## Facts

- Alberta Lessard was taken by police to a Milwaukee mental health facility and detained under Wisconsin’s emergency detention procedures.
- Officers later presented allegations to a county judge ex parte; the judge authorized continued confinement for additional periods without notice to Lessard or anyone acting for her.
- A physician sought permanent commitment; the judge ordered medical examinations and extended temporary detention orders.
- The judge interviewed Lessard in the facility without advance notice; counsel was not appointed until afterward (as guardian ad litem).
- Lessard later received notice of a commitment hearing; after an adjournment to allow counsel to appear, she was committed for 30 days, with extensions on a month-to-month basis.
- Lessard filed a § 1983 class action seeking declaratory and injunctive relief, challenging Wisconsin’s involuntary civil commitment scheme as violating the Fourteenth Amendment.

## Issues

1. Whether due process permits extended involuntary detention under civil commitment statutes without prompt judicial review and adequate notice.
2. Whether due process requires timely appointment of counsel, an adversary hearing process, and the detained person’s right to be present and heard.
3. Whether due process requires defined commitment criteria (mental illness plus dangerousness) and a heightened burden of proof given the liberty deprivation.
4. Whether class-wide declaratory and injunctive relief was proper for persons subject to the challenged commitment procedures.

## Decision

- The three-judge district court entered judgment for the plaintiffs and found multiple aspects of Wisconsin’s civil commitment procedures unconstitutional under the Fourteenth Amendment.
- The court required a prompt judicial probable-cause hearing, generally within about 48 hours of detention, to determine probable cause that the person is mentally ill and dangerous.
- The court required a timely full commitment hearing (within a relatively short period, on the order of weeks), with meaningful opportunity to prepare and contest the state’s case.
- The court required adequate written and, when necessary, oral notice of the factual basis for detention and of procedural rights.
- The court held that the person has a right to counsel appointed early enough for effective representation and an unwaivable right to be present and heard at hearings.
- The court required heightened evidentiary safeguards, including a heightened standard of proof and constrained dangerousness determinations.
- The court granted class-wide declaratory and injunctive relief, invalidated Lessard’s commitment order, and allowed the state a period to bring procedures into compliance.

## Legal Principles

- Involuntary civil commitment is a severe deprivation of liberty that triggers stringent procedural due process protections.
- Due process requires a prompt judicial determination of probable cause for continued detention following emergency confinement.
- Due process requires a meaningful adversary process at commitment hearings, including the ability to present evidence and cross-examine witnesses.
- Due process requires timely appointment of counsel functioning as an advocate for the individual, not merely as a guardian ad litem serving the court.
- The detained person has an unwaivable right to be present and to be heard at commitment-related hearings.
- Due process requires adequate notice of allegations, legal standards, rights, and the witnesses and substance of testimony supporting confinement.
- Commitment must be limited to defined criteria (mental illness and dangerousness) proven under a heightened burden of proof.

## Conclusion

The court held that Wisconsin’s civil commitment scheme violated due process by allowing extended confinement without prompt judicial review, adequate notice, and effective adversary protections, and it imposed procedural requirements—prompt probable-cause hearings, timely full hearings, counsel, presence, and heightened proof—through class-wide declaratory and injunctive relief.


Lessard v. Schmidt, 349 F. Supp. 1078 (E.D. Wis. 1972)