WEBVTT

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It's kind of interesting

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how this started.

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It was March of '72, if my

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recollection is correct,

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that another attorney in our office

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named Jeff Harche got a call

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from the Patient Advocate

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at Anoka State Hospital.

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Now Anoka was then

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and still is an institution for

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people with mental illness.

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But the Patient Advocate

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called and said that there

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was man in seclusion

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up there who needed legal

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representation because

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he was being held in seclusion for

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refusing to sign his treatment plan.

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And his treatment plan

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called for electroshock therapy.

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Jeff went up there and he

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interviewed the man,

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and we sued them in Federal

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Court, of course saying

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you could not condition... or you could not

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put somebody into seclusion for refusing an

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invasive procedure like electroshock.

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And the case settled

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late in the day that the

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Minneapolis Star at that time

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had this man's picture in his

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seclusion room on the front page of

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the second section.

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One of the persons that we sued

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was the acting Medical Director at Anoka

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at that time, Dr. Leonard Fielding,

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who called us up and said

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"You guys have better things to

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do than sue me" and suggested

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that we take a look at

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what was happening

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at Faribault and at Cambridge

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And Jeff Harche and Neil Mickenberg,

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who were in the office

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at that time, did that.

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And, of course, one look

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at the institutions

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at that time would indicate that

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something ought to happen.

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The conditions at that time were, I think,

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fairly described as horrendous.