The criminalization of mental illness is nothing less than a national disgrace!

PREVALENCE OF MENTAL HEALTH DIVERSION PRACTICES 

A Survey of the States

The criminalization of mental illness is nothing less than a national disgrace.

A 2010 study by the Treatment Advocacy Center found that more than three times as many severely mentally ill persons in the U.S. are doing time in jails and prisons than receiving treatment in hospitals. Other studies indicate a near-tripling over the last 30 years of the percentage of U.S. inmates who suffer from severe mental illness, to a current level of at least 16%.

The primary mission of the Treatment Advocacy Center is to promote mental health laws and policies which, if fully implemented by state mental health systems, would minimize – if never fully eliminate – the tragedy of people with severe mental illness falling into the clutches of the criminal justice system. In this report, we look to how state criminal justice officials are responding to the colossal failure of their mental health counterparts to meet this challenge.

View or print "Prevalence of Mental Health Diversion Practices" from PDF.

See the references cited in the study.

Visit our PRESS ROOM.

Laws surrounding mental illness make it harder for victims to get treatment

Laws surrounding mental illness make it harder for victims to get treatment

Sad but true -- many families are dealing with similar nightmares! Few are able to speak out so well as this Maryland Mother. Many of us are faced with dozens of barriers each day -- but the laws themselves are the most troubling. When we advocate for solutions, we are bombarded with debris from clueless, civil libertarians!

Kentucky makes national and world news as housing the mentally ill in prisons!

Business Insider Australia International and the Wall Street Journal have both recently published a staggering report about Kentucky jails and how Kentucky treats our most vulnerable and seriously mentally ill!  Read it here:

http://www.businessinsider.com.au/jenn-ackerman-pictures-of-the-mentally-ill-in-prison-2013-10#this-inmate-whos-also-in-his-cell-for-23-hours-a-day-talks-to-himself-the-aclu-has-found-that-prolonged-isolation-can-exacerbate-mental-illness-4

My question is ... why are Kentucky funds used to warehouse the most seriously mentally ill in prisons ... or worse they are surviving in the streets of Louisville and Lexington?  

On July 20, 2010, I posted Jenn Ackerman's award winning documentary about how individuals with severe mental illness are "trapped" in Kentucky's prison system, because I learned that no Kentucky media outlet had ever released it. 

I asked why? 

Are the media outlets paid off?  

In fact, Jenn's report was one of the main reasons I created this Blog. Three years later, this Blog receives over 2000 hits a month and the primary reason is people are searching for information on how to help people who are mentally ill in jail in Kentucky.  

I realized Kentucky media outlets rarely shared the real story of preventable tragedies -- often leaving out the criminal of a violent act was more often a victim of Kentucky's failed mental health system.

Each day, I read of horrific murders and domestic violence reports where individuals have shot or stabbed their family members -- and often commit suicide themselves. (In fact, I learned of two traumatic events just this weekend in nearby counties.) Many times, I receive a tip from horrified families where they have learned the person who committed the crime had just been released from a state psychiatric hospital with no follow-up care -- or perhaps worse, they were denied treatment at a state hospital!  Many suffered with 'untreated' mental illness for years before they finally kill themselves or others. 

This is yet another reason why I lobby for better and more humane outpatient treatment laws and the primary reason this Blog was founded!

The report from the Austria International report is extremely stigmatizing with a huge headline that reads ... 

13 Haunting Pictures Of Insane Prisoners In Kentucky The Wall Street Journal had a staggering report recently that showed just how many crazy people America keeps in its jails instead of mental hospitals aimed at helping them get better.

They go on to report, "America’s three biggest jail systems — New York City, Los Angeles, and Cook County in Illinois — have 11,000 inmates being treated for mental illness. By comparison, the WSJ reported, the three largest state-run mental hospitals in the U.S. have only 4,000 beds. 

"Minneapolis-based photographer Jenn Ackerman got permission to photograph the Kentucky State Reformatory‘s psychiatric unit in 2008, after reading an article about the mentally ill prison. It was not easy for Ackerman to get this kind of access, and the photos she took are absolutely haunting. We are running them with her permission.

