Laughing at the Mentally Ill?

After returning from breakfast in the chow hall the other day, I was lying on my bunk reading when I heard loud laughter through my window that was only slightly cracked open to let in a little fresh air. It wasn't the kind of laughter in response to a funny joke, or even the kind of laughter at another's expense. This laughter emanated from deep within the person, echoing the joviality in his heart. Involuntarily, I smiled, because that's the kind of laughter you rarely hear in prison. But my smile faded quickly as I thought with sadness about the man who was laughing.

The laughter came from a man who locks in the unit next to mine, a unit known as a Residential Treatment Program (RTP) unit. This unit houses nearly 240 prisoners who suffer from mental illness in varying degrees; the gregarious laughter, for example, is physically functional, but socially and mentally impaired. Around the whole compound, at many different times during the day, one can hear his raucous conversations with himself punctuated frequently by loud laughter. Sadly, this makes him the target of cruel teasing, sometimes by other prisoners, but mostly by prison guards. Knowing they'll get an animated response, some guards will hype him up as he is entering or leaving the chow hall, and I imagine at other times that I haven't observed.

This 240 prisoner unit is not the only RTP unit at this facility. Another 240 person unit houses other mentally ill prisoners who are usually higher functioning than those in the unit next door to mine. When the State of Michigan shut down mental hospitals in the 1990s, they had to do something with its residents who had committed criminal behavior. This led to an explosion in the number of incarcerated mentally ill people. Housing these prisoners together reduces their vulnerability to the predation of general population prisoners and makes providing social services easier, but it still leads me to question the appropriateness of putting many of these mentally ill people in prison in the first place. Certainly, society must protect itself from the mentally ill who behave criminally, but is imprisoning them the humane answer? Is this justice?

Some politicians have begun to recognize the cruelty of holding someone criminally responsible who does not have the mental health to understand his actions. Several months ago, Lieutenant Governor Brian Calley, who is a candidate for Michigan's next governor, wrote an article in the Detroit Free Press titled, "Being Smart on Crime Changes Lives" (11/19/17), noting that "Jail and prisons are not an effective or humane way to deal with untreated mental illness." He goes on to urge treatment over incarceration for those suffering from mental illness.

When a problem is out of sight, it is often also out of mind, but this does not change the injustice of incarcerating low functioning, mentally ill people who need treatment rather than incarceration. Mental illness may be the butt of a joke for some corrections officers, but it is not a joke, and treating, rather than incarcerating, those with mental illness ought to be a top priority for those who want to live in a just society.