De-criminalize Queerness and HIV: A Roadmap for Change!

"QUEER PRISON WALLS"

art by Margie Diddams / Photography by Margaret Jean Plews

Phoenix, AZ February 2013

Over the course of the past 12 months or so, I've had intensive correspondence with a number of gay men and transgender women imprisoned in the AZ Department of Corrections. Of all the stuff I've read on the LGBT community and criminalization, the best stuff seems to come from the prison abolitionists, like Dean Spade. This PDF is worth reading if you're studying or planning to act on issues related to the criminalization of LGBT people and people living with HIV.

A Roadmap for Change: Federal Policy Recommendations for Addressing the Criminalization of LGBT People and People with HIV by Catherine Hanssens, Aisha C. Moodie-Mills, Andrea J. Ritchie, Dean Spade, and Urvashi Vaid

the following graphic from American Progress introduces the document well...

---------------

Infographic: Why Are So Many LGBT People and People Living with HIV Behind Bars?

American Progress

By Aisha C. Moodie-Mills 

May 7, 2014

The pervasive profiling, arrest, and incarceration of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender, or LGBT, people and people living with HIV, or PLWH—especially those who are people of color—are not simply a response to higher rates of illicit behavior within those communities. The range of unequal laws and policies that dehumanize, victimize, and criminalize people because of their sexual orientation, gender identity, or HIV status perpetuates these high rates of contact with the criminal system. In fact, one study found that a startling 73 percent of LGBT people and PLWH have had run-ins with police in the past five years. 

Police, for example, often profile transgender women and use possession of condoms as evidence of prostitution-related offenses and grounds for arrest. Additionally, PLWH in 36 states can be charged with felonies for having consensual sex, biting, and spitting—even when there is no transmission of the virus. And LGBT youth are more likely to be arrested for status offenses—charges that relate to family rejection and hostile school climates, such as running away, sleeping outside, violating curfew laws, and truancy infractions—than criminal activity.

What’s more, LGBT people and PLWH often experience police misconduct such as false arrests and verbal, physical, and sexual abuse while in police custody. They also face harsh sentences, experience a lack of appropriate healthcare, and are sometimes placed in solitary confinement as a safeguard—although this isolation is often more punitive and stigmatizing than protective.

These cycles of criminalization and discriminatory treatment of LGBT people and PLWH often trigger a lifetime of economic and social instability. We can and must dismantle these cycles through federal policy measures that address abusive policing practices, improve conditions
for LGBT prisoners and immigrants in detention, decriminalize HIV, and prevent LGBT
youth from coming into contact with the system in the first place.

Learn more: A Roadmap for Change: Federal Policy Recommendations for Addressing the Criminalization of LGBT People and People with HIV by Catherine Hanssens, Aisha C. Moodie-Mills, Andrea J. Ritchie, Dean Spade, and Urvashi Vaid

Aisha C. Moodie-Mills is a Senior Fellow and Director of the FIRE Initiative at the Center for American Progress.

Investing in community? Mesa prioritizes private jail.

According to KidsCount: 

11.2% of  Mesa's children and 

7.1% of her seniors live below poverty.

8.5% of Mesa's kids live in high-poverty neighborhoods, and

 13.1% of teenagers are high school drop-outs.

Mesa also has a falling crime rate.

In light of all that, you'd think the city could find something better to do with her money than incentivize further criminalization and incarceration of her black, brown and poor people...

 

------------------from the AZ Republic-----------------

Mesa pushes for private jail to serve SE Valley

Gary Nelson - Apr. 10, 2012 09:56 AM
The Republic | azcentral.com

Stung by soaring costs for housing misdemeanor offenders in the county jail, Mesa is looking for someone willing to build and operate a private one.

 

The City Council's public safety committee told the police department Monday it could issue a request for proposals to build the jail, which also would serve Gilbert, Chandler, Tempe and perhaps Scottsdale.

"This is a positive step," committee chairman Dennis Kavanaugh said, noting that a regional wireless cooperative among public-safety agencies could serve as a model.

The size and cost of the jail are not specified. Assistant Police Chief Mike Dvorak said the department anticipates several proposals and will evaluate them on their merits.

The idea has been simmering for several years and has new momentum because of a projected spike in what the county charges cities to book and house misdemeanor offenders.

Mesa expects to spend $5.5 million for that this year. Next year's estimate is $6.9 million.

That money comes from Mesa's general fund and is not considered part of the police budget, Police Chief Frank Milstead said.

"We're not going to quit buying police cars because we have this big spike," he said. "But we've just got to come up with a better business plan than what we're doing now."

The private jail would be overseen by a board representing the police agencies using it. Companies bidding the on the project will be asked for numerous details, including how they plan to staff, operate and secure the jail.

Compliance with national standards for correctional facilities would be required.

If the model works well in the East Valley, Dvorak said other regions might want to pick up on the idea.
Arizona has no private jails at present. It does have private prisons, which hold felony offenders for a year or longer.

Dvorak said California has several private jails where police have noticed better accuracy in booking, lower costs and fewer confrontations between suspects and officers.

Milstead said the proposal for a private jail, which was first raised several years ago, went dormant for a while because of a notorious escape from a private prison in Kingman, Ariz., in 2010.

Two of the escapees murdered an Oklahoma couple.

"We were afraid at the time that people would not be able to differentiate ... between a private prison and a private jail," Milstead said.

At present, misdemeanor suspects are taken first to city holding facilities to be booked. They're arraigned in city court within 24 hours and if the court orders them held, they are taken to the county jail.

Mesa's holding facility can hold fewer than 30 people.

Peviously, the county's Southeast Valley jail at Mesa Drive and U.S. 60 both booked and housed offenders. The county stopped housing prisoners early last decade, and in 2007 stopped using it to book offenders as well.

That forced city police to take prisoners to the Fourth Avenue Jail in downtown Phoenix. Mesa police officers make about five such trips a day, Dvorak said.

Mesa Police Chief Frank Milstead said the county has indicated it would reopen the Southeast Valley facility within the next two months, but only to receive prisoners.

That still would help local departments, Milstead said, because they wouldn't have to spend so much time taking prisoners to Phoenix.

The old jail has 180 beds. Even if that part also were to reopen, it could house only some of the hundreds of misdemeanor offenders for which Southeast Valley cities are currently responsible.

Milstead and Kavanaugh both raised the possibility of the county turning over the vacant jail to Mesa or to a regional cooperative, but that would require political buy-in from the county board.

Mesa will pursue that with the county while also considering bids from private jail operators.

Mental illness in the CJ system: crises and diversions.

