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Court sides with DCF secretary

By CHRIS TISCH
Published December 30, 2006

An appeals court has ruled that a North Florida judge did not have the authority to threaten to drop a mentally ill inmate at Department of Children and Families Secretary Lucy Hadi's office if her agency didn't remove him from jail.

A Pinellas judge, Crockett Farnell, took similar steps by threatening to jail and fine Hadi if her agency didn't remove inmates from the Pinellas County Jail. The DCF is also appealing Farnell's decisions.

Both judges became frustrated because the DCF wasn't following a law that requires it to transfer mentally ill inmates from local jails to mental hospitals within 15 days after they are declared incompetent or insane.

The DCF said it couldn't follow the law because all its mental hospitals were full and it had no money to provide more beds. A wait list swelled to more than 300 inmates.

The appeals court agreed with DCF lawyers that Hadi can't be held in contempt of court if she has no ability to comply with the law and isn't willfully ignoring it.

"In this case the trial judge's understandable frustration appears to have led him to issue an order that the DCF was incapable of complying with," the opinion from the 1st District Court of Appeal in Tallahassee states. "There is no evidence to demonstrate beds were available. Beds cannot be created without funding. Adequate funding is up to the Legislature."

Lawmakers, at the request of Gov. Jeb Bush, are expected to approve $16.6-million for more DCF beds during an emergency meeting next month. This month, Hadi announced that she was retiring because of "an accumulation of things."

[Last modified December 30, 2006, 01:05:59]