When a national report was issued this summer that showed incarceration has largely replaced hospitalization for the severely mentally ill, the analysis reinforced what many counties across the country had been experiencing, including Riverside County.

And according the Riverside County Jail Utilization Study conducted by CA Fwd, mentally ill offenders stayed in Riverside County jails for longer periods of time and were booked more often. The national report and the Riverside County jail study also explained a contributing factor to Riverside County’s long-standing, court-ordered cap on the jail population, which has forced county officials to make changes within the system.

For the past year, the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department, which oversees the jails, and the Riverside University Health System’s Behavioral Health Department have collaborated to work with the mentally ill offenders in jail to provide effective treatment and in the process reduce recidivism among this population.

“When I’m in meetings, when I go to Sacramento on AB 109, we hear that we have some pretty exciting programs," said Deborah Johnson, the deputy director of forensics for the Department of Behavioral Health at the Riverside University Health System. "I think as we move forward, that we’ll probably hear more from other counties, because all the counties are struggling.”

What Johnson and her team did was create a treatment of care for the incarcerated mentally ill population to successfully transition them into the community with a plan to keep them stable and out of jail. The steps include:

• Carefully screen incoming jail detainees
• Divert mentally ill people who have committed minor offenses to the mental health system. Diversion to the mental health system of mentally ill people who have committed minor offenses
• Provide assertive case management and various social control interventions, such as outpatient commitment, court-ordered treatment, psychiatric conservatorship, and 24-hour structured care; involvement of and support for families; and, provision of appropriate mental health treatment
• Provide the same level of mental health care to mentally ill offenders available to mentally ill residents in other institutions and in the community
• Provide specific training to custody staff so they can monitor inmates with mental illness and provide timely interventions
• Provide post-release supervision and coordination between mental health and correctional authorities

To read more of Nadine Ono's article, please click here.