In September of 2022, CA Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law Senate Bill 1338, creating a mental health court. The Community Assistance Recovery & Empowerment (CARE) court program empowers a judge to compel people with mental health disabilities or substance abuse issues to accept psychiatric treat ment and medication against their will. The state Senate voted 38 to 0 in favor.
A court-appointed conservator would make financial and health care decisions and control a patient’s medication and treatment — powerful brain-altering drugs delivered initially at an involuntary temporary stay in a residential psychiatric facility. Could this be the housing promised by Gov. Newsom when he an- nounced his CARE Court plan?
The CARE Court is opposed by more than 40 advocates for unhoused people, legal, civil rights, human rights, and disability rights groups, including Human Rights Watch and the ACLU, who has called the conservatorship “. . . the greatest deprivation of civil liberties aside from the death penalty.” Set up by unde-clared presidential candidate Newsom to get the unhoused off the streets, CARE Court is backed by the Big City Mayor’s Coalition, including San Francisco Mayor London Breed and San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan.
But one need not be unhoused nor mentally ill, nor a substance abuser to qualify for being hauled into CARE Court, even if you haven’t committed a crime and are not a danger to yourself or others. First, a petition must be filed with the Court by “specified individuals” such as a relative, community member or police officer, and backed by a signed affidavit from a behavioral clinician diagnosing you as suffering from schizophrenia or other psychosis. If you insist you are sane, you might be suffering from “anosognosia,” or lack of awareness that you are ill, according to the Schizophrenia & Psychosis Action Alliance, which preaches “compassionate involuntary intervention.”
Ultimately, it is up to the CARE Court judge to speculate whether you have the decision- making capacity for your own medical care, depriving you of your right to self-determination.
Lawsuits are pending. Stay tuned.
Gloria A Lightheart was herself homeless for over seven years. Now living in subsidized housing, she continues to fight for the rights of the houseless.
This is horrifying. Anyone could be targeted for this – people who oppose police policies for example, or a relative who wants to take over a person’s property after they have been controlled by psychiatric drugs. I can think of SO many ways this is an abuse of power by the state.