We cannot put all of our resources into the future and abandon the present
The intersection between prison and mental health
Recently, I attended the premiere of a short documentary film at the invitation of my friend Veronika. She’s a public defender who lives in my neighborhood. She has a son a few years older than mine, and we met at the pool last summer. We immediately connected over our shared interest in politics, similar ideology, and efforts to get our sons to share their pool toys with each other.
Before she transitioned to work in a neighboring county, one of Veronika's clients was the subject of this documentary, and thus, she was featured in it as well. The 28-minute documentary Fractured is a collaboration between Frontline and our local PBS station. The film explores the mental health crisis playing out in our criminal justice system. Veronika’s client waited nearly two years from the point he was declared ITP (incapable of proceeding to trial) to when he was able to get a bed in a state psychiatric hospital for care.
Not only are those with severe mental health issues more likely to get arrested for even minor crimes (for a variety of reasons), they then face a murky gauntlet before they can even come to trial. They go to jail where, at some point, they are deemed too sick to understand the charges against them and in need of more intensive care than is offered at the jail. Then, they remain locked away for an indeterminate length until some unknown day when they get off the waiting list for such care, hopefully, are restored to the point of being able to stand trial while under that care, and then returned to jail until their trial takes place.
We are talking about potential years in jail before they stand trial for their alleged crimes. Most are refused bond because judges and district attorneys don’t want to be on the hook for sending someone with severe mental health issues back out into the community.
Also featured in the film is an assistant sheriff who runs the jail in a nearby rural county. His own nephew is deemed ITP and has been waiting for a bed in the hospital for over 450 days. He spoke to the massive pressure this crisis has placed on the staff at jails and prisons. When he began his service 30 years ago, an inmate deemed ITP was relatively uncommon. Now, he estimates that 10% of his inmates have some severe mental health issues.
It’s heartbreaking and frustrating and the tragic intersection of several different system failures.
This week on the show, Sarah discussed the reality that there are not enough beds to care for a variety of populations within our criminal justice system. Here is what that looks like in action.
While I don’t entirely agree with Sarah’s statement that containment is the best option for some of these populations while we wait for our systems to catch up to the need, I understand the sentiment. We’re failing these people who have not actually been convicted or sentenced.
During the panel discussion and Q&A after the film, I was particularly struck by how some in the room seemed fully focused on preventing young people from walking down a path that leads them to the place of these inmates. A good and reasonable goal! Getting upriver from a problem is vital if we want to solve it for the long term. Yet, we cannot abandon the ones who are already languishing in the mess that exists now. We cannot put all our resources into the future and abandon the present. Neither should we place all our resources on the present cases and allow the pipeline that led here to continue unabated.
I don’t have a solution. Neither does this documentary. Awareness in and of itself is important here, I think. If you have 28 minutes to spare this week, I highly recommend watching Fractured and contemplating if there is advocacy you can do in support of solutions - or in support of local journalism, which makes awareness-raising projects like this possible in the first place!
In our episode Lessons from the Covid War last week, Dr. Charity Dean encouraged us to share our stories and experiences from the pandemic. As much as many of us would like to forget, we have lots of lessons to learn. So, in that spirit, we loved this note from Callie Ann about her co-worker, D.
I have a story about my coworker. She doesn't even listen to your podcast, but I think she deserves to be celebrated.
I've worked with D for about five years now, and I have sat right beside her all five years. She has worked for my library for over 20 years, and I have often heard her tell stories "at the lab.” Before she worked for the library, she worked at a lab. "What kind of lab?" you ask?? I had never really known. But we live in Nashville and there are so many, many medical labs in this city. I don't know what she actually did there, but she is not a scientist.
Anyway, in March 2020, I had only worked with D for about six months. We work for a library, so like everyone, we shut down. We were all lost and confused. The library closed for a few months, and we all learned the words "work from home.” We eventually returned to the library but it remained closed to the public. We did curbside service for our patrons to pick up holds, and we did virtual story times. We figured it out.
One day, D said something about needing to go to the lab. I thought, "That's weird," but no one questioned it because D often talks about the lab.
But one day, I decided to ask.
"Why are you going to the lab?"
"I'm in the vaccine study."
"What vaccine?"
"The covid vaccine."
Turns out, D still has friends at the lab, and she often volunteers when they do studies, so when they reached out for volunteers to participate in the vaccine study as they were developing the COVID-19 vaccine, she signed up.
It had never crossed my mind how vaccines were created or studied along the way, but of course, they needed real humans to test it all!
When we talk about the pandemic’s heroes, I agree that our first responders, hospital workers, etc., are heroes. But now I think about D and all the people around the country who volunteered to get shots of unknown and unstudied drugs and then to be studied along the way for months or years. (She had to report to the lab with literally every symptom she had for at least six months.)
She eventually received a small medal (from the lab? from Moderna? I can't remember). Still, I know she and countless others will never really be recognized for their service during the pandemic.
D didn't advertise it, didn't make a big deal about it, but to me, she is a hero. I cried multiple times, thanking her and telling her how much it meant to me that she had helped create the vaccine we were all desperate for. Of course, she would say she didn't really do much, but if not for these volunteers, would we have had a vaccine so quickly?
Anyway, I just thought if anyone would celebrate my friend D like she deserves, it would be the team at Pantsuit Politics.
Thanks for all you do,
Callie Ann
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