FC PsychExperts has conducted forensic psychological evaluations across Palm Beach County for the 15th Judicial Circuit since 2008. Our nearest office is in Jupiter, about 25 minutes from Westlake
Westlake Has No Forensic Psychology Practice, And That Matters Less Than You Think
Nobody performs court-admissible forensic evaluations from an office inside Westlake. One licensed psychologist lists a Westlake address; the practice is clinical. Every forensic evaluator serving Westlake cases drives in from West Palm Beach, Jupiter, or Wellington, and the same is true in neighboring Loxahatchee and Royal Palm Beach.
This is a function of the city’s age. Westlake incorporated on 22 June 2016 as Palm Beach County’s 39th municipality with 906 residents at the 2020 census. It now holds roughly 10,675 people and grows about 18 percent a year, with a median household income of $131,925. Professional services have not caught up to the rooftops yet.
For a forensic evaluation, that gap costs you almost nothing. Evaluations are not therapy. There is no weekly appointment. A competency evaluation is typically one session. You will drive to the evaluator two to six times total, and you will drive to the courthouse in West Palm Beach regardless of who you retain.
What the distance does change is the courthouse question, and most Westlake residents get that wrong. Details below.
The Two Paths, Side By Side
Palm Beach County runs a county-funded evaluation office. Most people facing a court-ordered evaluation do not know it exists, and no ranking page for this query explains it.
| County Forensic Psychology Services | Private retention | |
|---|---|---|
| Who initiates | The judge, by written order | You or your attorney |
| What you pay | Set by the presiding judge and taxed through the case. Often little or nothing out of pocket | Retainer paid up front |
| What the evaluator is paid | $500 flat, adult competency or psychological evaluation, under AO 2.601 | Your retainer |
| Who picks the evaluator | The county office | You |
| Scope | The referral question in the order, nothing else | Whatever the retaining attorney defines |
| Typical report time | Set by the judge in the order | It varies |
| Best for | Court-ordered competency, dependency, delinquency, domestic violence risk | Defense-retained work, custody strategy, civil damages, immigration, rebuttal of an opposing expert |
Read that fee row again. Under Administrative Order 2.601-10/21, signed by Chief Judge Glenn D. Kelley and effective 19 October 2021, a psychologist appointed by the court receives $500 flat for an adult competency, adult psychological, or juvenile psychological evaluation. That covers the examination and the written report. Juvenile competency pays $350. A competency and intellectual disability examination pays $650. A neuropsychological evaluation pays $800. Testimony bills at $150 an hour and stops at $300 total. Travel pays $50 an hour, capped at one hour each direction. A no-show pays the evaluator $200.
That schedule is public, and it explains a great deal about how court-appointed evaluations get scoped. Three hundred dollars is the ceiling on testimony no matter how long the cross-examination runs.
How the County Path actually Works
The Forensic Psychology Services Office, often called Court Psychology, sits inside Palm Beach County Public Safety. It is not a private practice and you cannot hire it.
Every referral requires a court order. Once the judge signs one, scheduling runs through (561) 355-2108 or PSD-CourtPsychology@pbcgov.org, Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. The office keeps space in the Main, North, South, and West County complexes. Brochures are published in English, Spanish, and Creole.
What the office covers, by division:
- Criminal. Competency to proceed, evaluations of intellectual disability, mental status at the time of the offense, risk assessment and conditional release.
- Juvenile. Threat assessments, psychological evaluations in delinquency proceedings, competency to proceed, parental and child evaluations in dependency.
- Family. Risk assessment and psychological evaluations in domestic violence cases.
- Guardianship. Referred out to the Clerk of the Circuit Court and Comptroller.
The order form the court uses for adult competency cites Fla. R. Crim. P. 3.211(a) and (b) and Fla. Stat. §§ 916.115 and 916.301. It gives every party five days to deliver records the evaluator should consider. Miss that window and the evaluation proceeds without your material, which is the most common avoidable error in a county-path case.
