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Regardless Of The State In Which They Are Operating, Mental

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Regardless of the State in which they are operating, mental health counselors are held to strict guidelines and laws that aim to keep the therapist-client relationship ethical and confidential. In the video, “Legal and Ethical Issues for Mental Health Professionals, Vol 1: Confidentiality, Privilege, Reporting, and Duty to Warn,” a conversation is directed by a judge on the rules and exceptions of these four topics, and how they relate to the therapist-client relationship. Within the video, three separate cases are reviewed, including the ruling decisions that were made by the state courts in their charge. This paper will seek to outline the laws that pertain to confidentiality, duty to warn, mandatory reporting, and privilege in the state …show more content…

Confidentiality and privilege were the subject of the second case, as a police officer was called to the home where a domestic dispute was reported. The cop witnessed a woman being chased by a man, who was holding a knife in his hand. The police officer, after surveying the gravity of danger shot and killed the man, to protect the woman from the imminent danger that was perceived. As with most police shootings, the cop was placed on leave, and began counseling sessions to work through the grief and trauma that the shooting brought forth. A wrongful death lawsuit was filed against the police officer by the mother of the victim, claiming that her son was misrepresented as yielding a knife in the attack, when in reality, he did not. The mother of the victim sought to obtain the mental health counselor’s notes from the officer’s sessions to back her claim, however the officer did not sign a release of information, thus sustaining the police officer’s confidentiality within their sessions. Ultimately, the police officer was required by the judge to do one of two things. Release the therapist’s notes, or force the judge to rule in favor of the victim’s mother. The victim’s mother received half a million dollars in the suit, as the officer refused to release their confidential therapy notes, which the Supreme Court ruled that counseling notes are to be kept confidential and not to be disclosed (Sommers, 2008). Duty to harm was the topic of the

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