What happens if a person with Dementia physical abuses a women?
Dementia and police cases can be a tricky legal complication both for the police and for the judiciary.
Incase a person with Dementia has to be put behind bars, in that case, what are the provisions under Mental Healthcare Act to evaluate their mental capacity or mental soundness?
Since there is no mention of Dementia or Alzheimer’s in the Mental Healthcare Act in that case what are the rules for Dementia with respect to criminal proceedings?
If Mental Healthcare Act does not mention Dementia or Alzheimer’s and talks only about mental illness then what are the legal implications for a person with dementia incase of outraging the modesty of a woman?
An interesting article “Assessment of Dementia Under Prevailing Indian Laws and Its Implications” posted on Pubmed Central states;
The most common offenses by patients with Dementia include violence, sexual offense, and drugs-related offense. Others include theft, sexual harassment, and traffic offenses.
The larger point of debate is not about the crime but about the mental capacity of the person with Dementia to justify his/her case.
As per the article, a small number of elderly being sent to jail were unable to plead “not guilty because of Dementia” when committing their crimes.
Another critical aspect to consider in this context is the fitness of the elderly offender to plead and stand trial.
The trial procedures are often complicated and time-consuming, and the elderly offender with cognitive impairment may not understand the process well.
In addition to impairment in several cognitive domains, their physical conditions such as frailty, hearing, and visual impairment might also affect their ability to instruct their lawyers.
While on one hand, to evaluate the Dementia stage of a person through “Indian disability evaluation and assessment scale (IDEAS)” but then are the evaluators in rural areas and in the hinterlands competent to actually assess the level of memory impairment as there counterparts in the urban areas?
In short the critical questions are, can a person with Dementia be tried under IPC Section 376 (Rxpe) or IPC Section 354 (Outraging Modesty of Women).
I guess the policy makers and judiciary needs to take this grey area a bit more seriously and come out with clear cut rulings for future reference.
Pankaj Mehrotra