From David's Hope:

David's Hope is an education and advocacy agency designed to provide people living with mental illness, and all those involved in their care, the skills and knowledge needed to navigate the behavioral health and criminal justice systems. David’s Hope teaches people how to advocate for themselves and others by empowering them with information, training, resources, and mentoring. Through education and mentoring we hope to create understanding in the community of the issues facing those living with mental illness involved in the Criminal Justice System.

Suicide attempt results in prison for vehicular homicide.

A few months ago I heard a story in a community forum about the criminalization of people who are mentally ill that troubled me deeply. It was reported that the City of Phoenix was prosecuting a man for disorderly conduct due to his attempt to jump off a bridge when suicidal one day. A month or so before that I was told about a man in another county who had tried to kill himself by jumping into traffic, and was being prosecuted for the damage he did to the car that hit him. Last year the AZ Department of Corrections prosecuted a prisoner for arson who had set himself on fire and was burned over 80% of his body. And state prisoner Tony Lester was prosecuted and imprisoned in the first place for injuries friends incurred while trying to prevent him from cutting his throat in a psychotic state. 

All this impressed me as being unnecessarily punitive of individuals who were themselves already victims of suicidal despair and clinical depression, and I have a soapbox set up just for this issue. So when I read about this guy going to prison for killing someone during a suicide attempt, I expected more of the same kind of story. It wasn't. This guy is a real self-absorbed bastard who seems like he'd do or say anything to save his own life.

Now, granted, the prosecution only tells the state's version of a story - that version is the one posted below. If their premise is true, however, then Buot intentionally drove his SUV into an unsuspecting woman's path to hurt his wife by killing himself. That's pretty criminal in my book and deserves prosecution. What this man did was something like firing a sub-machine gun into a crowd while hoping to be taken out by a cop. It was reckless, cowardly, and could predictably end in someone else's grave injury or death. 

In the course of his "suicide attempt" (why would he really think he'd die by plowing his huge SUV into another car is beyond me), Buot killed a young mother of three, and lived to lie about it. Good for Bill Montgomery for holding him responsible. I'm not sure I'd send him to prison for the next 22 years, myself - there must be some better way to teach people not to be so careless when so consumed with self-destructive rage that they're driven to risk lives other than their own in the course of acting on suicidal impulse. Lacking that alternative sentencing option right now, though, I'm glad the guy will be off the streets for awhile.

I don't know if Buot has a serious mental illness that impaired his judgement, or if he's just a selfish, manipulative bully. In any case, my heart goes out to the family of this man's victim, Christine Ann Anderson. Condolences to all her loved ones. I still reject the criminalization of mental illness - but I'll remember what happened to Christine the next time I protest the prosecution of someone who endangers others in the course of trying to harm themselves.

Killing us softly: Prosecuting suicide.

I attended a community roundtable meeting last night about mental illness in the criminal justice system, and the issue of prosecuting people for suicide attempts came up. Killing oneself is no longer against the law in America, but it seems that doesn't stop the cops and prosecutors from coming after you if you fail. A woman in the audience noted that she had just helped get charges dismissed against a man who the City of Phoenix tried to prosecute for disorderly conduct over his attempt to jump off of a bridge after he recovered from the crisis. The city attorney's office complained that he disrupted traffic and tied up public services with his actions.


Isn't that what public services are for - to deal with that kind of thing? Arizona's suicide rate is twice our homicide rate, so we'd better come up with more creative ways to discourage people from killing themselves if we want to lower the death toll. This kind of prosecution seems aimed at minimizing the public's inconvenience, that's all.

Just a few months ago, at a similar meeting, I heard about a man in either Pima or Pinal county who was being prosecuted for criminal damage after surviving a suicide attempt in which he threw himself in front of a car. The damage to the vehicle was over $1000, so he was facing a felony - and therefore possible prison time.


What is wrong with this state? If a person dies from self-inflicted injury, they're listed as a suicide victim. If they survive, however, they can be prosecuted as a perpetrator. Granted, that guy's actions placed the occupants of the vehicle at risk and he should compensate them for the property damage. But that calls for restorative justice, not criminal justice interventions.

I know it's not just here. Last March, the ACLU filed a brief in Indiana on behalf of a woman who was being prosecuted for murder after she miscarried her child in a failed suicide attempt. Currently in the news, a marine in Maryland is fighting his conviction for self-inflicted injury (he cut his wrists in a suicide attempt), which brought with it six months in the brig and a bad conduct discharge. And many years ago in Michigan, when my brother overdosed on my grandmother's prescription medications in a suicide attempt, the cops came and arrested him a month later for possession of a controlled substance - which they seized from his room when the paramedics responded with them to the 911 call. He pled guilty to avoid prison.

I suspect this is happening far more often than any of us could imagine. We need to be substantiating and documenting these reports, and bringing them to light - the city and county attorneys making these decisions need to be held responsible for them, and people struggling with serious mental illness desperately need the support of the community behind them when they're being prosecuted for their symptoms - like despair, impulsivity, delusions, lack of insight, and self-injurious behavior.

I'm not saying that a psychiatric disorder exempts a person from responsibility for their actions. There's a difference between prosecuting a criminal with a mental illness, and prosecuting a person for the "crime" of being mentally ill, however - that happens far too often in America. It's important to make that distinction and be conservative about filing charges in these kinds of circumstances for many reasons - particularly in Arizona, where the mentally ill are more than nine times as likely to end up behind bars as in the state hospital. 

Even if there's some merit to a case, for example, or someone was particularly reckless and harmed others, the negative effects on the community of prosecuting it can still be greater than the benefits of doing so. It can have the chilling effect of discouraging people from reaching out for help after initiating a suicide attempt for fear of being criminally punished. That marine's conviction for self-inflicted injury is especially troubling given the high rate of suicide among service members these days - it's not like he shot himself in the foot to avoid deployment. I can hear a lot of GIs now telling themselves to be sure to use their service weapon if they take themselves out, so there's no chance of survival lest the same humiliation befall them...no more room for ambivalence there.


People aren't usually thinking rationally when they try to kill themselves, and while we should all be mindful not to harm others in the course of harming ourselves (as in with drugged or drunk driving), the consequences of such prosecutions - discouraging people from seeking help in the midst of a suicidal crisis - can be devastating to the "innocent" - those who are careful not to take others out with them - who may die for fear of summoning our community's emergency responders if they have lest minute regrets. It also leaves a lot of other victims behind to grieve them. That's not what we expect for our tax dollars when our fellow citizens are suffering so.

