Founding Eagles bassist Randy Meisner has been placed under 24-hour court-ordered supervision after threatening to kill himself and others.
Meisner allegedly threatened murder-suicide with an AK-47 assault rifle and a pile of pills in January and will be under round-the-clock care for at least the next few weeks, the New York Daily News reports.
Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge David Cunningham appointed a temporary guardian to manage Meisner’s drug prescriptions and health ahead of a follow-up hearing scheduled for September.
The 68-year-old was in court to oppose the order, but spoke only to confirm his name.
Meisner said in May that his long-time friend James Newton was lying when he said that Randy’s wife Lana keeps her husband in a “state of near-constant inebriation” because “he is easier to control when he’s drunk.”
Newton filed papers in April seeking a legal intervention known as a conservatorship – an American legal concept where a guardian and protector is appointed by a judge to manage the financial affairs of another due to physical or mental limitations or old age.
This week’s emergency ruling related to Meisner’s medical affairs came after Newton’s lawyer Troy Martin argued in court that Meisner has been diagnosed as bipolar.
Martin said: “He threatened to gun everyone down with an AK-47,” and added that he made a separate threat to end his own life by taking all his medication at one time. Meisner did not have a firearm in his possession at the time but made the threat to hospital staff, Martin said.
Newton and Martin allege that Lana Meisner is in denial about her husband’s mental state and has done little to help him battle his addictions.
After Lana made her anger at the decision known, the judge said: “If I’m going to err, it’s going to be on the side of protecting Mr Meisner. If it’s overkill, it’s overkill.”