For more information visit Jenn's website at: www.jennackerman.com 

Please share this with your Kentucky state legislators and national congressman. 

Ask them why this inhumane treatment for our most vulnerable individuals continues, as it has been going on for decades! 

20 years ago, Treatment Advocacy Center founder Dr. E. Fuller Torrey gave Kentucky an award for the "worse state in the nation" on housing the mentally ill in prisons. 

Please learn how "assisted outpatient treatment"  standards could help stop this insanity! 

A success story -- in time, (NOT 60 days) AOT can help a person find the bridge to recovery!

My Daughter’s Treatment Success Story – personally speaking

(Oct. 4, 2013) I write the way I speak. The way I speak these days is with impatience at the hesitancy to implement or fully use involuntary treatment laws in every state.

I wasn't always this way. When my daughter had her second psychotic break, I went to our urgent psychiatric center to fill out the involuntary petition and found myself sitting in the chair unable to speak or write due to crying uncontrollably at the thought that I was there quite literally begging for my 19 year old to get the medical care she desperately needed.

And beg I would. I would have done anything. But they accepted that petition and the other three I have had to fill out during the course of her now almost 10-year battle with serious mental illness.

Getting the care she needed still didn't stop me from being curled up in the fetal position the third time we had to go through the same process worrying about how my precious girl was supposed to survive in a world that prefers to incarcerate her or leave her on the streets.

My daughter's illness included a lack of insight, which means she was too sick to know she was sick. I have never needed studies or medical expertise to explain to me that her illness affects her brain, therefore her ill brain may not allow her understand she is sick. Common sense told me that.

But due to the fact that she was allowed access via our involuntary program to the medical care she needed for almost eight years, her illness relented and she now has insight. For the last year and two months, she has been receiving care voluntarily.

I still worry though. She is still mentally ill. There are no guarantees the symptoms of her illness won't rear their ugly heads again. And she still lives in a world that would prefer to incarcerate her or leave her on the street.

But I am grateful she has made it this far. I no longer find myself curled up in a ball sobbing.

Now I'm just impatient waiting for everyone to have access to medical care, including those with brain disorders rendering them too sick to ask for it on their own.

- THE MOTHER OF A YOUNG WOMAN WHO BENEFITED FROM ARIZONA’S ASSISTED OUTPATIENT TREATMENT (AOT) LAW.

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 AOT FACTS:

Court-ordered outpatient treatment requires that individuals with severe mental illness adhere to a prescribed treatment plan as a condition of living in the community. One of the mains goals of outpatient treatment is to facilitate more consistent adherence to treatment for the people in whom severe mental illness impairs the ability to seek and voluntarily comply with treatment.  This treatment typically combines a court order and a comprehensive treatment and services plan. When implemented, the court order requires the individual patient to follow his or her treatment plan. The court's role and the legal procedures related to outpatient commitment laws vary from state to state. Typically, the court commits the patient to the treatment system. Just as important, it commits the treatment system to the patient. 

The Department of Justice in 2012 certified assisted outpatient treatment as an evidence-based practice for reducing crime and violence. A study in New York documented that, among AOT recipients: 

• 77 percent fewer experienced hospitalizations compared to before participation. 
• 74 percent fewer experienced homelessness compared to before participation
• 83 percent fewer experienced arrests compared to before participation
• 88 percent fewer experienced incarceration compared to before participation

The Tipping Point for Mental Illness -- in a Mother's Voice

The tipping point for mental illness
By COURTNEY PERKES / ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

"What happened to my son was predictable and preventable," she said. "I've always said a mother's love is going to change this. I have prayed all the time that goodness would come out of my son's story."

"If my son had autism I could advocate for him and get services," said Palafox, a nurse. "If my mother had Alzheimer's I could advocate and get services for her. I had to wait for him to deteriorate to the point that I could legally take his rights away in conservatorship and that occurred only after the charges." - Mary Palafox

Mary is a fellow "mom advocate" in California.  Read her entire story here: The tipping point for mental illness

Recopied with appreciation from: 

It's time to change Tennessee's mental health laws!