Wisconsin Law Blog

Date: 11/13/2008

By RYAN J. FOLEY
Associated Press Writer

MADISON, Wis. (AP) _ A Wisconsin man who gunned down a Catholic priest and two others in 1985 should be released from a mental hospital, an appeals court ruled Thursday.

The District 4 Court of Appeals directed state health authorities to prepare to release Bryan Stanley from the Mendota Mental Health Institute with conditions.

The court said state lawyers failed to prove that releasing Stanley, 53, would present a danger to himself or the public. The decision overturns a ruling by a La Crosse County judge who had denied Stanley’s request for release.

Stanley was suffering from psychosis when he walked into St. Patrick’s Catholic Church in Onalaska and gunned down the parish priest, a lay minister and a custodian. Angry the priest was allowing girls to give Scripture readings during Mass, the 29-year-old Army washout claimed to be a prophet sent to cleanse the church.

Stanley was found not guilty by reason of mental disease and was committed to Mendota, a state psychiatric hospital in Madison.

In recent years, Stanley has been given greater freedom as his schizophrenia has been managed with medication. He was moved to an unlocked, minimum security unit at Mendota in 2006 and has been allowed to work part-time in the community and take classes at a local technical college.

He also has spent years researching and writing a 280-page book, “The Becoming of Driftless Rivers National Park,” a cultural and natural history of southwestern Wisconsin.

Department of Justice spokesman Bill Cosh said the state was considering whether to appeal to the Wisconsin Supreme Court. If it doesn’t, the state Department of Health Services will be required to present a plan to a judge for the conditions attached to Stanley’s release.

If approved, he would be released under conditions that would likely include an ankle bracelet so the state can track his whereabouts, staff supervision of his medicine intake and meetings with a case manager and probation agent. That protocol would protect the community, and Stanley would be taken back into custody if he posed a risk, state officials say.

Attorney Tom Hayes, who represented Stanley during his appeal, called on authorities to quickly approve that plan and release his client. Stanley is ready to follow any conditions imposed by the court, said Hayes, who wasn’t sure where Stanley would want to live.

“He’s exhibited an ability to be a pro-social member of any community over the last 15 years,” Hayes said.

Referring to Stanley’s writing, Hayes said, “He’s a very talented person. And now with the proper medication that stabilized his condition, he was able to develop that talent.”

Two doctors — one who treated Stanley at Mendota and another appointed by the court to examine him — both supported his petition for conditional release. They testified that he has a good chance of succeeding in the community as long as he continues taking his medicine.

La Crosse County Judge Ramona Gonzalez had denied Stanley’s petition for release last year, citing instances of him refusing or getting off his medications. She said that created a risk for dangerous behavior that “I am not willing to take … based upon what this crime was all about.”

But appeals court Judge Burnie Bridge, writing for a unanimous three-judge panel, said Gonzalez was mistaken. Testimony showed Stanley had refused to take his medicine for one day in 1993 and that was because it created harsh side effects; since he switched medications 15 years ago, he has never refused.

The evidence was not “clear and convincing” that Stanley would present a danger as required under state law to keep him committed, she wrote.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.