New Options for Mentally Ill Criminals
A $250,000 federal grant will help pay for a mental health court that looks at treatment programs before jail time. Story in the Patriot News.
Mentally ill criminal offenders in Dauphin County are closer to having a new avenue for help.
The county has been awarded a $250,000 federal grant to develop a mental health court for mentally ill prisoners.
The court would serve as an alternative judiciary process similar to drug and juvenile courts, county Commissioner Jeff Haste said.
A team including a public defender, the district attorney and pre-trial service representatives would collaborate to assign a treatment program before resorting to jail time, Haste said.
Defendants who are deemed successfully treated could have their criminal charges dismissed or deferred. Those who fail would re-enter the standard judiciary system.
The program would make the county prison system more economical, Haste said.
“Any amount of time we can reduce, whether it be no time in jail or reduced time in jail, helps … the taxpayers,” he said.
About 25 percent of the county’s prison population has been treated for mental illness and more than eight in 10 of those offenders have been imprisoned more than four times.
Mentally ill offenders often spend more days in jail than other offenders — even if they’ve committed the same crime, Haste said. Inmates with mental health problems might be unable to advocate for themselves or serve full sentences because of poor behavior, he said.
Similar mental health courts exist in Northumberland and York counties, Dauphin County spokeswoman Diane McNaughton said.
The grant also would pay for an expansion of jail diversion and re-entry programs, which reduce the number of days an offender with a mental illness and charged with a nonviolent misdemeanor has to spend in prison.
The county agreed in February to match up to $80,000 for the project. Haste couldn’t say when the court will be operational, but many of the pre-trial alternatives the court would enact are already being used for mental health offenders, he said.
The key to the process is not a special courtroom or a mental health judge, but a team of people working on the case, Haste said.
“There are a number of people who come together to develop a plan and take responsibility for an individual,” he said. “The judge then becomes the one who blesses the plan.”
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