Iowa Code Title VI. Human Services [Chs. 216-255A] § 229.29. Transfer to certain federal facilities

1. Upon receipt of a certificate stating that any person involuntarily hospitalized under this chapter is eligible for care and treatment in a facility operated by the United States department of veterans affairs or another agency of the United States government which is willing to receive the person without charge to the state of Iowa or any county in the state, the chief medical officer may transfer the person to that facility. Upon so doing, the chief medical officer shall notify the court which ordered the person's hospitalization in the same manner as would be required in the case of a transfer under section 229.15, subsection 5, and the person transferred shall be entitled to the same rights as the person would have under that subsection.

2. No person shall be transferred under this section who is confined pursuant to conviction of a public offense or whose hospitalization was ordered upon contention of incompetence to stand trial by reason of mental illness, without prior approval of the court which ordered that person's hospitalization.