Mental Health and Crime
When crimes are committed terms such as insane or crazy are often used to describe the guilty party. For the average law abiding citizen it seems impossible that anyone could even consider killing another person or even stealing something that does not belong to them. Although it has been proven that not every criminal has a mental illness, and not everyone who has a mental illness is a criminal. However the mentally ill are often find themselves in prisons and it is a question if prison is really the best place for them. Criminology and psychology tend to merge when it comes to the mentally ill, both in a sense strive to understand how and why the crime happened and what could be done to prevent it. This paper researches …show more content…
However all mentally ill inmates report some sort of family history of mental illness or trauma. For example many report being homeless or in foster care at one point in their life and they have a past of being sexually or physically abused. Many mentally ill also report a history or are currently struggling with substance dependency or abuse (James et. al). In all her years of work in the mental health and corrections facilities nurse Bell- Walsh believes that in order to best help the inmates one has to find what works best for that particular person. Every mentally ill inmate has a different set of issues at the very core of their disorder. It can be a struggle because many inmates, especially those with a mental disorder, reject the help due to fear of being seen as weak or just simply no knowing how to get the help they desperately need (Manchester).
The recidivism rates of these individuals when they have not received proper mental health care are much higher than other offenders. In fact majority of reoffenders are those with problems with substance abuse or another mental illness (Anestis et. al). If recidivism rates are affected by the mental ill in prison how effective is just punishment and incarceration? If they are suffering from a mental disorder how does the criminal justice system handle these offenders? There is criticism of imprisonment, a few believe it has begun to lose effectiveness according to the research of Dr. Gamo.
When crimes are committed terms such as insane or crazy are often used to describe the guilty party. For the average law abiding citizen it seems impossible that anyone could even consider killing another person or even stealing something that does not belong to them. Although it has been proven that not every criminal has a mental illness, and not everyone who has a mental illness is a criminal. However the mentally ill are often find themselves in prisons and it is a question if prison is really the best place for them. Criminology and psychology tend to merge when it comes to the mentally ill, both in a sense strive to understand how and why the crime happened and what could be done to prevent it. This paper researches …show more content…
However all mentally ill inmates report some sort of family history of mental illness or trauma. For example many report being homeless or in foster care at one point in their life and they have a past of being sexually or physically abused. Many mentally ill also report a history or are currently struggling with substance dependency or abuse (James et. al). In all her years of work in the mental health and corrections facilities nurse Bell- Walsh believes that in order to best help the inmates one has to find what works best for that particular person. Every mentally ill inmate has a different set of issues at the very core of their disorder. It can be a struggle because many inmates, especially those with a mental disorder, reject the help due to fear of being seen as weak or just simply no knowing how to get the help they desperately need (Manchester).
The recidivism rates of these individuals when they have not received proper mental health care are much higher than other offenders. In fact majority of reoffenders are those with problems with substance abuse or another mental illness (Anestis et. al). If recidivism rates are affected by the mental ill in prison how effective is just punishment and incarceration? If they are suffering from a mental disorder how does the criminal justice system handle these offenders? There is criticism of imprisonment, a few believe it has begun to lose effectiveness according to the research of Dr. Gamo.