If the profession can't rein its own members in and establish some better parameters to minimize criminal charges against people for the symptoms of their mental illness, then advocates for suicide prevention should be hounding their lawmakers to explore legislative remedies to this problem. In the meantime, please help me publicize when such prosecutions occur so we know just how often it happens, and under whose watch. Spread the word among public defenders, prisoners, the mental health community, and anyone else who might care. And tell those with the power to make decisions about such things that this is unacceptable.


Gary Verberg is the City Attorney for Phoenix - it's my understanding that all criminal prosecutions done by the city are ultimately his responsibility. I haven't verified the details of the allegation about the case above, so don't go off accusing his office of brutalizing people with psychiatric disorders. Just please contact him and make sure he knows that city residents expect suicide attempts to be treated as a medical emergency, not a criminal offense. The contact information for his office is:

Street Address:
300 West Washington, 8th Floor
Phoenix, AZ 85003 

Mailing Address:
P.O. Box 4500
Phoenix, AZ 85030-4500

Phone Numbers:
602-262-6461
Fax: 602-262-7052

The Maricopa County Attorney, Bill Montgomery, didn't make it to the roundtable last night, but he has been to others in the past year and has expressed his own sentiment that it's inappropriate, as a rule, to criminalize people who would not otherwise be offenders but for the symptoms of their mental illness. While we were talking largely about things like destroying property and being disorderly in the course of a psychotic episode, I think this kind of thing would fall under the same category. If you want to let him know your feelings on the issue, though, just in case they got some poor soul facing jail for trying to kill themselves now, drop him a line too at: 301 W. Jefferson St., Phoenix, AZ 85003 / 602-506-3411. I write to him all the time, myself.

Finally, if you're only going to write to one person or place about this, hit these folks: The Arizona Prosecuting Attorneys Advisory Council. It's made up of county attorneys across the state to promote their common crime-fighting agenda with the public and legislature, apparently. They're the folks who invest in propaganda campaigns that further demonize the prison population to support their claim that they've been putting all the right people behind bars in this state, and that we therefore don't need to reform sentencing guidelines or eliminate mandatory minimums. They can be reached at: 1951 W. Camelback Rd., Suite 202, Phoenix, AZ 85015 / 602-542-7222. 

Be sure to send a copy of the letter you send to any of them to the Arizona Republic - or to me - as well, so it can be published. Contact the AZ Republic at: the Editor, The Arizona Republic, P.O. Box 1950, Phoenix, AZ 85001. Letters may also be faxed to (602) 444-8933. Or use their on-line form here.

My address is PO Box 20494, Phoenix, AZ 85036. Or you can email me at prisonabolitionist@gmail.com.


Thanks.

The conviction of Tony Lester: A juror's regrets.

Most readers are already well aware of Tony Lester's story. Tony was sentenced to the Arizona Department of Corrections in 2010 for 12 years on assault charges stemming from a suicide attempt during a psychotic episode the previous year - the friends who tried to stop him from cutting his throat got hurt themselves, grabbing the knife.

In Arizona, people with mental illness are almost ten times more likely to be locked behind bars than admitted to the state hospital when they need help. Not surprisingly, instead of being admitted to a psychiatric hospital that night, Tony was put in jail, then criminally prosecuted. Tony was so ill when this happened that it took nine months to restore him to sufficient competency in the wake of the incident to be tried for it. Soon after he arrived in state prison - receiving no treatment there for his mental illness - Tony killed himself. 

This weekend one of the people on his jury posted the comment below to the MSNBC website following the piece Wendy Halloran did at KPNX on his suicide...the comment after it was left by Tony's aunt. This seems to be a call for sentencing reform and more diversion of the mentally ill from the criminal justice system in the first place...

---------------from MSNBC.com----------------

Did officers' inaction, lack of training contribute to inmate's death?

By M. Alex Johnson
msnbc.com

"Investigators' interviews with correctional officers at a state prison in Tucson, Ariz., suggest that the officers' indifference and lack of basic first aid training allowed an inmate to bleed to death after his second suicide attempt.
The recorded interviews were obtained by KPNX-TV, the NBC affiliate in Phoenix, which has spent much of the past year digging into the suicide of Anthony Clayton Lester, 26, in July 2010.

The station reports that Lester, who was serving a 12-year sentence for aggravated assault, had a long history of mentally illness and had tried to kill himself the previous month. But he was taken off his medications and was removed from a suicide watch two days before his death..."

(view the rest of the article and other comments here)

READER COMMENTS:

anonymous juror

My Grandson sent me this link to view and after I viewed this I felt that I had no other choice than to find the courage to post this comment. I was one of the jurors on this Anthony Lester criminal case. I sat through this entire trial and heard all the testimony, and I found that there was reasonable doubt in this case and that I and another juror voted not guilty on several deliberation votes, it was another juror on this panel that swayed our votes to vote guilty. There were two victims in this case, we came back with a not guilty verdict on the second victim immediately and it took us a few days to come back with the guilty verdict after we were persuaded to vote guilty.

Like I said before after hearing all the testimony in this case there was a reasonable doubt and now knowing that Anthony Lester was sentenced to a twelve year prison sentence has made me sick and I feel as if we had a hand in this too, the only way to vindicate myself from this incredible tragedy is to tell how I feel and perhaps this young man may forgive us for what we did to him. Knowing now that he was his mother's only child has just ripped my heart apart and taken his daughter's father away from her has made me feel completely saddened by this knowing now how extremely ill he really was. I am so ashamed, I hope his mother will forgive us and his daughter will some day know this truth, that if we the jurors would have known that by finding Anthony Lester guilty of this crime than we automatically sentenced him to a minimum seven year prison sentence. We could see that he was ill and we thought that he would get probation and get the help he needed.

I think that jurors should be told what would result if they find someone guilty of a crime that this could have a great bearing on the verdict. I have struggled with this decision that I made for the last two years, wishing that I could change my verdict, wishing that I stuck to my gut instincts instead of being convinced by a fellow juror to change my verdict. This is something that I will live with the rest of my life and I pray that Anthony's mother and family will find in their hearts to forgive me. I know the next time that I sit on a jury that I will not let someone sway my vote so easily.

I thought prison would take care of someone so ill as Anthony Lester, after viewing this story done by channel 12 news this has sickened me even more that is why I felt I needed to post this comment. Thank-you channel 12 for reporting this story maybe now Anthony Lester's story will help make changes in the criminal system, it certainly needs it. May Anthony Lester Forgive Us for what we did to him.

