It’s been a fraught and, in one instance, poignantly tragic month for three detained individuals who gained their liberty. We have had ‘fanatical hate preacher’ Abu Qatada’s release from jail after almost a decade’s detention without charge.

We have had a prisoner dressed in blue and yellow pyjamas, not dissimilar to the ones my children wore when toddlers, who escaped from a van while being taken from prison to court. And we have had a Supreme Court ruling on the tragic case of a patient who had voluntarily admitted herself to mental hospital and who, upon being granted permission to go home for a couple of days, hanged herself.

Let’s start with the patient. Melanie Rabone had a history of depression. She tried to commit suicide on 4 March 2005 and was admitted to Stepping Hill Hospital in Stockport, Manchester. She was discharged on 18 March 2005, but on 31 March 2005 slashed both her wrists with broken glass. No hospital beds were available, so on 6 April 2005 she was seen as an outpatient.

On 11 April 2005, she again attempted suicide and this time agreed to an informal admission to the hospital.

Patients opt for informal admission because then they won’t have the perceived stigma of a Mental Health Act (MHA) section on their record. In practice, however, most patients admitted in this way are promptly sectioned if they decide to discharge themselves before the doctors think they are ready to leave. This is what should have happened with Melanie - but didn’t.

When she was admitted, a senior house officer noted that if she attempted or demanded to leave, she should be assessed for detention (for sectioning) under the MHA. She was prescribed a course of drugs and, judged a moderate to high suicide risk, was kept under observation every 15 minutes.

Tragically, a doctor who had just returned from leave was told on 19 April 2005 that Melanie wanted to go home for a couple of days. He gave his permission, she went home and, on 20 April 2005, 24-year-old Melanie hanged herself.

Melanie’s parents brought a claim to establish, among other things, whether the hospital trust had a duty under article two (right to life) of the Human Rights Act (HRA) to protect their daughter’s life as a non-detained patient.

Last week, after a six-year battle through the courts, the Supreme Court finally ruled in their favour, confirming that, as a non-detained patient, the hospital trust had an operational duty to protect Melanie’s life under the HRA and that there was a real and immediate risk of suicide that was known to the hospital.

The court also ruled that the trust failed to do all that could reasonably have been expected to prevent that risk, and that Melanie’s parents were entitled to compensation for their bereavement,

It was a satisfactory outcome to a tragic case, with the HRA doing its bit to see justice done.

But what of ‘fanatical’ Abu Qatada, that hate figure who has made a mockery of British law by hiding behind the ample skirts of the European Convention on Human Rights - and of our domestic version of it, the aforementioned HRA?

Well, he’s not done great so far with human rights or, indeed, British law - we don’t need those awful Europeans to tell us that we don’t lock up people for a decade without charging them.

We crossed that bridge back in 1215 with clause 39 of the Magna Carta: ‘No free man shall be seized or imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or possessions, or outlawed or exiled, or deprived of his standing in any other way, nor will we proceed with force against him, or send others to do so, except by the lawful judgment of his equals or by the law of the land.’

There is also the small matter of the 1679 Habeas Corpus Act, which protects us from being arrested without charge. We supposedly gave up on torture some time ago, too, but the ‘war on terror’ has done for that particular good intention.

Returning to Abu Qatada, he has now been released. Or nominally released (he is under curfew 22 hours a day and is restricted in his movements and with whom he associates. It’s not what most of us would call freedom).

If he’s really this guilty, why on earth don’t we charge him? If we can’t make terrorism charges stick, we could always do an Al Capone and put him away for a lesser charge (tax evasion was Capone’s downfall) - if, I repeat, he’s really this guilty.

And finally, we return to the garishly dressed suspected murderer John Anslow, 31, who was sprung from a police van on the way to court by a masked gang armed with knives and sledgehammers. Three weeks later he is still on the run, presumably having shed his blue and yellow PJs.

It’s like something from a film - and nothing like the gritty reality of bereaved parents grinding through the courts for six years until they can finally say: ‘Unfortunately this won’t help Melanie, but we have to find something positive from this and it gives us some comfort to see that justice has at last been done and that other patients like Melanie will be afforded more protection. I wish we could go and tell her.’

LinkedIn logo Join our LinkedIn Human Rights sub-group

Follow Jonathan on Twitter