engleski

Civil law and forensic psychiatry

There are two main areas in which forensic psychiatry develops: criminal law and civil law. Contrary to criminal law, in civil law cases it is not the state that starts the legal procedure, but some interested party: Centre for social services, family members of patients with mental disorders and patients themselves. Civil law forensic psychiatry is concerned with individual rights and capabilities: the legal capacity (to exercise one’s rights), capacity to participate in legal actions, parental capacity (to care for children), capacity to write a will (testament), and compensation for non-material damage. In all of these cases the forensic psychiatrist first needs to determine if the person suffers from some mental disorder. By default, every person who is 18 has the legal capacity to exercise one’s right. Only if there is some mental disorder that directly influences person’s capacities to understand his/her rights or the volitional capacities to follow his/her actions, these legal capacities can be reduced. Also, it is necessary for a forensic psychiatrist to clearly describe how this disorder reduces person’s capacities. Some new developments in this area will be described in the paper. For example, with the passage of a new act, legal capacity can be reduced only in part (previously, it was possible to assess a person as having no remaining capacities – i.e. the capacity was lost in all domains). Now, specific domains in which a person is not able to execute his/her will have to be specifically stated. In case of psychiatric evaluation of a non-material damage due to some event, a forensic psychiatrist needs to establish all the psychiatric symptoms and syndromes (even if they are only partial syndromes, and not fully developed disorders). Also, it is important to describe how these mental symptoms influence the capacity of a person to fully lead his own life.

forensic psychiatry ; forensic evaluation ; civil law ; legal capacity ; compensation

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