#122 - Sat Dec 31, 2011 1:42 PM EST

 ----------------------------

Patti Jones

Just when you think that this could get much worse, than here comes more to grasp. I am completely and utterly speechless. I read your posted comment yesterday "Anonymous Juror" and I just wanted to wait until I could completely be able to post something that was not out of anger. I do not hold anger or any bitterness towards you for what you thought was the right thing. I could only imagine the inner turmoil that you must have felt and continue to feel knowing by changing your verdect the way that you did changed the course of so many lives, perhaps yours the most. If there is one thing that I have learned from this is to forgive and try to help bring the much needed changes, so that no other mentally-ill person will suffer the way Tony has. I will not judge your actions their is only one judge. And if we all try to live a righteous life than the reward will be phenomenal. I know Tony did come to grips with this at the end of his life. I do thank-you for coming out now to speak the truth, I knew that the system all around has let our Tony down.

I will always feel until the day that I die that Tony NEVER deserved that twelve year prison sentence that was handed down to him. But I feel that by you finally speaking out will now help us finally have Justice for Tony and now there can be many more lives like Tony saved. So I commend you on speaking out, and perhaps if you write to your legislatures this could help change these laws. You need to forgive yourself, I refuse to become angry and bitter. Tony would not have wanted this, it is about change in such a broken system. Peace. Patti Jones

#123 - Sun Jan 1, 2012 2:58 PM EST

Criminalizing youth resistance: Truancy in MESA

I swear I don't know I escaped being criminalized in my youth...

-------from the Arizona Republic------

Courts cracking down on truancy

Students warned of charges that can stem from skipping school

Cathryn Creno -

Dec. 25, 2011 09:24 PM
The Arizona Republic

The excuses for missing dozens of days of school this year ranged from insomnia to asthma to not liking the "drama" in high-school hallways.

But Judge Dan Dodge wasn't having any of it at a new special hearing he holds for truants and their parents once a month.

"Chronic truancy is a criminal offense. Do you want to start out your life with a criminal record?" Dodge said as he stared down from the bench at Gilbert's Highland Justice Court at a sleepy-eyed 15-year-old Dobson High School student.The freshman said he has missed dozens of days of school this year because he usually struggles to fall asleep until 3 a.m. He then has trouble getting up for his 8 a.m. class. And Mom, typically asleep herself at the hour school starts, is no help, the student said.

"I don't really care about school," he had said before walking into the courtroom. "I would rather stay up late and play music."

Dodge was unsympathetic, saying the problem could easy be solved with fewer late-night jam sessions and a louder morning alarm clock. Or maybe Mom should just pour a glass of water on his head every morning at 6 a.m., the judge said.

Dodge told the young insomniac to have no more unexcused absences this year or he could lose his right to apply for an Arizona driver's license until he turns 18.

Potential prosecution

On a recent afternoon, Dodge looked around a courtroom full of accused truants, their parents and their guardians and told everyone to shape up or face prosecution by the Maricopa County Attorney's Office.

Parents in the room eyed each other with chagrin as Dodge told them that they, along with their teens, could face Class 3 misdemeanor charges -- meaning fines and possible jail sentences -- if they did not get their kids to school on time or make arrangements for them to study at home because of chronic illnesses.

"And if you want to drop out and ruin your life at age 16, that is your prerogative. But before that, it is not your privilege," Dodge told the students, who are not identified because The Arizona Republic typically does not print the names of juveniles accused of crimes.

Dodge ordered the kids and parents to return to his courtroom in March with report cards and attendance records. If things have improved by then, charges will be dropped.

At least one student in the courtroom was already on her way to a new life. Wearing a charter-school uniform, she told Dodge that she hated the "drama" at her former district high school and had been in class every day since she transferred.

Truancy court is a no-nonsense year-old partnership between the Mesa Public Schools Safety and Security Department and East Valley justice of the peace courts, including Dodge's.

Mesa, the largest school district in the state, has a long history of being the toughest on truants.

Most schools traditionally let attendance clerks and counselors deal with kids who play hooky occasionally and report chronic truants to local police. Peoria Unified School District in the West Valley has an innovative on-campus program called "Sweeps" that requires kids who are late or loitering around campus to spend at least one class period away from other students explaining to a teacher why they were AWOL.

In contrast, Mesa employs nine uniformed, body-armor-wearing, pepper-spray-carrying security officers who spend at least half of their time tracking truants and their parents. The officers are not sworn law-enforcement officials but have been trained to restrain young offenders until police arrive.

The annual cost in salaries is about $140,000 for the anti-truancy program, said Mesa schools security director Allen Moore, who believes the expense is more than worth it.

Pathway to crime

While the district wants as many kids in school as possible -- it gets nearly $5,000 a year in funding for each child enrolled and has lost 9,000 students in the past decade -- it's even more important to turn around truant kids before they get involved in crime, Moore said.

After performing normal school-security duties, the nine officers patrol areas that truants like to frequent -- shopping malls, electronics stores and restaurants with deals on breakfast -- in search of kids who should be in a classroom.

While one ditch day here or there probably does not mean the start of a criminal career, juvenile-crime experts say habitual truancy often is the first step toward involvement with drugs, vandalism, burglaries and gangs.

"We get calls from the parks, from the malls ... sometimes the kids have already been involved in burglaries," said Tim Pinsonneault, security supervisor for Mesa Public Schools.

"Habitual truants like to hang out with each other," Mesa security officer Nathan Wax said. "Kids all have cellphones. They text each other and meet up at houses where parents aren't home."

In most cases, truancy problems are solved with a simple visit with the child and parents from a school security officer.

"We meet with parents and the student, we explain the state law to them. We say our goal is not to cite them," Pinsonneault said. "But if they don't correct the behavior, they are served by a process server and they have to go to court. If they don't show up, a warrant is issued for their arrest."

Moore said his officers have stumbled onto meth labs and dwellings where the conditions were so uninhabitable that they called Mesa police and the state's Child Protective Services.

But, he said, truancy is a middle-class problem, too.

"We have parents who want to take their kids out of school for a cruise," he said. "That is not allowed. And some parents want to start holiday break by going on vacation early. We don't call that vacation. We call it truancy."

Tutoring, counseling and parenting classes are made available to kids and parents who need them. But Moore said in many cases families just need to be made aware of the law. He said in the last calendar year, his officers have tracked down and given warnings to 1,184 truant junior-high and high-school students and 1,972 parents of truant elementary-schoolers. All but 606 middle- and high-school students and 234 elementary-school students returned to school with no additional action, he said. Those who did not heed the security officers' warnings were summoned to truancy hearings in a court like Dodge's.

