The Mentally Ill and the Justice System

The mentally ill are ridiculed daily and cannot live in peace. They are not given a fair chance at a job or at life. People look down at them daily. Depending on the illness, they go through a nightmare daily. Some schizophrenic victims live in fear with paranoia and depressed victims don't see a light at the end of their tunnel. It is very difficult for them to get the proper help they need while out in the world. Think about how hard it is for the mentally ill to get the proper treatment while in jail.

The Problem

According to Marcia Goin, who used to be the President of American Psychological Association, it has been found that there are three times as many inmates that are mentally ill in the prisons than those that are not. The jails and prisons have become the primary facility for these people, instead of treatment centers. Primarily due to inadequate mental health services and the country's criminal justice policies. While they are incarcerated, they are not receiving the adequate amount of treatment, therefore, causing their mental stability to deteriate more every day. This is wrong.

History

Due to the deinstitutionalization movement that was brought about by Dorothea Dix, a mass majority of the mentally ill patients were released from the treatment centers. The plan was to let them go with families and be better cared for. However, most of the patients did not have a place to go to. Either their family didn't want them, or they had no family. As a result, the patients did not have proper treatment.

As the years went by, new medicines had been introduced to the world. Because of this, society believed that because of these medicines, the mentally ill were somehow miraculously cured. Thus, when they did something wrong, no one contributed it to their illness. Since they did not contribute the crime to the illness, a mass migration of mentally ill patients went to the prisons. Within the last half of the twentieth century, an estimated one million inmates have had an illness that is severe enough to require treatment.

Another reason this has happened is due to the shift in law enforcement within the last twenty years. Both federal and state governments have issued policies that resulted in widespread arrests and incarcerations of nonviolent offenders, half of which have an illness. The systematic under funding of community mental health and the failure to provide for coordination of and accountability for care, along with the prosecution of nonviolent offenders, have led to what is essentially a Tran institutionalization of people with mental illness - out of the mental hospitals and into the jails and prisons. People with mental illness, who with appropriate services could be maintained in their families and communities, instead decompensate and wind up behaving in ways that engage them with the criminal justice system. There is consensus in both the mental health and criminal justice fields that if people with mental illness received the treatment they needed, the vast majority of them would not end up in our jails and prisons.

Statistics
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-70 percent are there for nonviolent offenses, they have serious mental illnesses, are likely to have a co-occurring substance use disorders.
-According to a 2002 report to Congress from the National Commission on Correctional Health Care, on any given day in the state prison systems, between 13.1 and 18.6 percent of the inmates have major depression
-2.3 and 3.9 percent have schizophrenia or other psychotic disorders
-2.1 to 4.3 percent suffer from bipolar disorder
-22 to 30.1 percent have anxiety disorder
-6.2 to 11.7 percent have post traumatic stress disorder

Some of these inmates wound up in jail because of their disorders, while others have disorders that were induced or exacerbated by their contacts of the criminal justice system. Why didn't they get sent to treatment centers? They don't belong prison. The prisons are overcrowded as it is, and security is tight, so every inmate can't get the adequate attention. Due to these circumstances, the mentally ill are trapped inside their cells while their illness is getting worse.

"Thousands of mentally ill are left untreated and un-helped until they have deteriorated so greatly that they wind up arrested and prosecuted for crimes they might never have committed had they been able to access therapy, medication, and assisted living facilities in the community. Mental health professionals told Human Rights that it is next to impossible to get their clients admitted to hospitals or treatmentprograms until after they have deteriorated to such a point that they have already committed a crime." - Human Rights Watch.

"Studies suggest that delaying treatment results in permanent harm, including increased treatment resistance, worsening severity of symptoms, increased hospitalizations and delayed remission of symptoms." -- E. Fuller Torrey, M.D.& Mary T. Zdandowicz

Why is this happening?

