Forcible medication of mentally ill criminal defendants: the case of Russell Eugene Weston, Jr.

• Author: Feinberg, Aimee
• Position: Notes

INTRODUCTION

In his prison cell in North Carolina, he picks at sores and insists that the ripening of corn causes time to reverse. (1) Once convinced that he was the favorite son of President John F. Kennedy and the target of a communist murder plot, (2) Russell Eugene Weston, Jr. lives physically in a federal correctional institution in Burner, North Carolina. (3) Mentally, he lives in world of his own creation.

In 1996, Weston, diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia years earlier, (4) arrived at the Central Intelligence Agency headquarters just outside of Washington, D.C. and introduced himself as an operative named "the Moon." (5) In suit-and-tie, he calmly explained the Ruby Surveillance System that he had created while working at NASA. (6) Constructed of a ruby, a watch, and a small wheel, this covert satellite system could reverse the march of time. (7) Fifty minutes later, after explaining his cloning at birth, but never threatening the life of the President, Weston was sent on his way. (8)

Two years later, on July 24, 1998, Weston returned to the national capital area--this time armed and ready to stop the work of the Ruby Surveillance System. (9) Cannibals had overused the system, he believed, and had spawned the development and spread of "Black Heva," a plague-like disease that could kill over one-third of America's population, (10) Weston was determined to reach the override switch located in the "great safe of the U.S. Senate" and halt the spread of "Black Heva." (11)

Running through the security magnetometers positioned in the entrance of the U.S. Capitol Building, Weston opened fire with a .38-caliber revolver, fatally shooting Capitol Hill Police Officers Jacob J. Chestnut and John M. Gibson. (12) Injured in the ensuing exchange of gun fire, Weston was taken into custody at the scene and charged with two counts of capital murder, attempted murder, and firearms offenses. (13)

With two federal law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty, harsh and swirl punishment was sure to follow. But today, three years after the murders, Weston has not yet been tried for his alleged crimes. Instead, government prosecutors, Weston's lawyers, and six federal judges have been grappling with the critical, but largely unanswered question on which Weston's fate hinged: May the government, and, if so, under what circumstances, constitutionally administer psychotropic medication to a mentally ill criminal defendant against his will for the purpose of rendering him competent for trial?

Once incarcerated immediately after his deadly rampage, Weston refused to take antipsychotic medication to tame the symptoms of his schizophrenia, (14) and in April 1999, D.C. District Court Judge Emmet G. Sullivan declared Weston incompetent for trial. (15) In response, the government sought court permission to forcibly medicate Weston in the hope that drug treatment would restore his competence to stand trial. Fearing that a trial would lead to an inevitable death sentence, Weston's attorneys fought prosecutors every step of the way.

Certainly Weston is not the first defendant to enter the legal labyrinth of forcible administration of psychotropic medicine. (16) But with two law enforcement officers dead, the security of the U.S. Congress breached, the death penalty on the table, and a severely delusional defendant willing to fight a drawn-out legal battle, the dramatic nature of this case has turned Russell Weston into the "poster boy" (17) for the issue of forcible medication of mentally incompetent criminal defendants.

This Note examines Weston's legal journey and the complex legal questions raised by the forcible medication of incompetent criminal defendants. Part I outlines current Supreme Court doctrine on this issue. Part II explores the application of this doctrine to Weston's case. Part III analyzes the most recent, and final, opinion of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and concludes that this decision established new law that likely will give government prosecutors considerable latitude to forcibly medicate non-dangerous, mentally ill criminal defendants in order to bring them to trial.

1. SUPREME COURT DOCTRINE ON FORCIBLE MEDICATION

   It is well established that the government may not constitutionally try or convict an incompetent criminal defendant. (18) While the standard of competence is clear--a "defendant may not be put to trial unless he has sufficient present ability to consult with his lawyer with a reasonable degree of rational understanding ... [and] a rational as well as factual understanding of the proceedings against him" (19)--the lengths to which the government may go to restore the trial competency of an incompetent defendant remain ill-defined.

