Incarcerating the Mentally Ill essays

Incarcerating the Mentally Ill essays The Incarceration of the Mentally Ill Mental institutions in the United States were founded for a very important reason; to keep the mentally ill people of America off the streets, and into a place that will provide them with the necessary treatment. Prisons and jails on the other hand, were not designed for that reason. Although many of the mentally ill may commit a crime of some sort, I feel they should be set aside from society, but a prison is not necessarily the right place for them to be sent to. The workers in prisons have been through training to deal with inmates, but they dont have the education or the correct facilities to properly care for the mentally ill. Keeping the mentally ill off the streets is a concern of many Americans, and throwing them in prisons or jail is not a reliable solution; this problem needs to be addressed. It is understandable that there is a need to help people with brain disorders get off the streets, but incarcerating them isnt the right way to do that. They arent being properly cared for in those facilities (Torrey 1). The need and want of getting the mentally ill off the streets has become so bad they are throwing them into jails and keeping them there without a good reasoning (Shopinsky 2). A reasonable percentage of the population in jails and prisons is composed of mentally ill people (Bazelon 1). A study conducted in 1999 showed that almost 300,000 seriously mentally ill people are being kept in jail or prisons (Torrey 1). The reasons for detaining the mentally challenged range from disturbing the peace and threats (Torrey 2). Is punishing them the right thing to do? I feel that all they really need is help. Police are desperate enough to throw a homeless mentally ill person in jail for simply talking too loudly outside a public place (Shopinsky 2). I feel that the mentally ill should not be treated as criminals, but as human beings. It has been proven that...