Mentally ill Iowans end up in jail: Your take
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Two county sheriffs told state lawmakers that county jails are becoming the facility of last resort for Iowans with mental-health problems.
“We’re all hearing the same thing. The sheriffs across the state continue to raise this as one of their major, major issues. Mental health is a huge problem,” said Black Hawk County Sheriff Tony Thompson, whose mental health assessment and jail diversion program was touted as a model for early detection and intervention of people needing substance abuse or mental health treatment rather than incarceration.
“In a growing scale and a growing need, we’re seeing more and more violent offenders, more and more people who are those square pegs in round holes,” Thompson told members of the Iowa Senate Judiciary Committee, who are assessing the problems mental-health issues create for public safety and Iowa law enforcement after a series of deadly shootings around the country. Most recently, an incident at a Connecticut elementary school where a gunman with a history of mental-health problems killed 20 children and six adults.
Story County Sheriff Paul Fitzgerald said local officials in Ames came together to create a crisis intervention unit that has had positive results in diverting people facing criminal offenses who need mental health services to the facilities where they can receive proper treatment. However, funding sources continue to decrease, making it a challenge to keep such services available as Iowa’s county-based mental health system makes a transition to a regionalized service delivery network.
“Unfortunately, throughout our country, the county jails are the largest mental health facility within a county,” said Fitzgerald, who recently served as the national leader of a county sheriffs’ association. “County jails do not have the funding or skills to appropriately care for those individuals afflicted with a mental illness.”
What do you think of the situation? Are Iowa’s jails the best place for offenders with mental health issues? Or is there a better solution that should be explored?
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Many mentally ill people will remain completely safe if they just stay on their medication. However, today there is no way to make certain that someone stays on their medication if they are not institutionalized. I believe there are some creative ways to solve this problem and let people stay out of institutions, remain on their medications and remain safe.
I envision a clinic where people have to go each day to receive their medication. I envision a monitoring system that notes when someone does not show up. I envision a special enforcement unit tracking people down if they do not show up. Electronic ankle bracelets would make it easy to locate people who did not show up. If someone perpetually does not show up, prison would be the default option.
This would not work for all mentally unstable people, but it would work for many. It sounds a little harsh, but it is better than prison and would save a lot of money.
Greer,
Meds aren’t a fix-all. They have their own list of negative side effects and they don’t always work.
Plus you’re assuming that “mentally ill” refers only to the most severely ill—people usually referred to as psychotic, delusional, schizophrenic.
A few days in jail can do a real number on perfectly functional people who suffer from depression, anxiety disorder, borderline claustrophobia or agoraphobia, and similar often minor dysfunctions and shove them right over the edge. I don’t think most people understand that once a person is booked, contact with the outside world is virtually cut off. If no one knows you’re in jail, it’s very difficult to get the help you need to get out. Because you can’t get out by yourself. If you want to know what it feels like, check out Kafka.
Jail is a poor solution to a lot of problems that would be better solved through mediation or counseling. Throwing people in a cage should be a last resort. Except it often isn’t.
Which means we’ve failed. As a society, we have failed