Written by attorneys — see sources below.
A disordered mental state marked by confusion, disorientation, and often hallucinations or delusions. It typically arises during illness, after surgery, or from intoxication and prevents the affected person from understanding the nature and consequences of their actions.
Denise Donovan, recovering from surgery, became delirious and threatened to jump from her hospital window. Nurse Dwight Dorsey locked the door and windows to stop her. Donovan later sued Dorsey for false imprisonment. The court held that Dorsey's actions were privileged because the delirium created an immediate risk of self-harm that justified intervention without consent.
Dwight Dorsey, held in solitary confinement for months, developed delirium with hallucinations and disorientation. He challenged his conditions as cruel and unusual punishment. The court considered medical evidence that prolonged isolation predictably produces delirium and related psychiatric harm.
Oklahoma has long used a three-drug protocol for executions. The first drug, a barbiturate, is intended to induce a state of unconsciousness. The second drug, a paralytic, is intended to paralyze the inmate and stop breathing. The third drug, potassium chloride, is intended to stop the heart. In 2009, Oklahoma began using a three-drug protocol consisting of sodium thiopental, pancuronium bromide, and potassium chloride. In 2010, after the sole American manufacturer of sodium thiopental announced that it would no longer produce the drug, Oklahoma began using pentobarbital in place of sodium thiopental. In 2013, after that manufacturer also ceased production of pentobarbital, Oklahoma announced that it would use midazolam in place of the barbiturate. On January 15, 2014, Oklahoma executed Charles Warner using the new protocol. Warner had filed a §1983 action challenging the constitutionality of Oklahoma’s lethal injection protocol, but the District Court denied his motion for a preliminary injunction, and the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed. On the day of Warner’s execution, petitioners, all Oklahoma death row inmates, filed a §1983 action in federal district court. They contended that the use of midazolam in Oklahoma’s execution protocol violates the Eighth Amendment because it is incapable of rendering a person insensate to pain. In December 2014, after discovery, the District Court held a 3-day evidentiary hearing on the preliminary injunction motion. The District Court denied the motion for a preliminary injunction. The Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed. Oklahoma executed Warner on January 15, 2015, but the Supreme Court subsequently stayed the executions of Glossip, Cole, and Grant pending the resolution of this case.
View caseDoris Duffy, a chronic alcoholic, was arrested for public intoxication. She later experienced delirium tremens during withdrawal. The court examined whether her condition constituted a disease that excused criminal liability for the underlying conduct.
In late December 1966, appellant Leroy Powell was arrested and charged with being found in a state of intoxication in a public place in violation of Texas Penal Code, Art. 477 (1952). He was tried in the Corporation Court of Austin, Texas, found guilty, and fined twenty dollars. He appealed to the County Court at Law No. 1 of Travis County, Texas, where a trial de novo was held. At the county court trial without a jury, the defense presented testimony from psychiatrist Dr. David Wade, who had examined Powell and testified that he is a chronic alcoholic with an uncontrollable compulsion to drink and that he loses the power to control his drinking. Powell testified that he works at a tavern shining shoes, makes about twelve dollars a week which he uses to buy wine, drinks wine every day, gets drunk about once a week, and usually goes to sleep in public places such as the sidewalk when drunk. The arresting officer testified that Powell staggered when he walked, that his speech was slurred, and that he smelled strongly of alcohol. The trial court entered findings of fact that chronic alcoholism is a disease which destroys the afflicted person's will power to resist the constant, excessive consumption of alcohol, that a chronic alcoholic does not appear in public by his own volition but under a compulsion symptomatic of the disease of chronic alcoholism, and that Powell is a chronic alcoholic who is afflicted with the disease. The court nevertheless convicted Powell and fined him fifty dollars. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed the conviction. Powell appealed to the United States Supreme Court, which noted probable jurisdiction. The record shows Powell had been convicted of public intoxication approximately one hundred times since 1949 and that he works shining shoes, earns about twelve dollars a week, and uses his earnings to buy wine, getting drunk about once a week usually in public places.
View caseA person must possess mental capacity to make or revoke a donative transfer such as a revocable trust. Delirium that produces confusion about one's role, the current year, or the nature of the transaction shows the settlor cannot understand the property, beneficiaries, or disposition. Courts therefore invalidate the amendment and leave the prior trust in effect.
Supporting sources
Delirium that leads a person to threaten suicide or other self-harm creates an emergency privilege. Another may lock doors or apply reasonable restraints to prevent the harm. The privilege arises independently of consent when immediate action is needed to avert injury a reasonable person would seek to avoid.
Supporting sources
No. The inquiry focuses on whether the donor could understand the nature and extent of the property, the natural objects of bounty, and the disposition at the moment of execution. Nursing notes documenting disorientation and mistaken beliefs supply evidence of incapacity, but the court must weigh all facts surrounding the signing.
Supporting sources
…of limiting their alcoholic intake to a reasonable amount—and yet who display severe withdrawal symptoms, sometimes including delirium tremens, when deprived of their daily portion of wine. M. Block, Alcoholism—Its Facets and Phases 27 (1965); Jellinek, supra , n. 2, at 17. See generally id. , at 13-32. :…