CCHR is continuing a campaign to educate Floridians on mental health rights so they can protect themselves and their loved ones from abusive use of this law.
The Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR), a non-profit mental health watchdog dedicated to the eradication of abuses committed under the guise of mental health, is continuing a campaign originally launched in 2015 to educate Floridians on mental health rights. The purpose of this campaign is to provide information to citizens so they can better protect themselves and their loved ones from abusive use of the mental health law.
Referred to as the Baker Act, the mental health law in Florida allows for individuals of all ages, including children, to be taken into custody and sent for an involuntary psychiatric examination. The most recent official report shows that there were more than 199,000 involuntary psychiatric examinations in Florida and that over 32,000 of these initiations where on children, some as young as two years of age. [1]
In addition to handing out information on the law at events across the state, CCHR began hosting seminars on Baker Act rights delivered by attorney Carmen Miller who, as a former Assistant Public Defender in the Thirteenth Circuit in Tampa, has a great deal of experience on the mental health law. Now in the private sector, Ms. Miller specializes in cases of those who have been Baker Acted.
“People need to know their rights under the law, especially when the law allows a person to be taken into custody against their will,” said the president of CCHR Florida, Diane Stein.
While the original stated intention of the Baker Act was to protect the rights of citizens sent for involuntary psychiatric examination, it has become a source of great abuse, abuse which CCHR is on a crusade to end. The complimentary Baker Act Rights Seminar is held monthly in the headquarters for the Florida chapter of CCHR located at 109 N. Fort Harrison Drive in downtown Clearwater. To learn more about the Baker Act or to reserve seats at the next seminar please call 727-442-8820.
About CCHR: Initially established by the Church of Scientology and renowned psychiatrist Dr. Thomas Szasz in 1969, CCHR’s mission is to eradicate abuses committed under the guise of mental health and enact patient and consumer protections. L. Ron Hubbard, founder of Scientology, first brought psychiatric imprisonment to wide public notice: “Thousands and thousands are seized without process of law, every week, over the ‘free world’ tortured, castrated, killed. All in the name of ‘mental health,’” he wrote in March 1969. For more information visit www.cchrflorida.org
Sources:
[1] Baker Act Reporting Center
