The number of incarcerated individuals in the United States with psychological or psychiatric disorders has been steadily increasing since the mid-1950s, with the upsurge stemming specifically from the deinstitutionalization movement that gained considerable momentum throughout the nation, particularly in the 1960s.
While well-intended, the movement did not produce the desired expectations. In large part because of the deinstitutionalization movement, I argue that our nation’s jails and prisons have effectively become “the new asylums,” the de facto state psychiatric hospitals, responsible for confining and caring for mentally ill offenders (Pittaro, 2015).
As I have publicly addressed on many occasions, prisons and jails were never designed nor intended to serve in this capacity. And despite vast improvements made over the last decade, our correctional system is still ill-equipped to effectively supervise the many men and women whose needs far exceed what corrections can adequately provide.
The closing of most state psychiatric hospitals shifted the focus of mental health care in the United States, which led to a significant influx of mentally ill individuals entering communities that were and, to a significant extent, still are, ill-equipped to handle individuals with such pressing needs. As a result, many became homeless or wound up in prison or jail, a trend that has continued to this day. Today, nearly half the people in U.S. jails and more than a third of those in U.S. prisons have been diagnosed with a mental illness—not to mention the prevalence........