CASE STUDY

CASE:

The patient, Wessner, had been voluntarily admitted to a facility for psychiatric

care. Wessner was upset over his wife extramarital affair. He had repeatedly

threatened to kill her and her lover and had even admitted to a therapist that he

was carrying a weapon in his car for that purpose. He was given an unrestricted

weekend pass to visit his children, who were living with his wife. He met his wife

and her lover in the home and shot and killed them. The children filed a wrongful

death suit alleging that the psychiatric center had breached a duty to exercise

control over Wessner.

This is a case of malpractice and negligence of the psychiatric center. The psychiatric

negligence caused two persons to die because they were unable to control their patient and grant

the patient an unrestricted weekend pass to visit his children. There are several pertinent facts

that the psychiatric center should have paid more attention to.

In terms of confidentiality, the counselors at the psychiatric center may disclose the

information of the patient may proved to be dangerous to the wife and the lover. Even in

Malaysia’s Act 580, the counselor may disclose the information of the patient because he poses a

threat and in his current condition, he is not fit to meet anyone from his family. However, the

counselor failed to recognize this and still grant him a weekend pass. The fact that the patient’s

malice towards his wife and lover is obvious and knowing that fact, how can the counselor

approve of his weekend pass? Was there an order from a higher up or was the patient uses some
ways to persuade the counselor to give him the pass? If there was, then the psychiatric center

should have brought the matter to light as to have justice.

As counselors, we should care about not only the client but the others as well, especially

if there is malice intention towards others. Callanan & Corey (2007) applied that in the case of

the client presents maladaptive behavior towards another individual, the counselor may disclose

the information of client either to the individual mentioned or the authorities, to ensure that the

client do not perform anything dangerous. In this case, the children were right to sue the

psychiatric center as they are the ones held responsible to the wife and the lover’s death. The

children were sure to win the case as they are the ones who received the collateral damage from

the killings. The privileged communication in the case of Wessner’s are waived because of his

actions. In court the counselor in charge of Wessner would be held responsible for granting him

the unrestricted weekend pass. He or she would most probably be asked to divulge the

information as to shed some light on the matter.

The counselors of the psychiatric center have the duty to protect the ones whoever has the

potential to be harmed by the client. According to Bednar (1991), the counselors must exercise

the ordinary skill and care of a reasonable professional to (1) identify those clients who are likely

to do physical hard to third parties, (2) protect third parties from those clients judged potentially

dangerous and (3) treat those clients who are dangerous. In Wessner’s case, the counselors are

presented with the fact that he is dangerous to his wife and her lover. The patient confessed and

this shows that the counselors are well-informed of his behavior. There can be no excuse for the

counselors to say that they are now aware of the fact that the patient is potentially dangerous. If

the supervising officer wants to grant the person a weekend pass, he would have to review his

file to check the current status. If the file says that he is, there is no reason that the officer should
grant the pass. For the second point, the counselors failed miserably, seeing as two people died.

There is no justification or discussion on this point because the results are obvious. For the third

point, there is no information given based on the case study, therefore, it can be assumed that

there may or may not be sessions for Wessner. He is most probably caught and sentenced to jail

or death. He might be sentenced to a mental health facility. There are a lot of guesswork, but

since there is no information regarding the status of Wessner after the murder, we can only do as

much.

To conclude, there are a lot of loopholes in this case where the counselors at the

psychiatric center failed to uphold their duties to protect the third parties who are in danger to the

threat posed by the patient and because of their negligence, two people died. This just shows how

serious the position as counselors is. We need to be professional and work according to the rules

and the code of conduct and also abide by the ethical codes.