In Maryland, Mentally Ill Wait In Jail Despite Court-Ordered Psychiatric Treatment

People with severe mental illness, accused of crimes in Maryland but deemed too sick by the courts to participate in their cases and who are considered dangerous, are languishing behind bars long beyond the 10-day deadline prescribed by state law for the health department to admit them to one of its five psychiatric facilities following a judge’s order, the Baltimore Sun reports. It takes about 53 business days for a defendant to be admitted, the health department said. But at recent court hearings, some defendants had spent six months or more behind bars before being transferred. The health department’s 1,056 psychiatric beds are perpetually full, with patients staying in the department’s care on average more than two years, health officials said. With a rapidly increasing number of court orders, the health department said it has a waitlist of close to 200 defendants. Meanwhile, defendants often deteriorate in jails ill-equipped to care for their mental health, experts said.

“It’s inappropriate for individuals with serious mental illness, who are in such bad shape that those around them feel like they’re not even fit enough to go through the justice system, to languish in jails, which are some of the most nontherapeutic places that you can imagine,” said E. Lea Johnston, a professor at the University of Florida’s Levin College of Law. Such delays are a nationwide crisis that dates to the 1960s, when the country transitioned away from institutionalizing the mentally ill in favor of community care, researchers said. But mental health care in the community never materialized, leaving sick people to deteriorate without support. “Individuals with mental disorder are increasingly in contact with the criminal justice system. That’s a function of not having enough community mental health resources,” said Johnston, whose research focuses on mental health and criminal law. “So individuals are more symptomatic, or are openly symptomatic, and come to the attention of law enforcement, and then these individuals are arrested.”