John Manweiler was awarded almost €3 million by a High Court jury after it found he was unlawfully detained in a psychiatric hospital, and wrongly prescribed anti-psychotic drugs for more than a decade. He speaks for the first time about his experience to Carl O'Brien, Social Affairs Correspondent.
John Manweiler is quiet, withdrawn and almost painfully shy. He speaks in barely audible tones. He doesn't like socialising, dislikes crowded pubs and hates trying to fit in. By his own admission he is a loner.
"I'm not a sociable person," he says. "I've been like that all my life. I used to get teased about it in school . . . I don't have much to say to people. They'd say: 'That's John there - has he no tongue in his head?' Some people talk and talk and talk, have the gift of the gab, make everyone laugh. That's not me."
Manweiler (64) has led a solitary life. He is not married, has drifted from job to job, and now lives on his own in a local authority flat in Dundrum, Dublin. Yet, looking back on his life, the loneliest he ever felt was due to his treatment at the hands of the psychiatric service.
Three weeks ago he was awarded almost €3 million by a High Court jury which found he was unlawfully detained in a psychiatric hospital and prescribed an anti-psychotic drug for more than a decade because a consultant threatened to lock him up in a secure unit if he failed to take it. His case has raised questions about the sometimes murky procedures used to detain patients in psychiatric hospitals against their will, as well as the attitude of sections of the medical profession dealing with mental illness.
"You were told nothing," Manweiler says. "Nothing was ever explained. I complied with what I was told to do. It was either that or take a one-way ticket to another country. I'm not the sort to do that. I'm very slow to move."
The sequence of events which led to Manweiler's involuntary detention in St Brendan's Hospital, Grangegorman, from September until December 1984 began when he overheard a conversation in the sitting room of his parents' house in Blackrock. At the time he was living at home and had been made redundant from a job on the assembly line with the television company, Pye.
Standing at a partition between rooms, he says he heard his mother and sister and a solicitor discussing changes to his father's will. An earlier will had been cancelled and a new one was to be drawn up leaving the family house at Cross Avenue to his sister, Pauline. He had been left out of the entire process, he told the High Court.
"This really upset me. I felt very disappointed. She was going to be the sole beneficiary . . ."
Around two years later, on September 20th, 1984, after his father died, Manweiler was at home. His mother, aged 83, was suffering from dementia. He had been cleaning some rusting tools in paraffin earlier in the day, but found they had been moved.
"I asked her if she had moved the tools and she said no," he says. "I got a bit annoyed. When I found them, I said she must have moved them. I threw the tools into a flower bed. She was very surprised and said she was afraid, that she would report me to one of the family. I couldn't understand why she would be afraid. I never threatened her, I never threatened anyone."
His sister Pauline and a brother, Colm, arrived at the house later and, Manweiler says, told him he had to go to St Brendan's psychiatric hospital. He told the High Court that Pauline warned him that if he did not go voluntarily, he would be "committed". He didn't want to go, but felt he had little option.
He was signed in as a voluntary patient. The next day he was told his clothes were being taken away and he would have to wear pyjamas from now on.
When he was seen by a doctor, the notes at the time recorded: "Chronic mild depression. Schizoid personality. Short stay only. Then day care." This note was to prove crucial in the High Court case 20 years later.
A schizoid personality is a disorder characterised typically by traits such as emotional coldness, a preference for solitary activities and a lack of close friends. It is a personality disorder, not a mental illness, and does not typically respond to anti-psychotic drugs.
A week later the head psychiatrist, Dr Henry Burke, concluded that Manweiler was mentally ill and changed his status from a voluntary to an involuntary patient under the Mental Treatment Act (1945).
Burke told the High Court that he did this partly on the basis of evidence of a history of violence he obtained from a nurse who was familiar with the patient and the family. Manweiler spent the next three months as an involuntary patient.
"All I remember is the boredom. We'd play draughts. That's all I remember. And TV. We had no personal belongings, no privacy . . . I just wanted to get out of there," says Manweiler, recalling life on ward 3A. "There were all sorts there. There was a man with a stroke, there were some very elderly people. There were some alcoholics as well."
During this three-month detention, he was interviewed by a psychologist, who confirmed that he did not have any psychosis. Despite this, Burke prescribed Manweiler Clopixol, an anti-psychotic drug used to alleviate symptoms often associated with manic depression, such as paranoia and hallucinations. Burke told the High Court he did this because of Manweiler's "history of violence". Manweiler still remembers the first injection.
"After an hour or so I didn't know what was coming over me," he says. "I had no control over some of my arm; my hand was moving around. I couldn't control my hand."
Manweiler maintains that Burke told him that if he did not have the injections, he would be detained in locked secure unit 8A. Dr Burke vehemently denied this in court.
After his discharge in December 1984, Manweiler continued receiving treatment on an outpatient basis, and was prescribed the anti-psychotic drug for the next 11 years. He says he complained of the side-effects of the drug and insisted he was not mentally ill.
Burke retired in 1991. In October 1994 Manweiler was told by another psychiatrist he was to be taken off the drug. He then began to pick up the pieces of his life. He was prompted by a sympathetic nurse to make an official complaint about his treatment.
When the Freedom of Information Act was passed, he finally got access to records he had been seeking for years. He also spent time reading up on aspects of mental illness.
"The more I read, the more I realised what had happened," he says. "I'd spent a lot of time in bookshops, reading up about schizoid personality. They were probably wondering who is this character who keeps coming in but doesn't buy any books."
When the jury in the case considered five key questions relating to Manweiler's detention and treatment, they found in his favour on each point. In addition, the jury found that health authorities had aggravated the injury to him by the manner in which they conducted their defence of the action. Manweiler was characteristically restrained when the ruling came. There was no outburst, just relief at being vindicated.
"I was confident. I'm not sure why. I wasn't elated," he says, in soft tones. "People say to me, look at all the money. I never had any money in my life. I have savings, I get the disability benefit. That's all I need. . . What I can do now is try to put it all at the back of my mind and begin to forget about it."