Who is Diverted?: Case Selction for Court-Monitored Mental Health Treatment

• NCJ Number: 189139
• Journal: Law and Policy Volume: 23 Issue: 2 Dated: April 2001 Pages: 217-236
• Author(s): Mary Lee Luskin
• Editor(s): Jeffrey A. Butts
• Date Published: April 2001
• Length: 20 pages
• Grant Number(s): MH51669
• Sponsoring Agency: National Institute of Mental Health
• Publication Format: Article
• Publication Type: Issue Overview
• Language: English
• Country: United Kingdom
• Note: This is a special issue on Problem-Solving Courts. For additional articles see NCJ-189135, NCJ-189136, NCJ-189137, NCJ-189138, and NCJ-189140

Annotation

This article specified and estimated a model of the decision to divert mentally ill defendants from criminal prosecution into a court-monitored mental health treatment program.

Abstract

Specialized courts have raised questions about the decisions that bring some defendants into such courts and keep others out. New developments in dealing with mentally ill defendants calls to the diverting of these defendants charged with minor crimes from the criminal justice process. Because of the risks perceived in diverting mentally ill defendants, decisions to select defendants for mental health courts are seen as especially interesting. This article looked at a model of the decision to divert mentally ill defendants from criminal court to court-monitored mental health treatment programs. The question was what determined which mentally ill defendants would be selected for diversion into court-monitored mental health treatment? The setting for this research was the Psychiatric Assertive Identification and Referral (PAIR) program in Indianapolis. PAIR authorized conditional deferment of judicial proceedings in minor crime when mental illness is a contributing factor. The specific variables included to obtain general considerations are the seriousness and type of charge, the defendant’s criminal history, the source of the referral, and the defendant’s age, race, and gender. In summary, four of the model’s variables produced significant effects in the direction of criminal prosecution or diversion. A history of felony convictions, being charged with a crime against a person, and being a male, all decreased a defendant’s chances of being diverted. In addition, a significant interaction was found between gender and age, such that increasing age worked to the advantage of male defendants’ and to the disadvantage of female defendants. These findings pointed to the importance of structuring selection processes in the design of specialized courts. Tables and references