Berenson's article takes an interesting and important approach but it only brushes on one crucial issue which is the fact implicit in the article that the man facing commitment has never been helped by the drugs he's been forced to take or by being imprisoned in a psych hospital. The public defender in the commitment proceeding argues that "the hospital has not shown that treatment will improve him,” she said. The judge apparently reviewed the evidence and found her argument credible and futhermore found that he was able to survive outside of the hospital. I think the man has a god given right to his personality and opinions and wish him the best.

I thought it was unfortunate that the story stated that there was no debate that the man subject to commitment was "not fine". The victory Jim Gottstein won in Alaska was terrific but it does not stop Alaska from committing folks, it only makes it more difficult to force drug them. Also, it's not ironic that Jim was involved in both cases, it's connected. Go to www.psychright.org to see the connection. Jim legally obtained the Zyprexa documents in the course of litigating against forced drugging in Alaska's state hospital.

I wish we had a state in which it was not possible to commit folks to state hospitals, but such is not the case.

Having the 2 years of experience inside mental health court rooms with Judges that I do; I say BRAVO! to the Judge in Berenson's article!

That is unheard of, that Judge did a damn good thing! Keep on proving these inpatient doctors wrong with their opinions that locked up and medicated is the answer!

I thought Alex' article said that previous experience showed that Zyprexa and other atypicals had done this man no good. I thought it also said that he (Mr. Bigley) stopped taking them as soon as he got out of the hospital and that this had happened more than once. So, though I was thrilled to have the judge support Mr. Bigley (not violent, etc) to me it was hard to tell if the drugs had ever had a fair trial. But, most of all, I was glad that Mr. Bigley has figured out a way not to be killed by Zyprexa.

the best part of the judge ruling, was that NO treatment helped; whether it was Zyprexa or not; Bigley was not locked up for "annoying" behavior and being a so called nuisance in "society".

The judge made a decision that I have never witnessed in mental health court, and trust me i've been there as a fly on the wall for years.

it's all about freedom and civil liberties and not forcing medication, least restrictive environments---in essence the right to remain you. However you are.

This Bigley's] story is bigger than the Zyprexa lawsuit.

reading about Bigley helps me lose some anger about the agony Zyprexa caused; it gives hope where we need to place it. [the future].

Yes Stephany, it's a good decision and the Berenson article while not perfect is moving in the right direction. This may seem a bit tangental, but I think it's related - yesterday the Atlanta Journal had an article about how prisons were the de facto psych wards as so many prisoners are on psych drugs and labeled mentally ill. You've heard the tired rhetoric a zillion times from TAC. However, it occurs to me that everyone in prison is someone who has not been found to be "mentally ill." If they had been found to be mentally ill before prison they would have been not guilty by reason of insanity and locked in psych wards instead of prison, which finally gets me to my point, being involuntarily imprisoned whether in a prison or psych hospital causes mental illness. The prisoners aren't in prison because they're mentally ill, they're mentally ill because they're in prison. It's a similar situation in locked psych wards.