New Policies for the Criminally Insane
NH – The state Department of Corrections is changing the way it treats and supervises insane prisoners as they are transitioned back into the community. Complete details on the Nashua Telegraph.
A new policy adopted by the department governs how mental-health services are administered to the state’s more than two dozen patients found not guilty of their crimes because they were legally insane, according to Dr. Robert MacLeod, director of the DOC’s division of medical and forensic services.
Those prisoners had committed a crime but were found not guilty by a court because a mental illness triggered their infraction, MacLeod said.
The prison system, usually over a course of several years, works with people found not guilty by reason of insanity to transition them from the prison to a mental-health hospital and eventually to the community at large. That process involves a number of “baby steps” and extensive supervision, MacLeod said.
“They’re well tethered to our mental-health case management,” he said.
Before the new standards were adopted, those patients received mental-health treatment based on general DOC policies, according to department spokesman Jeff Lyons. The new procedures include systematic steps specific to working with inmates in the state’s Secure Psychiatric Unit and those found not guilty by reason of insanity in the prison’s other treatment programs, including the New Hampshire Hospital, and parolees enrolled in community health programs.
There are five such inmates in the prison’s psychiatric unit and another 20 under supervision in the other programs, Lyons said.
MacLeod said the biggest change under the new policy was the creation of a position whose duties specifically include tracking and evaluating the treatment and progress made by inmates found not guilty by reason of insanity.
That person will meet with each resident at least once a month and stay in contact with doctors regarding their treatment to make sure treatments are effective and to spot warning signs that they aren’t, MacLeod said.
Most of the other new guidelines include step-by-step instructions governing admission and orientation to the psychiatric unit, staff responsibilities and the makeup of a treatment team. It also sets up procedures for discharge to other prison units, MacLeod said.
“It makes it more comprehensive. It’s more concise at this point,” MacLeod said. “It’s an evolving science, the whole issue of trying to predict risk. There’s a recognition that some of these services are best delivered out in the community.”
Lyons said the department started examining its policy
after high-profile defendants employed the defense of not guilty by reason of insanity in recent years.
Sheila LaBarre’s attorneys argued she was suffering from delusions when she killed two boyfriends in 2005 and 2006. A jury disagreed and ruled she was sane at the time of the murders.
In 2008, a judge accepted an insanity plea by Susan Disharoon, who was charged with murdering her landlord, Syed Ali Hussain, in July 2006.
“People seem to be using that defense more, so we thought it was important to get it in writing,” Lyons said.
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