In United States v. John Sterling Coad, Defendant-Appellant, the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals found that under 18 U.S.C. §§ 4241 and 4246, if a district court finds a criminal defendant incompetent and unable to be restored to competency for trial, the court can order the defendant’s temporary hospitalization for an evaluation, and possible certification, of his risk of bodily injury to another person or serious damage to property upon release. Defendant-Appellant Coad opposed the hospitalization. The appeal concerns the legality of the court’s hospitalization order.
The court ruled that once Coad’s hospitalization for competency treatment ended without his regaining competency, the district court lawfully ordered him hospitalized for a precertification dangerousness evaluation. But the court lacked authority to order an “examination and report” under § 4246(b). Only a court in the same judicial district as the hospital could order that. The court affirmed Defendant-Appellant’s hospitalization for a dangerousness evaluation and possible certification under § 4246(a), reversed the court’s ordering a § 4246(b) examination and report, and remanded back to the lower court for further proceedings.
Read the entire opinion here.