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The NYPD: Keeping Insane People Out of Jail, for the Benefit of All — Brooklynian

The NYPD: Keeping Insane People Out of Jail, for the Benefit of All

biff ackley
biff ackley
edited November -1 in Crown Heights/Prospect Lefferts Gardens

This morning I called the cops on a shirtless man who was running up and down Franklin Avenue (btw EP and Union - the block that is home to Brooklyn's most diverse selection of derelicts, drug dealers and other f-ck-ups) screaming profanities and threatening to beat up some high school kids who were on their way to school. The cops rolled up in a paddy wagon, got out, talked with the man, told him to put his shirt back on, and then let him walk on down the street. Then they drove off. Five minutes later, the dude came back to the exact same spot and commenced with the screaming of profanites and threatening of high school kids.

Well done NYPD! Wouldn't want you to rush to judgement and accidentally arrest a violent crackhead who's threatening children.

Comments

  • whynot_31
    whynot_31

    When the police arrest someone who is mentally ill, they are quickly marked "Return To Sender" by the Department of Corrections, which doesn't want him either.

    Here's what Dora Schriro, the Commissioner of the Department of Corrections, said in an article published on 9/30/11 regarding persons with mental illness in city jails:

    "The goal is to divert as many on the front end, to intervene successfully as many as we can in the middle and when we release those at the end, at the end of their detention or their sentence, that we see them less frequently, ideally we never see them again," said Schriro.

    At the Anna M. Kross Center on Rikers Island, half of the 2,400 inmates have been diagnosed with a mental illness. It's these inmates that the steering committee is responding to. They will meet three more times and plan to adopt recommendations next spring.

    source: http://www.ny1.com/content/news_beats/criminal_justice/148187/rikers-island-struggles-with-record-mental-illness-numbers

    Spoiler alert: In the Spring of 2012 the hard-working committee that is discussing what to do about the mentally ill population in NYC jails will recommend:

    1. Increasing funding for OASAS, OMH and community programs.

    2. Increasing police and correction officer training

    3. Increasing funding for city run psychiatric units

    4. (Feel free to add).

    ....I hope all of us are in this for the long haul.

  • pragmaticguy
    pragmaticguy

    Years ago it was decided by the powers that be and the lack of money that people who were mentally ill may not necessarily be a danger to others. Just because they're ranting and raving doesn't make them a threat. Hell, you can see people doing that at Macy's on black Friday. So, when the cops spoke with him they decided that even though this guy may be "nuts" as long as he's not carrying a knife or any other weapon there's not much they can do.

  • whynot_31
    whynot_31

    ^ this is part of the phenomena as well ^

  • jack krohn
    jack krohn

    Whynot, great post as always, though I don't see any of those recommendations happening over the next decade or so. This problem is so complex that I don't know how it can ever be solved. Now that AOT requires patient consent, it's been rendered toothless (not to mention the cumbersome application procesure, which would deter even the most patient of social workers). Society as a whole doesn't care about the mentally ill or MICA populations until they hurt someone. The cops might have taken this guy to the CPEP at Kings County (and he's probably been there many times already), but in the end he would only be discharged with an aftercare referral that he would probably not keep. Frustrating. Don't get me going on how the criminal justice system has replaced the state hospital system of yesteryear!

    OK, rant over. Time to rest up over the weekend and back to the front lines on Monday!

  • whynot_31
    whynot_31

    Jack-

    Yes it is comforting to realize that our supporters are intelligent, rational, and patient. Afterall, one only need read the recommendations of now adjourned task forces to conclude they have been publishing the same recommendations for decades.

    If the discussion is posed merely in terms of whether a system based on consent is better than one based on coercion, we will never move forward....

    Correct, we may never move forward. Ah, the weekend.

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