Jimmie Fielding, Appellant, v. Winfred Overholser, Superintendent, St. Elizabeths Hospital, Appellee, 268 F.2d 898 (D.C. Cir. 1959)

Consequent upon our opinion in Fielding v. United States, 1957, 102 U.S.App. D.C. 167, 251 F.2d 878, a judgment of acquittal by reason of insanity was entered and Fielding was committed to St. Elizabeths Hospital. His petition for a writ of habeas corpus brought pursuant to D.C.Code § 24-301 (Supp. VII, 1959) failed to allege that petitioner "will not in the reasonable future be dangerous to himself or others." The Superintendent in response to the District Court's rule to show cause filed a sworn return disclosing that petitioner is suffering from a mental illness, schizophrenic reaction, paranoid type, and that the Superintendent "is not warranted in certifying, at this time, that the petitioner has recovered from his abnormal mental condition and that he will not be dangerous to himself or others within the reasonable future." Petitioner failed thereafter to traverse or otherwise to put in issue the conclusions of the Superintendent. He filed no supplemental pleading to allege that the failure of the Superintendent to issue the statutory certificate was arbitrary or capricious. On the record so stated, the district judge concluded that a hearing was not necessary. We have reviewed the record and have concluded that there is no error. Cf. Stewart v. Overholser, 1950, 87 U.S. App.D.C. 402, 186 F.2d 339 (en banc).

Affirmed.