Defining A Mental Health Court
Mental health courts vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, but most share a number of characteristics. The Council of State Governments Justice Center has defined the “essential elements” of mental health courts. The Justice Center, in a publication detailing the essential elements, notes that the majority of mental health courts share the following characteristics:
- A specialized court docket, which employs a problem-solving approach to court processing in lieu of more traditional court procedures for certain defendants with mental illnesses;
- Judicially supervised, community-based treatment plans for each defendant participating in the court, which a team of court staff and mental health professionals design and implement;
- Regular status hearings at which treatment plans and other conditions are periodically reviewed for appropriateness, incentives are offered to reward adherence to court conditions, and sanctions are imposed on participants who do not adhere to the conditions of participation;
- Criteria defining a participant’s completion of (sometimes called graduation from) the program.
Read more about this topic: Mental Health Court
Famous quotes containing the words defining, mental, health and/or court:
“The industrial world would be a more peaceful place if workers were called in as collaborators in the process of establishing standards and defining shop practices, matters which surely affect their interests and well-being fully as much as they affect those of employers and consumers.”
—Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)
“It is a monstrous thing to force a child to learn Latin or Greek or mathematics on the ground that they are an indispensable gymnastic for the mental powers. It would be monstrous even if it were true.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)
“The health of the eye seems to demand a horizon. We are never tired, so long as we can see far enough.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“In the court of the movie Owner, none criticized, none doubted. And none dared speak of art. In the Owner’s mind art was a synonym for bankruptcy.... The movie Owners are the only troupe in the history of entertainment that has never been seduced by the adventure of the entertainment world.”
—Ben Hecht (1893–1964)