Pinsonneault said that before last year, Mesa schools, like most other districts in the county, referred its habitual truants to the county's Juvenile Probation Department. The problem, he said, was that some parents failed to take the juvenile citations seriously.

"Bringing everyone to a justice court gives the process more teeth," he said.

Of the 79 chronic truants who appeared in Dodge's court last spring, only 12 still have charges pending, Moore said. The rest "have corrected their behavior and are attending school successfully," he said.

"It amazed me what a difference a little bit of the fear of the law would make," Dodge said.

Arizona's truancy law

Arizona law requires students to attend a public, private or home school until they turn 16 or finish 10th grade.

Students must be present 90 percent of the time -- 162 days of a 180-day school year -- to get a passing grade and credit in a class.
 
Kids are considered chronically truant after they miss 18 days of school, even if some of the days were excused absences.

Schools can issue citations that refer students to court or truancy-diversion programs after five unexcused absences.

Kids who fail to return to school after getting warnings face penalties ranging from fines to loss of eligibility for an Arizona driver's license until age 18.
Parents who fail to get their kids back to school can face fines or, in extreme cases, jail time.

Sources: Mesa Public Schools, Highland Justice Court, Maricopa County Juvenile Probation Department

Diverting mentally ill from the CJ system: Communtiy Roundtable FEB 2012

ROUNDTABLE FORUM
First Contact: Mental Illness in the CJ System

Sponsored by David's Hope and the Arizona Mental Health and Criminal Justice Coalition

THURSDAY
FEBRUARY 2, 2012

7:00 - 9:00 PM

Taking place within the historic

A. E. England Building
ASU DOWNTOWN CAMPUS
424 N. Central Ave. Phoenix 85004

Sign in begins 6:30pm.

Forum is free and open to the public.

Please join us in this mediated discussion regarding those with mental illness,
as their lives intersect with law enforcement.

Parking is available in ASU Visitor lots where credit cards may be used. There is also a public lot on the northeast corner of N. Central and E. Fillmore which requires $5 cash and has no time limit

MORE INFORMATION: 602-774-4382
www.davidshopeaz.org

Roundtable Participant List 

February 2, 2012

 
Cecil Ash Arizona State House of Representatives
Barbara Broderick Chief, Maricopa County Adult Probation
Chris Carson CEO, ConnectionsAZ
Tom Chabin Arizona State House of Representatives
Justin Chase Director of Crisis Services, Magellan Health Services of Arizona
Sean Connolly Lieutenant, Phoenix Police Department, South Mountain Precinct
Joy Green Advocate and Board Member, David’s Hope
Laura Irish Director of Mobile Crisis, TERROS Behavioral Health Services
Nick Margiotta Director of Crisis Intervention Training, Phoenix Police Department
Bill Montgomery Maricopa County Attorney
Frank Munnell Chief, Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office
Dawn Noggle Mental Health Director, Maricopa County Correctional Health Services
Suzanne Rabideau CEO and President, Crisis Response Network Inc.

Agenda

 
7:00 pm Dr. Michael Shafer, “Five Reflections” Director, ASU CABHP
7:10 pm Roundtable Dialogue
8:00 pm Audience Q&A
8:50 pm Closing remarks, Mary Lou Brncik, Founder, David’s Hope

Special thanks to Emily Jenkins, President and CEO of the AZ Council of Human Service Providers and Kelly Carbello, Executive Director of David’s Hope, for moderating this forum.

Who is ALEC, and why do we care?

from the People for the American Way, a brief tutorial on why these are people who must no longer be allowed to write our legislation....

__________________

ALEC: The Voice of Corporate Special Interests In State Legislatures

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Who Founded and Funds ALEC?
• Who’s Behind ALEC?
• How Does ALEC Work?
• What Does ALEC Lobby For?
• Undercutting Health Care Reform
• Corporate Power and Workers’ Rights
• Tax Policy
• Private School Vouchers
• Voter ID and Election Laws
• Obstructing Environmental Protection
• Conclusion

Introduction

When state legislators across the nation introduce similar or identical bills designed to boost corporate power and profits, reduce workers rights, limit corporate accountability for pollution, or restrict voting by minorities, odds are good that the legislation was not written by a state lawmaker but by corporate lobbyists working through the American Legislative Exchange Council. ALEC is a one-stop shop for corporations looking to identify friendly state legislators and work with them to get special-interest legislation introduced. It’s win-win for corporations, their lobbyists, and right-wing legislators. But the big losers are citizens whose rights and interests are sold off to the highest bidder.

Who Founded and Funds ALEC?

The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) was founded in 1973 by Paul Weyrich, who helped build a nationwide right-wing political infrastructure following the reelection of Richard Nixon. In the same year, he helped establish the Heritage Foundation, now one of the most prominent right-wing policy institutes in the country. One year later, Weyrich founded the Committee for the Survival of a Free Congress, the predecessor of the Free Congress Foundation. In 1979, he co-founded and coined the Moral Majority with Jerry Falwell, and in 1981 he helped establish the ultraconservative Council on National Policy.

ALEC’s major funders include Exxon Mobil, the Scaife family (Allegheny Foundation and the Scaife Family Foundation), the Coors family (Castle Rock Foundation), Charles Koch (Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation and the Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation), the Bradley family (The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation) and the Olin family (John M. Olin Foundation). These organizations consistently finance right-wing think tanks and political groups.

Members of ALEC’s board represent major corporations such as Altria, AT&T, GlaxoSmithKline, Johnson & Johnson, Koch Industries, Kraft, PhRMA, Wal-Mart, Peabody Energy, and State Farm. Such corporations represent just a fraction of ALEC’s approximately three hundred corporate partners. According to the American Association for Justice, over eighty percent of ALEC’s finances come from corporate contributions.

Who’s Behind ALEC?

ALEC’s activities reflect its founding, funding, and control by corporate interests. According to the American Association for Justice, “the nuts and bolts of lobbying and crafting legislation is done by large corporate defense firm Shook Hardy & Bacon.” This firm plays a significant role in managing ALEC’s legislative and governmental advocacy programs.

The American Bar Association Journal describes Shook Hardy & Bacon as the “darling of corporate America. ” Their tenacious defense of the tobacco industry “made Shook Hardy the firm many of the world’s biggest companies turn to at the first hint of trouble with one of their products.” A New York Times report on Shook Hardy said “tobacco is their middle name,” and the firm’s lawyers have been viewed as “industry propagandists, apologists and co-conspirators.” Shook Hardy represents clients from the pharmaceutical, energy, food, banking and tobacco industries, like Pfizer, Bayer, Eli Lilly, Cargill, Kraft, Bank of America, Philip Morris, Lorillard Tobacco, and British American Tobacco. ALEC’s monthly periodical Inside ALEC demonstrates the significant role of Shook Hardy, as members of the law firm contributed essays criticizing environmental protection efforts¹, endorsing corporate immunity from lawsuits², and defending abusive insurance company practices³.