When the county path is the right answer: the court ordered it, the question is narrow, and you have no dispute with the methodology. Take the appointment. Paying privately for work the court will fund is a waste.
When To Pay For A Private Evaluation Instead
Retain privately when the county path cannot give you what the case needs. Four situations, specifically:
You need scope the order does not authorize. A competency order asks about competency. It does not ask about mitigation, trauma history, or malingering. If your defense theory depends on any of those, the court-appointed report will not contain them.
You need the evaluator in the room for a full day. Testimony under AO 2.601 stops paying at $300. A privately retained expert bills for the full trial day and prepares accordingly.
You are rebutting an opposing expert. Reviewing another psychologist’s raw data, protocol selection, and scoring is consulting work no court appointment covers.
Your matter has no criminal case attached. Custody strategy, personal injury damages, immigration hardship, guardianship, and employment matters never come with a county referral.
Which Courthouse A Westlake Case Actually Goes To
Most Westlake residents assume “West County” because of the name. West County is in Belle Glade, and it is the farthest complex from Westlake.
| Courthouse | Address | Road distance from Westlake |
|---|---|---|
| Main / Judge Daniel T. K. Hurley Courthouse | 205 N. Dixie Hwy, West Palm Beach | ~16 mi |
| Criminal Justice Complex | 3228 Gun Club Rd, West Palm Beach | ~14 mi |
| North County Courthouse | 3188 PGA Blvd, Palm Beach Gardens | ~13 mi |
| South County Courthouse | 200 W. Atlantic Ave, Delray Beach | ~30 mi |
| West County Courthouse | 2950 State Rd 15, Belle Glade | ~31 mi |
Assignment follows the division and the assigned judge, not your home address. Felony and family matters originating in Westlake are generally heard downtown at the Main complex or the Criminal Justice Complex. Confirm the venue on your case docket rather than assuming, and confirm which Court Psychology office your order routes to when you call (561) 355-2108.
Criminal Evaluations For Westlake Defendants
A competency evaluation in Florida answers a statutory question with a fixed structure. Fla. Stat. § 916.12(1) sets the standard: whether the defendant can consult with counsel with a reasonable degree of rational understanding, and has a rational and factual understanding of the proceedings.
Subsection (3) then requires the examining expert to address six specific capacities in the report: appreciating the charges, appreciating the range and nature of possible penalties, understanding the adversarial nature of the process, disclosing pertinent facts to counsel, manifesting appropriate courtroom behavior, and testifying relevantly. A report that omits any of the six is incomplete on its face.
Criminal responsibility evaluations reconstruct mental state at the moment of the offense, which is a harder evidentiary problem than competency and takes roughly twice the hours. Miranda waiver evaluations assess capacity at the time of waiver and can determine whether a confession stands. Mitigation work identifies trauma history and developmental factors supporting a downward departure. Dr. Colet performs all four categories for defense and for the state.
Violence and sexual behavior risk assessments use actuarial instruments and structured professional judgment. Both are admissible in the 15th Circuit and both get challenged, so the report documents base rates and error margins rather than presenting a single number.
Family, dependency, and juvenile evaluations
Florida custody recommendations are written against a checklist. Fla. Stat. § 61.13(3) enumerates 20 best-interest factors, lettered (a) through (t), and a custody evaluation that does not organize its findings against them makes the judge do the mapping.
A custody evaluation assesses both parents, the children, and each parent-child interaction through observation, interview, testing, and collateral records. Every party is assessed on the same terms. That symmetry is the whole reason the report carries weight.
Parental capacity assessments examine each parent’s functioning and ability to meet a child’s developmental needs, and become central when abuse allegations, substance use, or mental health questions enter a dependency case. FC PsychExperts has conducted family evaluations for the Department of Juvenile Justice, ChildNet, and Communities Connected for Kids.
Juvenile evaluations weigh adolescent development against legal standards written for adults. Juvenile competency in Florida runs under Fla. R. Juv. P. 8.095 and Fla. Stat. § 985.19, a different framework from the adult chapter, and the county office handles the ordered version at $350 flat.
