Comprehensive Justice and Mental Health Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, I am proud to be an original cosponsor of legislation offered by Senators CORNYN and FRANKEN, the Comprehensive Justice and Mental Health Act. This critical piece of bipartisan legislation would promote alternatives to incarceration by helping identify and treat Americans suffering from mental illness. For far too long our criminal justice system has been a substitute for a mental health system. That practice is costly, wastes limited resources, and is contrary to evidence-based practices proven to make our communities safer. I thank Senators CORNYN and FRANKEN for their hard work on this important criminal justice reform bill.

Today, law enforcement is ill-equipped and not properly trained to deal with individuals suffering from severe mental disorders whose conditions can cause them to commit crimes. The mentally ill are too often treated as common criminals and are not given access to the critical treatment they need.

The Comprehensive Justice and Mental Health Act would save taxpayers' money and effectively use limited resources by ensuring our prisons contain violent offenders as opposed to those who suffer from mental illnesses. When more than four of five inmates with a mental illness are not treated in jail, we waste resources by incarcerating them. This bill would make the public safer and save taxpayers' money by ensuring that we continue to support vital programs, such as mental health courts, veterans' courts, and crisis intervention teams.

The bill would also improve public safety. Persons with complicated psychiatric problems that are thrown in jail can have their mental state deteriorate even further. If incarcerated without treatment, some mental illnesses can lead people to be a danger to the public once released. But with proper treatment, they can lead ordinary, law-abiding lives even absent incarceration.

The bill would help to reduce jail overcrowding caused by warehousing people for low-level crimes, which often includes the mentally ill. For example, from 2009 to 2013 in New York City, about 400 people were sent to jail on at least 18 occasions each. That amounts to more than 10,000 jail admissions and 300,000 days in jail. In Chicago, from 2007 to 2011, 21 percent of the people sent to jails accounted for 50 percent of jail admissions. Because a significant number of people in jail are mentally ill, reducing recidivism for this population is critical. By supporting state and local efforts to identify and direct them to the appropriate mental health services, this bill would reduce recidivism and, in turn, help reduce jail over-crowding.

The bill would also encourage the development of curricula on mental health conditions for police academies and orientations. Finally, the legislation would include new grant accountability measures and emphasize the implantation of evidence-based practices.

It is time we address mental illness in our country through treatment, not incarceration. Passing this common-sense bill would reduce recidivism, save taxpayer money, and make our communities safer. That is why I support this bill and I urge its speedy passage.

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