The clout of corporations and corporate-backed groups comprising ALEC is unmistakable: Victor E. Schwartz, a Shook Hardy partner and head of its Public Policy Group, chairs ALEC’s Civil Justice Task Force; Tom Moskitis, the American Gas Association’s Director of External Affairs, chairs the Energy, Environment and Agriculture Task Force; Bob Williams, founder and senior fellow of the corporate-funded Evergreen Freedom Foundation, chairs the Tax and Fiscal Policy Task Force; Bartlett Cleland, director of the corporate-financed Institute for Policy Innovation, chairs the Telecommunications and Information Technology Task Force, and Emory Wilkerson, associate general counsel for State Farm Insurance, chairs the Commerce, Insurance and Economic Development Task Force.

Simply put, “corporations can implement their agendas very effectively using ALEC,” as stated by Edwin Bender of the National Institute on Money in State Politics.

How Does ALEC Work?

ALEC serves as a means for corporations to advise, lobby and sway legislators. By paying hefty dues and sponsorship fees, corporations are able to participate in ALEC ventures, forums and legislative advocacy work and also underwrite conferences, task forces and meetings with politicians. Corporations use ALEC to formulate, present and promote model legislation to elected officials who are ALEC members and sometimes hold leadership roles in the organization.

“Our members join for the purpose of having a seat at the table. That’s just what we do, that’s the service we offer,” explains Dennis Bartlett, an ALEC task force head who is also the executive director of the American Bail Coalition. “The organization is supported by money from the corporate sector, and, by paying to be members, corporations are allowed the opportunity to sit down at the table and discuss the issues that they have an interest in.”

ALEC propagates a wide range of “model legislation” that seeks to make it more difficult for people to hold corporations accountable in court; gut the rights and protections of workers and consumers; encumber health care reform; privatize and weaken the public education system; provide business tax cuts and corporate welfare; privatize and cut public services; erode regulations and environmental laws; create unnecessary voter ID requirements; endorse Citizens United; diminish campaign finance reform and permit greater corporate influence in elections.

In order to draft and promote their “model legislation,” ALEC operates task forces that bring representatives from corporations together with lawmakers. Each ALEC task force is chaired by both elected officials and “private sector” members. According to Jesse Zwick of the Washington Independent, “ALEC’s task forces are better known for crafting legislation that coincides, rather than conflicts, with the interests of its private-sector members. Famous for hosting lavish conferences for state legislators who possess no staff of their own, the group pampers lawmakers while providing them the opportunity to collaborate on legislation often previously researched and introduced by the policy shops of its corporate members.”

According to ALEC, in 2009, of the 826 “model bills” that were introduced in state legislatures, 115 of those bills were enacted into law. That number is sure to grow following the major Republican gains in the 2010 elections.

ALEC was influential in crafting and passing a Texas law, dubbed the “Successor Asbestos-Related Liability Fairness Act, that shielded Crown Cork and Seal, a business that in 1966 acquired a company that used asbestos in its products, from lawsuits from the company’s workers. Even though Crown agreed to pay the company’s liabilities, it wanted immunity from paying damages to workers facing asbestos-related diseases. Crown Cork and Seal turned to ALEC to help shape the Texas law, which put an extremely low cap on liability for companies like Crown who acquired companies which committed wrongdoing, known as a “successor immunity” law.” Mark Behrens, an attorney for Shook Hardy, worked as a lobbyist for both ALEC and Crown to encourage allied lawmakers to introduce and pass the bill. The American Association for Justice writes that “this so-called ‘successor immunity’ has all the hallmarks of an ALEC special interest bill. It is plainly designed not with public policy in mind, but rather a specific industry (or in this case, a specific company).” The Texas Supreme Court ultimately found the cap to be an unconstitutional retroactive protection for Crown that inhibited the rights of people to rightfully sue corporations for damages, but similar ALEC-derived laws are still on the books in other states.

In Arizona, an investigative report by NPRfound that ALEC significantly helped one of its clients, the Corrections Corporations of America (CCA), influence the state’s new immigration law. The CCA is a for-profit prison company whose “executives believe immigrant detention is their next big market,” and thought that a law which “could send hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants” to prison would “mean hundreds of millions of dollars in profits to private prison companies responsible for housing them.” As a dues-paying member of ALEC, the CCA was able to write, present and lobby Arizona policymakers for a draconian immigration bill at an ALEC-hosted conference. “Four months later, that model legislation became, almost word for word, Arizona’s immigration law,” and many of the bill’s cosponsors later received significant campaign contributions from the CCA. ALEC also helped the CCA by pushing “truth in sentencing” laws that restrict parole eligibility for felons, and consequently increase the number of prisoners.

What Does ALEC Lobby For?

Since the organization claims to only “exchange” legislation, ALEC is not technically a lobbying firm, and does not need to register. However, ALEC’s tactics and operations are strikingly similar to those of registered lobbyists with corporate benefactors.

Undercutting Health Care Reform

After the passage of health care reform, ALEC’s top priority has been to challenge the law by encouraging members to introduce bills that would prohibit the law’s insurance mandate. ALEC’s Health and Human Services task force is led by representatives of PhRMA and Johnson & Johnson, and representatives of Bayer and GlaxoSmithKlein sit on ALEC’s board. The group’s model bill, the “Freedom of Choice in Health Care Act,” has been introduced in forty-four states, and ALEC even released a “State Legislators Guide to Repealing ObamaCare” discussing a variety of model legislation including bills to partially privatize Medicaid and SCHIP. The legislative guide utilizes ideas and information from pro-corporate groups like the Heritage Foundation, the Goldwater Institute, the James Madison Institute, the Cato Institute, the National Center for Policy Analysis and the National Federation of Independent Business.

Corporate Power and Workers’ Rights

ALEC works fervently to promote laws that would shield corporations from legal action and allow them to limit the rights of workers. The group’s model legislation would roll back laws regarding corporate accountability, workers compensation and on the job protections, collective bargaining and organizing rights, prevailing wage and the minimum wage. ALEC is a main proponent of bills that undermine organized labor by stripping public employees of collective bargaining rights and “right to work” laws.They also push “regulatory flexibility” laws that lead to massive deregulation. It is no surprise that the director of ALEC’s Commerce, Insurance and Economic Development Task Force previously worked as a Koch Associate at the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation.

