Project Proposal

With the fall of the state run institutions for the mentally ill in this country many mentally ill individuals are left helpless and forced to live on the street.  On the street without proper guidance, health care, and medications many of these mentally ill individuals find their way into the criminal justice system, in where many of them who are deemed “mentally fit to stand trial” are convicted and sent to prison. In prison these mentally ill individuals are not given the proper care and attention that they deserve because of their illness. Instead they are forced to behave in a system that does not consider mental illness as an excuse for not following the rules.   Because of the way in which the prison system is configured, mentally ill prisoners have a major disadvantage compared to mentally stable individuals.

            For my Criminology class I visited the Marion Correctional Institution (MCI) in Marion Ohio. MCI is a minimum security prison which means that it houses prisoners that are considered less likely to pose a risk to the public and correctional officers and staff. Because MCI had a low security level prisoners were offered more “freedoms” than higher level security prisoners would have been. What I mean by this is that Prisoners were allowed to participate in services like cafeteria worker, barber, machine shop, GED education, computer skills, and there was even a partnership with a local farm where prisoners who earned clearance were allowed to work off the grounds of the prison. The Warden of MCI Jason Bunting (who was a social working undergrad major) spoke highly of this at the time even saying, “The more opportunities that we can give our inmates the busier we keep them, and the busier we keep them doing productive activities the less time they have to do unproductive ones.” To exemplify how affective MCI’s prisoner services have been in the past five years there have been 0 escapes, walk-a-ways, and recaptures, and there have been 0 employee deaths in the line of duty over the past five years at MCI (MCI, 2012). However because good behavior is how prisoners are able to join work programs, some inmates are not always capable of participation in these programs. For example mentally ill inmates sometime act up when they stop taking their medication, and in many cases the mental illness is not taken into consideration form the inmate. The Warden also showed us the mental health care section of the prison and told us that they were mandated by law to offer mental health care to prisoners. In fact the warden told us that this was one on the newest additions made to the prison.

            Later in my undergraduate studies I watched the PBS Frontline documentary entitled “The New Asylums.” In the frontline presentation it discussed how the Ohio prison systems were a model for other prisons in their treatment of the mentally ill. The documentary discussed the difficulties in treating the mentally ill inmates because many of the inmates are or become “extremely depressed, hopeless, suicidal, and many turn to self-modulation or self-injury, and many of the inmates become delusional and hallucinate” (Frontline, 2005). The video went into detail about how some inmates do not take their medications regularly, and therefore get more ill, and eventually stop because they believe the medication is causing them to become ill. One of the most interesting aspects from the film is the understanding that the prisons are not designed to help the mentally ill but, in fact they are designed to help the public by keeping the criminals locked away. Along with this is the awareness that “eventually the inmates are going to do what they are told whether they want to or not” (Frontline, 2005). The film discussed how many mentally ill are originally sent to minimum security prisons were the rules and regulations are less strict. However without mandated medications many inmates do not take their medications and are not able to follow the rules eventually climbing up the levels of higher security prisons in the justice system (Frontline, 2005). One reform that was accomplished in the Ohio prisons is the inclusion of mental illness into the punishment of the inmates. The reform allows for mentally ill inmates who are accused of rule violations to be sent to a tribunal to assess if punishment will be assigned to the inmate or not while considering the inmates mental illness as a factor (Frontline, 2005). However the system is not always perfect and many inmates who are found guilty are sent to segregation lockup. Segregation does have a positive effect on mentally ill inmates. The video documented one mentally ill prisoner who was sent to a psychiatric hospital from the prison to be treated. It was evidentially clear that the hospital environment was hugely beneficial to the mentally ill inmate, compared to the prison system he was in. However the psychiatric hospitals are not long term treatment centers for the mentally ill so when inmates are sent back to their prison systems they usually act up and are caught in a cycle of being sent back the hospital (Frontline, 2005).  

            Prisons have become the new asylums of today because for many mentally ill individuals prison can be the best form of mentally ill treatment they will ever receive. The video discussed how some court judges will convict the mentally ill individuals because the treatment that they will receive in prison is the best treatment they will ever get. With the closing down of the government run mental hospitals the mentally ill have been made homeless and criminals. The prisons systems are not designed to help in treating the mentally ill long term (Frontline, 2005). Instead they are designed to solve a short term treatment that does not benefit the mentally ill inmates (Frontline, 2005). It can also be argued that the justice system can be blamed for allowing many individuals that are clearly “not fit to stand trial” through the system. The video showed how Ohio’s mental health care treatment is an example that other states are looking towards implanting. But, at what cost are the mentally ill faced to live with by our countries justice system?

