(Jan. 5, 2015) New York Gov. Mario Cuomo closed out the old year by signing into law a bill that mandates releasing mentally ill state prison inmates into community treatment with enough medications to reach their first mental health appointment.
This is a step in the right direction, and more states should take it.
The Treatment Advocacy Center’s 2014 study, “The Treatment of Persons with Mental Illness in Prisons and Jails,” reported that inmates with serious mental illness who were released from prison without follow-up treatment were almost four times more likely to commit another violent crime compared to mentally ill inmates who were given treatment after their release.
Mental illness is a treatable disease. Untreated, it results in behaviors that land hundreds of thousands of individuals behind bars every year. Treated, it reduces the chances they will return there.
New York’s new law mandates that every inmate who has received mental health treatment within three years of his or her anticipated prison release “shall be provided with mental health discharge planning and, when necessary, an appointment with a mental health professional in the community … and sufficient mental health medications prescriptions to bridge the period between discharge” until the mental health provider assumes care. The law also applies to inmates with mental illness who have refused care.
Our study reported that few corrections systems release prisoners to psychiatric follow-up. With the enactment of S.7818, New York is among them.
That’s good for state prison inmates with mental illness and good for the communities they return to. Even better would be if other corrections systems followed suit.
To comment, visit our Facebook page.
Visit our blog archive to read all our recent posts.