Can you take legal action against a psychiatrist who threatened to call the police on you without a reason--absolutely no threats to harm yourself or others?

Answer 1

Psychotherapists are required in many states to inform police when the client makes a credible threat of violence against an identifiable victim.

In the landmark case of

Tarasoff

v. Regents of University of California, the California Supreme Court held that the special relationship between a psychotherapist and a patient imposes on the therapist a duty to act reasonably to protect the foreseeable victims of a patient.

Some courts have limited this rule to cases where the patient makes a threat against a specific person. Many courts have held that a therapist is not required to call the police when the patient makes a generalized threat of violence against society. These courts reasoned that when a threat is generalized, there is no meaningful way for the therapist to warn society at large.