Tax Policy

As states face challenging budget deficits, ALEC wants to make it more difficult to generate revenue in order to close shortfalls. Bills include the “Super Majority Act,” which makes it so complicated for legislatures to change tax policy that California voters overturned the law; the “Taxpayer Bill Of Rights,” which brought fiscal disaster to Colorado; and measures to eliminate capital gains and progressive income taxes. The main beneficiaries of ALEC’s irresponsible fiscal policies are corporations and the wealthiest taxpayers.

Private School Vouchers

Despite constitutional problems, negative impacts on public schools, bias against disadvantaged students, and comprehensive studies in cities like Washington DC, New York, Milwaukee, and Cleveland which demonstrate that private school voucher programs failed to make any improvements to the education system, ALEC sees vouchers as a way to radically privatize the public education system. Under the guise of “school choice,” ALEC pushes bills with titles like “Parental Choice Scholarship Act” and the “Education Enterprise Act” that establish private school voucher programs.

Voter ID and Election Laws

ALEC is directly tied to the emerging trend among state legislatures to consider voter ID laws. Using false allegations of “voter fraud,” right-wing politicians are pursuing policies that disenfranchise students and other at-risk voters,--including the elderly and the poor--who are unlikely to have drivers’ licenses or other forms of photo ID. By suppressing the vote of such groups, ALEC’s model “Voter ID Act” grants an electoral advantage to Republicans while undermining the right to vote. In addition, ALEC wants to make it easier for corporations to participate in the political process. Their Public Safety and Elections taskforce is co-chaired by Sean Parnell of the Center for Competitive Politics, one of the most vociferous pro-corporate election groups, and promotes model legislation that would devastate campaign finance reform and allow for greater corporate influence in elections.

Obstructing Environmental Protection

At the bidding of its major donors like Exxon Mobil and Koch Industries, ALEC is behind state-level legislation that would hinder the ability of government to regulate and curb polluters. ALEC has previously said that carbon dioxide “is beneficial to plant and human life alike,” and promotes climate change denialism. The group’s model legislation assails EPA emissions guidelines and greenhouse gas regulations, destabilizes regional climate initiatives, permits free-reign for energy corporations, and pushes for massive deregulation. Unsurprisingly, ALEC’s “Energy, Environment and Agriculture” task force is led by Tom Moskitis of the American Gas Association and Martin Shultz of Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, a major lobbyist firm for oil and gas companies like ConocoPhillips. The group receives funding from ExxonMobil, Shell, Chevron, Texaco, Amoco, the American Petroleum Institute, and the American Electric Power Association.

Conclusion

Americans are increasingly recognizing and speaking out against the disproportionate power of corporations in shaping public policy and steering politicians, and ALEC is a prime example of how Corporate America is able to buy even more power and clout in government. Rather than serve the public interest, ALEC champions the agenda of corporations which are willing to pay for access to legislators and the opportunity to write their very own legislation. It helps surrogates and lobbyists for corporations draft and promote bills which gut environmental laws, create a regressive tax system, eliminate workers’ rights, undermine universal and affordable health care, privatize public education, and chip away at voting rights. It's no wonder that so many big corporations view ALEC as a wise investment. ALEC represents an alarming risk to the credibility of the political process and threatens to greatly diminish the confidence and influence ordinary people have in government.

Endnotes

1. Phil Goldberg, “State-Sponsored Global Warming Litigation is Weighing Down on American Business.” Inside ALEC. March 2011.
2. Victor Schwartz and Cary Silverman. “Rage Against Federal Pre-Emption.” Inside ALEC. June 2009.
3. Victor E. Schwartz. “How “Bad Faith” Becomes Bad Law.” Inside ALEC. November/December 2009.

Police Brutality day of protest, October 22, 2011!

FIGHT POWER with POWER.

Call-out from the October 22 Coalition at www.october22.org:


Across the U.S., Black, Latino, and poor neighborhoods are treated like occupied territory by increasingly militarized armies of law enforcement. People are criminalized and brutalized for their perceived status – socioeconomic, immigration, mental health, and/or racial, gender, or sexual identity. People living in our communities, especially youth, are routinely stopped, harassed, beaten, and even killed.


In Chicago, the home of the first Black president, police have shot 44 people so far this year, mostly youth of color, including 13-year-old Jimmell Cannon, who was shot eight times.



NYPD continues to stop hundreds of thousands of youth of color every year for the most minimal suspicion, fewer than 10% of which result in arrest, and far fewer in charges or conviction.



Police nationwide continue to kill with very little consequence. Twelve Miami cops shot at 22-year-old Raymond Herisse 100 times, then threatened those who recorded the incident, destroying their cellphones. A Tucson SWAT team shot at 26-year-old Iraq War veteran Jose Guerena over 70 times, claiming that he fired at them and then leaving him to bleed to death in his home. Both their allegations of gunfire and drug-dealing were later revealed to be false. In New York and New Jersey, at least 28 people have been killed by police since October 22 of last year, while at least 35 people have been killed by law enforcement in Washington State in the last 12 months. The killing of 22-year old Oscar Grant in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2009 resulted in a rare conviction for the officer who shot him; however, he was freed after mere months in prison, while people protesting the outrageous verdict were met with police violence and mass arrests. In the weeks following that cop’s release, SF cops killed Charles Hill, a 45-year-old homeless man, on a subway platform and 19-year old Kenneth Harding after he supposedly failed to pay a $2 train fare, then left him dying on the pavement in front of dozens of outraged witnesses.



Police routinely abuse the mentally ill and disabled. Fullerton, CA cops beat to death homeless and mentally ill 27-year-old Kelly Thomas, described by many in the community as “a gentle, childlike soul.” In Fresno, CA, 28-year-old Raul Rosas, Jr. died after being tasered by police. His girlfriend said "I didn't call the Fresno County Sheriff to kill him. I called because he needed help with his mental illness.” Raul went into cardiac arrest and was denied access to three medical ambulances that showed up to assist.



Recently enacted anti-immigrant laws have given police in the states of Arizona, Georgia, and Alabama sweeping powers to stop people "suspected" of being undocumented on no other basis than appearance. The hostility and racism stoked by these policies have already culminated in violence, as seen in the killing of 15-year-old Sergio Adrián Hernández Güereka by a border patrol agent and the beating death of 42-year-old Anastasio Hernández Rojas at the hands of La Migra. More than one million have been deported under the Obama administration.



