PSYCHOTHERAPISTS, COUNSELORS AND THE COURTS

A One-Day Seminar on the Legal Implications of Clinical Work

November 2, 2003: 9:00 am - 4:30 pm
George Ignatieff Theatre, Trinity College, University of Toronto
15 Devonshire Place

 
 
 
 
    Clinical Notes in Legal Proceedings.
  • Regulated and Unregulated Practitioners
  • Confidentiality and Rights of Clients
  • Legal Responsibilities and Rights of Clinicians
  • Approaches to Note Taking
  • Notes and Lawyers—Notes and the Courts
    Encounters between Clinicians and Lawyers
  • Who is the clinician required to talk to?
  • Approaches to communications with lawyers
  • What are the legal implications of talking or not talking to lawyers?
  • Preparing a document for court use
    Clients and the Criminal Courts: The Clinician’s Role
  • Criminal court actions on behalf of the client
  • Criminal court actions against the client
  • Criminal court actions against the clinician
    Clients and the Civil Courts: The Clinician’s Role
  • Steps in civil actions for the client
  • Civil court actions against the client
  • Civil court actions against the clinician
    The Therapist or Counselor as a Witness in Court
  • As the clinician working with defendant or complainant
  • As an expert witness

 
 
PRESENTERS:

 
  Martin Peters is a criminal lawyer now based in Vancouver, B.C. He has acted for defendants, patients and practitioners with regards to criminal proceedings. Mr. Peters has had a great deal of experience in calling practitioners as expert witnesses. He also is routinely involved in obtaining production orders for client files or in restraining the granting of such orders.


Kirby Chown is a civil litigator with McCarthy Tetrault in Toronto. She routinely acts for physicians in civil proceedings and before the College of Physicians and Surgeons in discipline proceedings. She has a particular interest in representing psychotherapists in such proceedings. She deals frequently with experts in the field of psychiatry and psychotherapy in the context of civil and regulatory proceedings.


Joel Whitton, M.D., Ph.D. is a neuropsychiatrist and psychotherapist. From 1973 to 1997 he was actively involved in family, civil and criminal courts, and regulatory proceedings as an expert witness. He retired from medico-legal work in 1997. His expertise was sought from Vancouver to Halifax, and in several United States including Minnesota, Florida and West Virginia. In later years he specialized in sex abuse issues, and false memory conditions. His retirement is spent mostly writing, and old friends and colleagues still seek his advice on difficult therapeutic cases.


Adam Crabtree, Ph.D. is a member of the faculty of the Centre for Training in Psychotherapy, Toronto. Among other duties, he instructs therapists about the form and use of clinical notes. He supervises psychotherapists whose clients are involved in court cases and has served as expert witness in regard to psychotherapy in courts in Ontario and Nova Scotia, and also before the Tribunal of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario.

 
     
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