One reason is due to hardening of attitudes towards the crimes committed by the mentally ill. Also, with the prison population being so crowded, many mentally ill inmates can't get the help they need. There isn't enough help to go around. Plus, when an individual gets arrested, they are held in jail for a number of days or even months before their court date, meaning they don't get help or treatment. According to a study, thousands of mentally ill inmates are incarcerated without the possibility of proper treatment

How to Fix This

On December 4, 2004, President Bush signed S 1194, the Mentally Ill Offender Treatment and Crime Reduction Act of 2004, into law. This bill authorizes Federal grants to states and local communities to foster local collaborations on developing strategies to more effectively respond to non-violent juvenile and adults offenders with mental illnesses or co-occurring mental illnesses and substance abuse disorders. Grants from S. 1194 can be used for a variety of strategies, including jail diversion programs, treatment programs for incarcerated offenders with mental illnesses, community reentry programs, and cross-training of mental health, law enforcement and corrections. In creating this bill, Congress found:

(1) According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, over 16% of adults incarcerated in United States jails and prisons have a mental illness

(2) According to the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, approximately 20% of youth in the juvenile justice system have serious mental health problems, and a significant number have co-occurring mental health and substance abuse disorders

(3) According to the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, up to 40% of adults who suffer from a serious mental illness will come into contact with the American criminal justice system at some point in their lives

(4) According to the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, over 150,000 juveniles who come into contact with the juvenile justice system each year meet the diagnostic criteria for at least one mental or emotional disorder

(5) A significant proportion of adults with a serious mental illness who are involved with the criminal justice system are homeless or at imminent risk of homelessness, and many of these individuals are arrested and jailed for minor, nonviolent offenses

(6) The majority of individuals with a mental illness or emotional disorder who are involved in the criminal or juvenile justice systems are responsive to medical and psychological interventions that integrate treatment, rehabilitation, and support services.-- Minnesota Corrections Association

Something that might help this process even more is advocacy. Advocacy is similar to a lawyer in that they work as a partner for the defendant. However, unlike lawyers that are really interested in winning for the money, advocates work with lawyers by researching the defendant's past to save the defendant. There should be an advocate for every defendant. Inmates such as Andrea Yates, who drowned her children a few years back and has been diagnosed as severely mentally ill, have not had a fair chance. People that are severely mentally ill should not be held accountable for their actions. Instead of being sent to prison, they need to be sent to a hospital for treatment.

The government can ensure that mentally ill inmates are taken care of by properly trained psychiatrics. Direct more correctional funding towards mental health. One can consider adopting advance health care directives, also know as living wills, to secure treatment for offenders before they become mentally incompetent. And continue to inform the public on mental health issues through newsletters, media, etc.

The owner of the website, www.nodeathpenalty.org, has a page about Andrea Yates. The owner says that Andrea Yates needs treatment, not death. The state of Texas is still seeking the death penalty. This is not right. It has been found that she had post-partum depression with psychosis. If Andrea Yates could get an advocate assigned to her, the advocate may be able to gather more evidence from Andrea's past and do research to save Andrea's life.

There are many inmates on death row that have mental illnesses. The government does not even know about half of them. They are in prison, getting ready to die when they should be getting help. No one knows about them. Every year, so many trials are in progress with defendants that are mentally ill. They do not have a fair chance. Afterwards, when the sentencing is complete, it is found that the defendant has an illness and another trial is formed. That is not only unfair to the defendant, it also wastes a lot of time. Time that could be spent on trials where the defendant is not mentally ill. Not to mention the waste of money. If an advocate could be assigned to the defendant in the beginning of the trial, a lot of time and money could be saved.

References

Campaign To End The Death Penalty
Available via MSN

Ditton, Paula M- US Department of Justice "Bureau of Justice Statistics Special Reports"
Available via MSN

Fuller Torrey, E. , M.D. & Mary T. Zdandowicz "Treatment Advocacy Center Publishes Assisted Treatment Model Law online
Available via MSN

Goin, Marcia- President of American Psychological Association
Available via MSN

Human Rights Watch "Ill Equipped: US Prisons and Offenders with mental illness", online
Available via MSN

Jones, Greg & Michael Connelly PhD "Mentally Ill Offenders and Mental Health Care Issues: An Overview of the Research" Maryland SCCSP Available via MSN
Minnesota Corrections Association. "Mental Illness Offenders", online Available via MSN

NAMI Georgia "Dorothea Dix, Mental Health Reformer, 1802-1887"
Available via MSN

O'Malley, Suzanne "A Cry In The Dark" The Oprah Magazine
Available via MSN