   In Washington v. Harper, (20) the Supreme Court held that prison inmates "possess a significant liberty interest in avoiding the unwanted administration of antipsychotic drags under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment." (21) The Court found, however, that the unique context of an inmate's confinement necessarily restricted the scope of this right. (22) "[G]iven the requirements of the prison environment, ... the State [may] treat a prison inmate who has a serious mental illness with antipsychotic drugs against his will, if the inmate is dangerous to himself or others and the treatment is in the inmate's medical interest." (23) The government need only show that the forced treatment is reasonably related to legitimate penological interests. (24)

   Two years later, in Riggins v. Nevada, (25) the Court considered the claims of a pretrial detainee asserting his right to be free from unwanted medication. The defendant, Paul Riggins, sought reversal of his capital conviction based on a Nevada state court's refusal to allow him to discontinue antipsychotic drug therapy during trial, and argued that forcible medication infringed on both his Fourteenth Amendment liberty interests and his fair trial rights. (26) He asserted that the "drugs' effect on his demeanor and mental state during trial [denied] him due process" (27) and that "because he [offered] an insanity defense at trial, he had a right to show jurors his true mental state." (28)

   Reversing Riggins' conviction, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, writing for the Court, held that because "the Fourteenth Amendment affords at least as much protection to persons the State detains for trial" as it does to convicted inmates, pretrial detainees have a due process right to be free from unwanted psychotropic medication. (29) The Court explicitly relied on Washington v. Harper, (30) but recast that case's emphasis, signaling that more searching review was appropriate in the pretrial detainee context. (31) While the government could forcibly medicate Harper by advancing a "legitimate penological interest[]," (32) the state of Nevada could permissibly medicate Riggins only if it showed an "overriding justification." (33)

   In dicta, the Court added that two rationales potentially could justify forcible medication of pretrial detainees. First, the State "certainly would" satisfy due process if the involuntary drug treatment were "medically appropriate and, considering less intrusive alternatives, essential for the sake of [the defendant's] own safety or the safety of others." (34) Second, the State "might" be able to justify forcible drug therapy if the treatment were medically appropriate and the State "could not obtain an adjudication of [the defendant's] guilt or innocence by using less intrusive means." (35) Because the Nevada courts had made none of these required findings, the Court reversed Riggins' conviction and remanded the case. (36)

   Importantly, however, the Supreme Court did not establish any substantive standards for reviewing Riggins' claims. (37) Although the Court's language of "essential state interest" (38) and "less intrusive alternatives" (39) echo the language of strict scrutiny review, (40) the Court explicitly denied that it had adopted a strict scrutiny standard, insisting that its decision had left that question for another day. (41) Additionally, it did not define the term "might" that it had used in the context of the State's competence restoration rationale. (42) The opinion did not specify whether the term meant that the Court was simply reserving the issue of whether the state ever could justify forcible medication solely to render a defendant competent, or whether the word "might" meant that the state could administer involuntary medication for that purpose, but only under certain circumstances. (43)

   As for Riggins' claimed infringement of his constitutional right to a fair trial, the Court noted that the effects of antipsychotic drugs, such as their impact on a defendant's demeanor, and on his ability to testify, to communicate with counsel, and to comprehend the proceedings, could create unconstitutional trial prejudice. (44) Justice O'Connor took judicial notice of the known side effects of psychotropic medicines, including acute dystonia, a severe involuntary spasm of the upper body, tongue, throat or eyes; motor restlessness, often characterized by the inability to sit still; and tardive dyskinesia, which causes uncontrollable movement of muscles, especially those around the face. (45) Because psychotropic drugs here likely rendered Riggins drowsy or confused and likely affected his appearance and the content of his testimony, forcible medication "may well have impaired the constitutionally protected trial rights [that he] invoke[d]." (46) Additionally, the Court found that expert testimony explaining the drags' effects on the defendant's demeanor was inadequate to cure the potential trial prejudice. (47)

   The Court, however, did not erect an insurmountable hurdle to forcible medication, even where the involuntary drug treatment creates trial prejudice. To the contrary, the Court approved prejudice-producing drug therapies as long as the...