INSANE WIFE

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLII, Issue 20514, 4 September 1936, Page 4

INSANE WIFE

HUSBAND’S SUIT FOR DIVORCE A LEGAL POINT ARGUED By Telegraph—Press Association AUCKLAND, September 3. The legal question whether a person who voluntarily enters a mental hospital can be said to be “confined" there was at issue in divorce proceedings heard by Mr Justice Callan in the Supreme Court. Petitioner was married to respondent in 1920 at Auckland. Mr Coates represented petitioner and Mr Meredith appeared for the solici-tor-general as guardian ad litem. Mr Coates said it was alleged by' petitioner that respondent was a person of unsound mind and had been attended as such for a period of seven years. The only point on which there was contention was whether or not respondent had been a person confined within the meaning of sub-section 10 F of the Divorce and Matrimonial Causes Act, 1928. This sets out as a ground for divorce that respondent is a person of unsound mind and unlikely to recover, and has been confined as such in an institution for seven years out of the preceding 10. Mr Coates said he would submit that a voluntary boarder was a person "confined” as of unsound mind within the meaning of the sub-section. Petitioner said there was one child, and shortly after Its birth his wife had a severe mental breakdown. She entered the Auckland mental hospital at Avondale in 1922, and was in and out of it for some years. The last time she entered it was on March 19, 1929. He visited her there, but she did not know him. The medical superintendent of the Auckland Mental Hospital, Dr. H. M. Buchanan,, gave particulars of respondent’s admissions and discharges from the hospital from 1922 to March, 1929. when she was admitted as a voluntary boarder. Her degree of insanity was such that she could have been lawfully committed as a patient at any time. Since her last admission her condition had got steadily worse, and he was sure there was no possibility of her recovery. He thought she could have been committed in March. 1929. Witness said there were many voluntary boarders whom he could not commit. Mental disease generally tended to be a matter of growth, and if treated in time might be prevented. The voluntary boarder system was extensively used.

Mr Meredith: Which way do the majority go?—The majority get better. Mr Coates said it was. clear from the evidence that respondent had in fact been detained in the institution for a period of upwards of seven years, and that at any time within that period she was certifiable. His Honour said that in mental unsoundness, which was a matter of degree, there was room for an infinite difference of opinion, and in many cases the most eminent alienists could be assembled on both sides. Parliament had decided to require, in addition to expert opinion, proof of the fact that the patient had actually been locked up as mentally unsound in a mental hospital. His Honour said he regarded this morally as a perfectly clear case, but he had to be careful not to open the door to the possibility of a very grave scandal. A husband might persuade his wife, who was nervously upset, to become al voluntary boarder and then afterwards use that as a ground of divorce. Mr Meredith said the Act indicated that a person who qualified for a reception order should not be taken as a voluntary boarder,- showing that it was intended to keep the two classes distinct. Decision was reserved.