Milligan's pretrial commitment to Harding Hospital was a legal and clinical turning point: it shifted William Milligan from the Franklin County Jail into psychiatric care after doctors questioned whether he could participate in his defense. The move did not decide whether he was responsible for the charged offenses. Instead, it brought the immediate question of competency—his present ability to work with counsel and take part in court—to the foreground, while placing him in an institution expected to examine and treat him before trial.

From jail evaluation to a competency dispute

While Milligan was in jail, Gary Schweickart and Judy Stevenson continued visiting him despite a letter from Milligan dismissing them. The public defenders’ office released funds for a psychological evaluation, and on January 8 and 13, 1978, clinical psychologist Willis C. Driscoll administered a battery of tests. Milligan received an IQ score of 68, which Driscoll attributed in part to depression. Driscoll diagnosed acute schizophrenia and described a severe disturbance in Milligan’s sense of identity and ability to distinguish himself from his surroundings. He reported that Milligan heard voices directing and berating him, and that Milligan described both tormenting figures and benevolent people who entered his body to oppose them. Driscoll concluded that Milligan could not then assist in his defense or adequately understand events, and recommended hospitalization for further examination and possible treatment.

On January 19, Schweickart and Stevenson presented Driscoll’s report to Judge Jay C. Flowers as evidence that Milligan could not help prepare his defense. Flowers ordered an examination by the forensic psychiatry unit at Southwest Community Mental Health Center. The order brought a new difficulty: the public defenders feared that information Milligan disclosed to the court-appointed clinicians might later be used against him, while Gary Schweickart and Judy Stevenson were concerned that Southwest generally supported the prosecution’s position.

The disagreement became a dispute over confidentiality as well as clinical access. Schweickart insisted that disclosures during the examination remain privileged. Prosecutors Terry Sherman and Bernie Yavitch objected, and the defense threatened to tell Milligan not to speak with the Southwest clinicians. Judge Flowers came close to holding the lawyers in contempt. The parties ultimately agreed that prosecutors could question Milligan about incriminating statements made during the examination only if he testified in his own defense. With that limited protection in place, the defense allowed the forensic unit to interview him.

Harding’s assessment and the admission decision

In a letter dated March 13, 1978, Dr. George Harding, Jr., concluded that Milligan was not competent to stand trial. The stated grounds were his inability to cooperate with his attorney and his lack of the emotional integration Harding considered necessary for testifying, confronting witnesses, and maintaining an effective psychological presence in court. The assessment concerned Milligan’s ability to participate in proceedings; it was not itself a finding about his mental state when the alleged offenses occurred.

Harding then had to decide whether to recommend admission to the hospital he directed. Schweickart and Yavitch had asked him to go beyond a competency evaluation and seek examination and treatment at Harding Hospital. Harding weighed the unusual involvement of a prosecutor in the interview against the assurances from both sides that he would not be cast as an advocate for either party. They agreed in advance that his report would enter the trial record by stipulation. Harding presented the admission request to the hospital administrator and finance officer, arguing that the hospital should take on difficult cases and that the evaluation could contribute to staff learning and psychiatric knowledge. On his recommendation, the committee agreed to admit Milligan for the three months mandated by the court.

Transfer to a locked hospital unit

The transition began under restraint. On March 14, officers came to take Milligan from jail, and a guard said the sheriff required him to go in a straitjacket. Milligan did not resist as it was fastened and he was led from his cell to the elevator. He arrived at Harding Hospital on the morning of March 16, two days ahead of schedule. Dr. Harding had assembled and briefed a treatment team but was away at a psychiatric meeting in Chicago. Dr. Shoemaker, a staff physician, agreed to take personal charge until Harding returned, and the deputy transferred custody of the prisoner to the hospital.

Judy Stevenson and Dorothy Turner had followed the police car to Harding Hospital. They understood that returning Danny to jail would be a severe setback, and accompanied him to Wakefield Cottage, a locked psychiatric unit designed for fourteen difficult-to-manage patients requiring constant observation and personal attention. Staff prepared a bed in one of its two special-care rooms. Heavy oak doors had peepholes for continuous observation; a psychiatric aide brought lunch, and Stevenson and Turner stayed with him while he ate. The details of the placement made the change in setting tangible: Milligan was no longer in a jail cell, but neither was he in an open ward. He entered a closely supervised hospital unit under a court-ordered period of evaluation and treatment.

After lunch, Dr. Shoemaker and three nurses joined the women. Turner believed it important for staff to observe the reported multiple-personality syndrome directly, so she suggested that Danny bring Arthur forward to meet some of the people who would work with him. Nurse Adrienne McCann, the unit coordinator, had already been briefed as part of the treatment team; two other nurses were taken by surprise. The scene introduced a practical tension that would shape treatment: clinicians needed to understand the identities Milligan described, while staff also had to decide how those accounts would fit within a shared ward and its routines.

The clinical label and the legal questions

The hospital admission placed Milligan’s reported experiences within a clinical setting, but it did not settle the case’s legal questions. During later proceedings, Judge Flowers dismissed the first rape count for lack of corroborating evidence and a similar pattern of conduct. For counts two through ten, he relied on stipulated medical evidence that Milligan had been mentally ill at the time of the offenses, unable to distinguish right from wrong, and unable to refrain from the acts. The resulting finding of not guilty by reason of insanity addressed criminal responsibility at the time of the acts, a question distinct from the earlier determination that Milligan could not assist in his defense at the time of evaluation.

That distinction gives the commitment its place in the larger sequence: Driscoll’s and Harding’s evaluations supported the need for hospitalization and raised the competency issue; Harding Hospital supplied a supervised setting for examination and treatment; and the later trial addressed responsibility for the charged conduct under a different legal standard. The hospital’s clinical description also followed Milligan beyond the pretrial period. In a later court-ordered hospitalization proceeding, a judge identified multiple personality as his diagnosis and required that treatment be consistent with it. The label thus moved among clinical reports, courtroom decisions, and institutional plans, changing how Milligan’s condition was described and how care was arranged without collapsing those separate decisions into one.