Racially targeted mass incarceration exacerbates the criminalization and marginalization of Black people, playing the same role as the Jim Crow laws that sprang from the Virginia slave codes of 1705. In 1954, 90,000 Black people were incarcerated. Now, over 900,000 Black people are imprisoned, a tenfold increase, while the total U.S. Black population has merely doubled in the same period. The U.S. also has the highest incarceration rate worldwide, with 2.4 million people in prison.



Law enforcement continues to harass and sexually assault people, most especially women and the transgendered. According to the website InjusticeEverywhere.com, sexual misconduct was the second most common complaint (following excessive force) against police in 2010, involving 618 cops.



Young schoolchildren are increasingly labeled and treated as criminals by school security and local police. Eight-year-old Aidan Elliot was peppersprayed and handcuffed by Colorado police, and ten-year-old Sofia Bautista was removed from her elementary school, then taken to a NYPD precinct, handcuffed, and interrogated for hours, while police nationwide continue to use tasers on students as young as six.



Meanwhile, repression against those who take action against injustices continues to escalate. Over a dozen activists with Food Not Bombs have been arrested in Orlando for feeding the homeless in public parks. The killings of Oscar Grant, Kenneth Harding, Kelly Thomas, Raymond Herisse, and John T. Williams (in Seattle) were all caught on video. Now, as if in retaliation against the subsequent public outrage, police in cities and towns nationwide have attacked and arrested people merely for recording their activity, while in Illinois, Maryland, and Massachusetts, video-recording the police is now explicitly illegal. Cops haven’t stopped killing and brutalizing people—they’re just making it a crime to record them while they do.



Repression against progressive and antiwar activism has intensified: simultaneous FBI raids on activists from numerous antiwar and international solidarity organizations in three U.S. cities took place on September 24, 2010. Twenty-three activists now face serious jail time for refusing to participate in the ensuing grand jury witch hunts that clearly intend to discourage and intimidate would-be dissenters.



These vicious attacks are not going down without opposition. Whether standing up to police violence when it happens, as we saw in the video of Kenneth Harding's shooting, or organizing inspiring prison strikes in Georgia and California, people are uniting to fight back. Determined outcry from people nationwide against the shooting of unarmed men crossing the Danziger Bridge in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina has finally brought convictions of the guilty cops and exposed the sort of extensive cover-ups that are routine with police shootings.



More and more crimes against the people are being revealed, as we have seen with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives’ Operation Fast and Furious, which intentionally provided weapons to Mexican drug cartels, and the overturning of over 4,000 convictions of youth in Pennsylvania after it was found that juvenile judge Mark Ciavarella received kickbacks from private for-profit detention centers. Once we have seen the man behind the curtain, how can we pretend he is not there? One thing we know from years of experience is that when this system has to answer to organized people, it can’t easily get away with all the things it's used to doing. Resistance matters.



THE VIOLENCE OF THE COPS, THE COURTS, THE FBI, LA MIGRA, AND HOMELAND SECURITY IS INTENSIFYING. OUR RESISTANCE MUST INTENSIFY AS WELL! Every year, thousands of people nationwide express their outrage, creativity, and resistance in response to the crimes of this system. People speak out and perform, they march in the streets, and more. The October 22nd Coalition to Stop Police Brutality, Repression, and the Criminalization of a Generation embraces and encourages any and all such expressions of people’s righteous outrage.



As said by the mother of Gil Barber, gunned down by a deputy in High Point, NC in 2001, “October 22nd is our day.” ORGANIZE against these injustices! BREAK DOWN the barriers between communities that these crimes seek to strengthen! MOBILIZE people of all communities in the most visible way…and on October 22, 2011, WEAR BLACK! FIGHT BACK!



JOIN US if there is already an October 22nd event in your area. CREATE one if you are in an area where there is currently no group organizing. For listings of activities in your area, check the website www.october22.org. To start building for an event in your area, email info@october22.org

Felony Mental Health Courts could help turn the tide...

Here's some background on felony mental health courts from a document put out by the folks who pulled together Harris County's Felony Mental Health Court in Texas. Support the creation of such courts in Arizona to address the needs and challenges presented by people with mental illness being charged with felonies, and come on out to the next Roundtable by David's Hope on October 20 at 5:30pm.

---------------------------

"Criminalization of Persons with Mental Illness

A report submitted to the Harris County Commissioners Court on June 19, 2009, by Dr. Barry Mahoney of the Justice Management Institute, noted that in a little over five years, the average daily population of the Harris County Jail (designed for a capacity of 9,434) increased by more than 50 percent. Between January, 2004, and February, 2009, the jail inmate population increased from 7,648 to 11,546. Dr. Mahoney’s report noted, “[a]pproximately 25% of the inmates in the jail (over 2,500) have some type of mental health problem, as indicated by the fact that they are prescribed psychotropic medications. The Harris County Jail is now the largest facility providing mental health services in the State of Texas.” Dr. Mahoney reported that about 90 percent of the inmates with mental illness have previously been in the jail, a reflection of the frequent “recycling” of many of these defendants through the criminal justice system.

Furthermore, Dr. Mahoney also observed that, in recent years, the jail has markedly improved its capacity to house and provide services for mentally ill inmates. He went on to say that there is broad agreement among jail officials, other criminal justice practitioners, and the local mental health treatment community that more must be done to improve treatment for mentally ill or impaired defendants. The report indicated that there is a “strong consensus on the desirability of developing effective alternatives to jail for mentally impaired persons who are arrested (sometimes repeatedly) for low level offenses.”

Dr. Mahoney recommended that the county “consider[s] major expansion of specialty dockets, in light of the high proportion of persons charged with misdemeanor offenses and lower-level felony offenses who have substance abuse, mental illness, or co-occurring disorders.” He emphasized that these dockets should incorporate ‘best practices’ identified through research on the operations of specialty courts and dockets in other jurisdictions.

What is a Mental Health Court?

Mental health courts are problem-solving courts in which criminal defendants with a mental illness participate in a judicially supervised treatment plan developed by mental health
professionals. The defendant meets frequently with the judge, who provides monitoring, guidance, and praise for his progress. If the defendant fails to attend mental health or substance abuse treatment, uses illegal drugs, or fails to comply with other conditions of supervision, the judge will admonish the defendant and may impose sanctions, including jail time. A mental health court is a therapeutic court in which the adversarial process is replaced by a desire on the part of all participants for the defendant to successfully complete the supervision. The ultimate goal is to facilitate the rehabilitation of the defendant, so that he does not return to the criminal justice system."