Modulator

Incarcerated Without Charges

Most folks, with the notable exception of the bush administration, think it is wrong to incarcerate someone without filing legitimate criminal charges against them. It turns out that there may be others:

County health authorities obtained a court order to lock him up as a danger to the public because he failed to take precautions to avoid infecting others. Specifically, he said he did not heed doctors’ instructions to wear a mask in public.

Radly Balko asks what we should make of a case where it appears that just such an injustice may have occurred:

Now this guy softened the hard question a bit by refusing to take what I'd say were relatively unobtrusive precautionary measures. But I'm curious, what do H&R readers make of the collision of individual rights and the state's arguable (I'd say convincing) duty to protect us from highly-communicable, untreatable fatal diseases?

The idea that someone who's done nothing wrong could be condemned to an isolation cell for the remainder of his life is pretty horrifying.

Nothing wrong? The guy has a drug resistant strain of tuberculosis and apparently will not take precautions to protect others from the disease.

His behavior appears to fall into a category like attempted assault, reckless endangerment, etc. If so, charge him, prosecute him and incarcerate him.

There needs to be a set of court vetted rules of law that apply in cases like this and due process needs to apply.

Once convicted and incarcerated then the normal rules of incarceration for this type of behavior need to apply. This may be a bit unacceptable:

He said sheriff’s deputies will not let him take a shower — he cleans himself with wet wipes — and have taken away his television, radio, personal phone and computer.

There is no reason to provide convicted felons televisions, phones, radios or computers. But this guy is not a convicted felon and there should likely be different rules in this type of public health case.

Access basic hygiene should be mandatory.