Adams v. Board of Sedgwick County Commissioners

The opinion of the court was delivered by

Luckert, J.:

In this appeal, we hold that an outpatient mental health center and its employees did not owe a duty to those injured by a psychiatric patient who became violent 9 months after an outpatient treatment order was allowed to expire, even though there existed a basis for the continuation of the order. We conclude that an outpatient mental health treatment facility does not take charge of an outpatient subject to an outpatient treatment order in a manner that gives rise to a duty to control the outpatient’s conduct or to protect others from the…