Not only should the court systems overlook their standards for what it takes for an individual to be considered “Fit to stand Trial.” But also, psychiatric hospitals should be institutions where the convicted mentally ill are sent if they are “Fit to stand Trial,” and are convicted. However, even one of these changes in the justice system in this country would be a colossus task. Also if there was legislation passed it would probably take years until it was implemented. This is not good enough for all of the thousands of mentally ill prisoners serving time. Our justice system needs a relatively inexpensive program that can provide the most help to ease the stress that is prison on the lives of mentally ill individuals.  The U.S. justice system needs to create programs and bring in social workers with a focus on helping the mentally ill to better cope with the hardships that can be brought on by the criminal justice system.

            If there is a program implemented where social workers work with the mentally ill convicted there will be many positive outcomes. I hope that this program will allow for mentally ill prisoners all over the world to have a voice in the prison system where they might not be able to speak for themselves before. The mentally ill convicted supported by social workers can better function within the prison system and eventually leave the system without having to serve more time. As discussed earlier many mentally ill inmates find their ways into the minimum security prisons first and then through not conforming the rules of the system are sent upward to higher security prisons. Social workers can prevent this from happening. With proper guidance mentally ill individuals can serve their time without any reason for unfair punishment.

            The purpose of this project is to provide a short term bandage to a long term injury. Social workers can make a difference now and are not dependent on new laws by the government, they can help individuals now because now is when they need help. Providing more social workers to the already existing prison systems with a focus on the mentally ill will help the already chaotic prison system run smoother. With the money that will be saved over time by having mentally ill individuals functioning in the prison system, less money will be allocated to enforcing these individuals with higher securities. Social workers can also fight to have mentally ill individuals sent to psychiatric hospitals which are very effective in treating mental illness and have been shown to drastically help even the most violent or nonresponsive individual calm to a point of no disturbance. In reality it would be better for psychiatric hospitals to be long term places where mentally ill individuals can serve their time in peace and receive the treatment that is specialized to their needs. However this would become very expensive and prisons and psychiatric hospitals are already under budgets as it is. Social workers are the most practical and purposeful solutions to this problem that can provide the most help to mentally ill individuals who need it.

            The new program will take at least 4 to 5 months to a year until the program is operating at full capacity. More time is allocated due to fact that state budgets can vary from year to year. One of the first steps will be the bureaucratic step of the mandating to the government and government officials for the implantation of this program.  This would be more successful at the state and local level than the federal level because state and local governments have fewer responsibilities than federal governments and therefore they can devote more of a focus to the problem in hand. Therefore, I would start small with the state of Ohio. This will be one of the hardest steps because I would have to show the government that there is a need for this programs implantation. When successful the government will have to allocate funding to creating the program. Like how MCI was forced by the government to provide mental health care to its prisoners my program would be forced on the prison system by law. There is no exact time period this legal process will take, however it is the first step necessary for starting this program.

            After the red tape and legal issues are resolved I would perform a 2 month study on the prisons in the State of Ohio to determine the extent of the system. I would then perform a study to determine the levels of mentally ill inmates as to know where to allocate social workers and how any to send. Ohio has roughly 28 prisons in the state including juvenile institutions. Therefore some institutions are going to need more help than others so it is important to understand the extent of the mentally ill in prisons.

            After the study is completed and problem institutions are determined I will allocate social workers to these institutions. It is important to note that all prison institutions will be mandated by law to provide social workers specialized for mentally ill inmates; however some prisons will require more social workers than others. This process will take 2 month until it is operating fully. Once the logistics are in place social workers will be able to not only help mentally ill inmates  cope with the stresses of prison, but the will also be able to speak for these individuals where they might not have been able to speak before. Through this program more knowledge will be learned by experience that will create new opportunities for mentally ill inmates and simultaneously making the prison system more productive and safer.

Works Cited

Marion Correctional Institution. (2012). Ohio department of rehabilitation and correction marion correctional institution. Retrieved from http://www.drc.ohio.gov/public/mci.htm

Frontline, P. (Director) (2005). The new asylums [Web]. Retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/asylums/view/