Civil, neuropsychological, and guardianship work
Personal injury evaluations translate psychological harm into what civil courts actually award on: functional limitations, treatment needs, diminished earning capacity, prognosis. Dr. Colet’s Level 1 Trauma Center experience covers traumatic brain injury, motor vehicle cases, medical negligence, and catastrophic injury, including assessment of malingering.
Dr. Lauren Miller handles forensic neuropsychological testing where cognition is the disputed issue. Her work quantifies how a brain injury changed capacity and what the prognosis supports. She also consults on litigation strategy, including review of an opposing expert’s protocols and deposition question development.
Guardianship evaluations determine whether an individual retains capacity to manage personal and financial affairs. The county office refers guardianship matters to the Clerk of the Circuit Court, so contested capacity cases in Westlake are privately retained by default.
Immigration and specialized assessments
Immigration evaluations document extreme and exceptional hardship for waiver applications, asylum claims, and VAWA petitions. Dr. Colet also evaluates competency to participate in immigration proceedings and conducts evaluations at ICE detention centers and correctional facilities.
These follow the same protocol discipline as court work, with one addition: cross-cultural validity review, because instruments normed on English-speaking U.S. populations produce misleading profiles when applied without adjustment. See immigration hardship and asylum evaluations for the filing-specific detail.
Meet the Team
Dr. Cathy Colet
Forensic PsychologistDr. Cathy Colet is a Licensed Clinical and Forensic Psychologist and founder of Forensic and Clinical PsychExperts, LLC.
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Dr. Lauren Miller
Clinical and Forensic NeuropsychologistDr. Miller has nearly 20 years of experience as a clinician, consultant, lecturer, and writer.
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Dr. Matthew J. Jalazo
Forensic PsychologistDr. Matthew J. Jalazo is a licensed psychologist who has practiced forensic psychology on a full-time basis for the last fifteen years.
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Dr. Christopher J. Beltran
Forensic PsychologistDr. Beltran is a Licensed Forensic Psychologist with over twenty-five years of experience in criminal and family law
Read MoreWhen We Turn A Referral Down
We decline when we have treated the evaluee or a family member. A prior therapeutic relationship disqualifies the evaluator, and an opposing attorney will find it.
We decline when the retaining attorney wants a predetermined conclusion. The evaluation goes where the data goes, including when that damages the case that paid for it.
We decline when the deadline cannot support the protocol. A custody evaluation compressed into ten days is a report that gets excluded, and taking that work would waste your retainer.
And we tell you when the county path is the better option, which happens more often than a private practice publishing a page like this would prefer.
Questions Westlake attorneys and residents ask
How do I schedule a court-ordered evaluation?
Wait for the signed order, then call the Palm Beach County Forensic Psychology Services Office at (561) 355-2108 or email PSD-CourtPsychology@pbcgov.org, Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Deliver any records you want considered within five days of the order date. That five-day window is in the order form and is missed constantly.
When should I hire a private forensic psychologist instead of accepting the county appointment?
When the referral question in the order is narrower than your case needs, when you need the expert available for a full trial day, when you are rebutting an opposing expert, or when there is no criminal case attached at all. Custody, personal injury, immigration, and guardianship matters have no county path.
Which courthouse will my Westlake case be heard in?
Usually the Main Judicial Complex at 205 N. Dixie Highway or the Criminal Justice Complex on Gun Club Road, both in West Palm Beach, roughly 14 to 16 miles from Westlake. Despite the name, the West County Courthouse in Belle Glade is the farthest at about 31 miles. Assignment follows the division and judge, so confirm on your docket.
Does insurance cover a forensic evaluation?
No. Forensic evaluations answer a legal question rather than a treatment question, which puts them outside medical necessity. Expect to pay privately or have the cost taxed through the court.
Can FC PsychExperts testify in the 15th Judicial Circuit?
Yes. Dr. Colet has been court-appointed and has testified in the 15th, and in Florida’s 1st, 17th, 19th, and 20th circuits, for both prosecution and defense. Reports are written on the assumption that testimony follows.