Essay On Mental Illness In Prison

According to some estimates, 50% of the prison population suffers from mental illness. Most of the inmates don’t remember the crime that they committed. As a consequence, each year thousands of mentally ill offenders are sent to prison where they poorly equipped to treat them. These inmates are placed in solitarily confinement, and they serve longer sentences than the other inmates and they cost the city three times as much as other inmates. The most common mental illness in the prison is anxiety, anti-social personal disorder, post-traumatic disorder, and bipolar disorder.
In 1998, 238,000 mentally ill offenders were incarcerated in the prisons and jails. State prison inmates with a mental condition were more likely to be incarcerated for violent offenses than other inmates for being under the influence of alcohol or drugs at the time of the offense. Some of these offenders might have been homeless and lived on the dangerous streets before they were incarcerated. They were incarcerated because they might have committed murder, sexually assaulted
He died at the age of 38 and he only weighed 75 pounds. While he was incarcerated in Baraga, Michigan, they found out that he had this mental illness. Mr. McManus would cover himself in chewed food and feces according to the prison staff. They also said that he would refuse to eat. The prison did not have a psychiatry department and Mr. McManus only had contact with the psychologist through the cell door. When he became disruptive they would cut his water supply and limit his food and did not allow him to receive the treatment that he needed. Before his dead the guards pepper-sprayed him because he did not comply with them to make sure he was not armed. His death could have been prevented if they wouldn’t have cut his water supply and limited his