Confused and not making progress

I was having trouble finding non-internet sources so I decided to interview someone who has experience in the mental health field. I tried to ask her about different opinions on what should be done. It ended up getting really off topic and left me more confused about what I'm trying to present. I'm starting to realize that my topic is a lot more complex than what I was trying to focus on. I was hoping to get a somewhat unbiased more objective view of different solutions to the problem, but it turned out to be the opposite. She started to talk about how people who are dangerous can't be treated in mental health facilities, but non-violent people can. She says that there is a different between mental health issues and behavior. For example, someone with a conduct disorder can't be treated with medication. A sociopath (or anti-social personality disorder) can't be sent to a hospital for two reasons. One, they are too dangerous. Two, it does not help to put them in a different facility when they need to be held accountable for their actions. Once accountability is there, she said that mental health treatment would be appropriate. She said that a big problem with why treatment doesn't work is because there is no follow up and the need for case workers. She also asked me if I knew is there was any screening for a person to be put into the mental health section of the jail. I am not sure if there is a screening process so I will research it. She encouraged me to do more research on the system and what happens before inmates are incarcerated. I'm not sure if that's what needs to happen.

The conversation went way off topic and it left me more confused. She asked me to identify what different sides I'm trying to look at and I told her I was looking at different opinions on solutions. She still did not have a clear answer to my question partly because of her bias, which she recognized, and the need to expose the entire situation. Because she explained more parts of the criminal justice system and mental health, I am really confused about what I'm writing about. I pretty much have no clue anymore. I did research on different possible solutions which is what my original plan was, but I couldn't find very much besides some info on CIT (which isn't that related), mental health courts, and some alternative treatment facilities. I guess I'll just do research on everything and see what turns out.

Despite the information overload and confusion, I did talk to someone whose father works in the criminal justice system. I'll be talking to them tomorrow and I'm hoping to receive a non biased, objective answer.

Progress

I found an article by Justice Evelyn Lundberg Stratton who was directly involved with and witnessed the effects on mental health and the legal system. Partly because of her own personal experiences, she has concerns about and advocates for keeping people suffering from mental illness out of jails and placing them in appropriate mental health treatment. She starts off by listing statistics. According the the U.S. Department of Justice, 16% of inmates reported a mental condition or previous psychiatric hospitalization. She also says that according to some studies, nearly half of the inmates had three or more previous sentences and that inmates with mental illness stay an average of three to four times longer than other inmates. The fact that inmates have had previous sentences shows the theory of the revolving door which many talk about. She says that mentally ill inmates require more resources, but taxpayers are paying for police to repeatedly arrest, transport, and process mentally ill defendants. She makes a point by saying, "The question becomes, would we rather spend these dollars to keep mentally ill citizens homeless, revolving in and out of our criminal justice system, or would we rather spend these dollars to help them to become stable, productive citizens?". Her focus for solution to this problem takes place in Ohio's criminal justice system. Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) is a training program to help police officers deal with mentally ill people. In this training, they learn about diagnoses, treatment, symptoms, crisis de-escalation, etc. so that they can better deal with mentally ill and prevent violence and large coflicts. CIT is a collaboration between law enforcement and mental health community and this is what Stratton says is an important part of keeping the mentally ill out of jail. Another solution that Stratton and other advocates promote is a separate mental health court.

Not very much progress...

I tried to do more research on different opinions on what should be done about the treatment of mentally ill patients. I found a lot of articles on how they are being mistreated including the issues of the death penalty and mentally ill inmates. I didn't really find any new information on why they should be treated better and everything I've found so far has said the same thing. Almost all of them have said that jails are not where mentally ill people should be receiving treatment even though most are. Most people say that they should be treated in hospitals. Even though most sources said that inmates are being treated poorly, I found one article that spoke about how mentally ill inmates are being treated better and one that told a story about an inmate getting court ordered treatment in a hospital. I have not yet been able to find sources for reasons that support inmates not being treated with better care.

Progress...

I did more research on the history of state hospitals, why they got shut down, and the effects of deinstitutionalization. Deinstitutionalization began in 1955 after the introduction of the first effective antipsychotic medication. Deinstitutionalization had two stages: moving people out of the institutions and then closing parts of all of the institutions. This created a huge crisis because those released could not be guaranteed necessary care to live in the community or medication. Not only did it negatively impact those released at the time, but those who became ill after had no access to public mental health care. Deinstitutionalization was also based off the idea that mental illness should be treated in less restrictive settings and different treatment philosophies. I have not yet found sources for different arguments or views on how mentally ill inmates should be treated.

Progress

I did some more research on specific details and statistics. I found more information, but I haven't compared it to other sources yet. I found more information on state hospitals regarding their development, controversies, and reasons for shut down. I also found more statistics one them being in 1955, about 560,000 Americans were being treated in state hospitals. Between 1955 and 2000, the population increased from 166 to 276 million. You would expect to find 930,000 patients in state hospitals, but there are fewer than 55,000 today. Almost 300,000 are in jails and prisons and another half million are on court-ordered probation. I did further research into possible solutions and alternatives that have been tried or are functioning currently. I watched a documentary on Atascadero State Hospital in California which is a facility that holds mentally ill inmates after they have served their time in jail. It showed the conditions of the hospital, which were much better than jail, but also some of the reasons why it is controversial (is it fair to keep people after they have served their time, cost, etc). I also re-read the part of Pete Earley's book "Crazy" on the Diversion Program which sends inmates to actual mental health facilities to be stabilized.