Tuesday, March 30, 2004

Mental Health Court steers defendants to treatment (Montana)
Story in The Missoulian - "In an attempt to keep mentally ill people out of prison and in treatment, several local judges are participating in a new Mental Health Court program. "Our jail is full; our prisons are full," District Judge John Larson said in a recent interview. 'The Department of Corrections at the state level is looking at other ways of dealing with these cases.' The idea is to get people the help they need, hopefully stabilizing them enough to help them stay out of trouble with the law. There will be a total of 24 slots in the program - eight allocated to Municipal Court, eight to Justice Court and eight to District Court. It's up to each judge whether he or she will participate, and treatment coordinator Mary Pierce was hired in September to arrange services for Mental Health Court clients through a contract with St. Patrick Hospital. Those services include everything from medications to therapy to help finding homes and jobs."