stand trial. Evans has refused antipsychotic medication to restore his competency and in 2003 the government moved for authorization to medicate him involuntarily. After a hearing, and applying the four-part test articulated by the Supreme Court in Sell v. United States, 539 U.S. 166, 123 S.Ct. 2174, 156 L.Ed.2d 197 (2003), I granted the government’s motion. United States v. Evans, No. 1:02CR00136, 2004 WL 533473 (W.D.Va. Mar. 18, 2004).

Evans appealed, arguing that the first, second, and fourth prongs of Sell were unmet. 1 The Fourth Circuit vacated this court’s decision and remanded for further proceedings. United States v. Evans, 404 F.3d 227 (4th Cir.2005). In its opinion, the court of appeals disagreed with Evans regarding Sell’s first prong, holding that there was adequate evidence that the government’s prosecutorial interest was sufficiently important to involuntarily medicate Evans. Id. at 238, 239-240. However, it found erroneous my factual conclusions regarding the second and fourth Sell prongs — whether the government had adequately demonstrated that its prosecutorial interest was significantly furthered by involuntary medication, and whether involuntary medication was medically appropriate. It held that the government had failed to articulate with sufficient particularity the medications it planned to administer to Evans, the potential side effects particular to Evans’ medical condition, and *698 a plan for responding to the onset of such side effects. Id. at 240-41.

In its opinion, the Fourth Circuit “emphasized that [the Sell ] principles require an exacting focus on the personal characteristics of the individual defendant and the particular drugs the Government seeks to administer.” United States v. Baldovinos, 434 F.3d 233, 240 n. 5 (4th Cir.2006) (characterizing Evans decision).

Following remand, the government submitted to the court a new forensic evaluation prepared at the Federal Medical Center in Butner, North Carolina (“Butner”). In response to the Fourth Circuit’s finding of a lack of specificity, the new evaluation (the “Butner Report”) detailed the process by which the government proposed to involuntarily medicate Evans, and included the particular medications and dosages to be used, the methods of administering those drugs, and a treatment plan for responding to side effects. In reply to the Butner Report, Evans submitted a report co-authored by Margaret S. Robbins, M.D., and Thomas E. Schacht, Psy.D., (“Robbins Report”), which included objections to the course of treatment proposed in the Butner Report and rebutted the analysis regarding the cited literature review. Both reports are summarized in greater detail hereafter.

On February 10, 2006, an evidentiary hearing was held in obedience to the directions of the court of appeals relating to the second and fourth Sell prongs. Testifying at that hearing were Byron Herbel, M.D., a psychiatrist at Butner, for the government, and Drs. Robbins and Schacht for the defendant. The parties have timely submitted additional briefing, and the issues are now ripe for decision.

II. The Forensic Evaluations.

The Butner RepoH.

I begin by setting out the treatment plan proposed by the Butner Report. But-ner proposes treating Evans first with long-acting risperidone (Risperdal Consta), a second-generation antipsychotic medication, to be administered by injection. In order to determine Evans’ ability to tolerate risperidone, Butner proposes administering small test doses of short-acting ris-peridone over the course of two days: one-half milligram on day one, and one milligram on day two. In administering the initial doses, Butner would first attempt to persuade Evans to ingest the oral doses voluntarily; if he refuses, Butner proposes to restrain Evans, insert a nasogastric tube, and administer the test doses in that manner.

If Evans tolerates the test doses with no adverse reaction, Butner proposes beginning injections of twenty-five milligram doses at two-week intervals, monitoring Evans for therapeutic benefit and medication side effects. Sustained release of the medication would begin approximately four weeks after the initial injection. The report predicts that symptoms would begin to improve after six to eight weeks, though an adequate antipsychotic trial would only be reached after three to four months of continuous treatment. Serum risperidone levels could be obtained to provide guidance for dosage adjustments up to fifty milligrams every two weeks. If after an adequate medication trial Evans’ symptoms continue to be resistant, then treatment with a substitute antipsychotic medication should be considered.

The Butner Report provides that during the risperidone treatment, Evans would be monitored for neuromuscular and metabolic side effects, the latter being more prevalent with second-generation drugs. The report provides a specific plan for administering adjunctive medication to manage any neuromuscular side effects that mani *699 fest, including treatment with an alternative antipsychotic should the side effects persist despite adjunctive treatment. Also during the risperidone treatment, Evans would be monitored for negative effects on his diabetes, using the standard Butner protocols including weighing, body mass index recordings, fingerstick glucose, and serum lipid measure, all on a monthly basis. Evans would also be counseled on relevant lifestyle modifications should side effects arise.

If it became necessary to discontinue the risperidone treatment, the Butner Report suggests a first alternative plan using long-acting haloperidol (Haldol Decanoate) in an injectable form, implementing a similar test dose strategy as with the risperi-done treatment. Initially, Evans would be administered test doses of one milligram for two days, either in oral form or through injection, depending on Evans’ cooperation. A nasogastric tube is not indicated for administration of haloperidol. Barring any adverse event following the test doses, Evans would be administered twenty-five milligrams of long-acting halo-peridol at two-week intervals. With serum haloperidol monitoring, the dose could be increased not to exceed 150 milligrams in a four-week period.

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Related

United States v. White
620 F.3d 401 (Fourth Circuit, 2010)
Carter v. Superior Court
46 Cal. Rptr. 3d 507 (California Court of Appeal, 2006)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
427 F. Supp. 2d 696, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 40549, 2006 WL 1030240, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-evans-vawd-2006.