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The Indiana Supreme Court denied 12 transfer petitions and granted one for the week ending Feb. 23, agreeing to hear a case involving whether criminal contempt defendants are entitled to the appointment of mental health experts.
The case granted transfer is Russell Finnegan v. State of Indiana, 24S-MI-68.
In that case, appellant-defendant Russell Finnegan was charged with indirect criminal contempt of court and was ordered to show cause why he shouldn’t be held in contempt.
The Pulaski Circuit Court’s show-cause order said Finnegan, proceeding pro se, had “filed a document … that is obnoxious, profane, and attempts to undermine the Court’s authority, justice, independence, and dignity.”
Following a hearing, Special Judge John Potter found Finnegan in indirect criminal contempt. The court then began to receive “vulgar, misogynistic, inappropriate and harassing correspondence” from Finnegan.
During a hearing in January 2023, with Special Judge David Chidester presiding, Finnegan’s counsel alerted the trial court that there were mental health issues and that they were in the process of having a mental health evaluation completed in an unrelated criminal case that was also pending in the court.
A few weeks later, Finnegan filed notice of intent to raise the defense of mental disease or defect and requested that the trial court appoint medical personnel to evaluate his mental health and testify at the contempt hearing. His counsel also filed a motion for continuance to allow more time for the results of the evaluation.
Chidester denied the motion for continuance and never ruled on the notice.
Following the final contempt hearing, Chidester issued an order finding Finnegan in indirect criminal contempt. The trial court imposed a sanction of almost six months in the Department of Correction.
Finnegan then appealed, arguing the trial court abused its discretion in failing to appoint medical personnel to evaluate his mental health and testify at his criminal contempt hearing.
The Court of Appeals of Indiana agreed.
According to the COA, Chidester had remarked that he didn’t believe Finnegan was mentally ill based on prior observations and interactions. And for its part, the state said Finnegan “was simply ‘not entitled’ to file that notice and obtain the statutory mental health evaluations because a contempt proceeding is not a ‘trial of a criminal case’ as contemplated by Indiana Code Section 35-36-2-2.”
But determining a criminal contempt proceeding is, in fact, a “trial of a criminal case” under I.C. 35-36-2-2, the COA held, “Accordingly, defendants like Finnegan, who are held to answer for criminal contempt and face the same array of punishments as do other criminal defendants, are entitled to the same statutory protections afforded other criminal defendants, including the right to file a notice of insanity defense and obtain the appointment of appropriate experts to testify at the contempt proceedings.”
Oral arguments in Finnegan have not yet been scheduled.
Among the cases denied transfer is Joe Alcozar, et. al. v. Orthopedic Sports and Medicine Center of Northern Indiana, et al., 22A-CT-909, which involves several patients in St. Joseph and Elkhart counties who were injured or killed after being given injections of preservative-free methylprednisolone acetate, a steroid purchased from New England Compounding Pharmacy.
According to court records, more than 100 people affected filed a lawsuit.
In 2016, the appellate court ruled that the plaintiffs’ claims against an anonymous clinic and the defendants were subject to provisions of the Indiana Medical Malpractice Act.
Then in 2018, the plaintiffs moved for preliminary determination/partial summary judgment on their prescription-law claims before the St. Joseph and Elkhart Superior Courts. Both trial courts denied the partial summary judgment motions and found the cases first had to be presented to medical review panels.
The MPRs led to the filing of a motion for preliminary determination by ASC Surgical Ventures LLC in Elkhart County and a joint motion in St. Joseph County.
In St. Joseph County, the judge found the plaintiffs’ claims of prescription-drug-law violations by the anonymous clinic should be presented to the MRPs in each case and rejected its preemption argument.
Conversely, the Elkhart County judge denied the plaintiffs’ motion for partial summary judgment and found that they were asserting fraud on the Food and Drug Administration, which was preempted by the federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. It also found that the plaintiffs’ negligence per se claims based on ASC’s violations of Indiana’s Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act were preempted.
On appeal, the COA affirmed the judgment of the Elkhart County court in its entirety but reversed the St. Joseph County court.
“Because Plaintiffs cannot establish that Defendants’ alleged statutory violations caused their injuries or, indeed, that Defendants have violated any federal or state prescription-drugs law whatsoever, any questions regarding negligence per se and preemption are moot,” Judge Cale Bradford wrote. “Even if we were to assume that an MMA plaintiff could discuss allegations of statutory violations in the MRP under certain circumstances (a question we leave for another day), Plaintiffs certainly cannot continue to press those claims in this case.”
The case was remanded in St. Joseph County with instructions to enter summary judgment in favor of the defendants on the plaintiffs’ federal and state prescription-law claims.
Justices Mark Massa and Derek Molter voted to deny transfer to that case while Chief Justice Loretta Rush and Justice Christopher Goff voted to grant the petition to transfer. Justice Geoffrey Slaughter did not participate in the decision.
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