Seeking Justice: 'Are We Punishing People For Being Sick?'(California)

• Author: Lacey, Jackie

This piece was originally published through Route Fifty as part of an ongoing series of pieces on criminal justice issues from the National District Attorneys Association.

The Los Angeles County jail has more than 17,000 inmates at any one time. More than 4,000 of the inmates have a serious mental illness. This makes the Los Angeles County jail the nations largest mental institution.

As the District Attorney, it is my duty to seek justice--that means determining what is the right thing to do and then doing it.

I can still recall the first time I began questioning the interaction between the criminal justice system and those with mental illness.

It was 2011 and Miriam was just 28 years old when she moved to Los Angeles to attend graduate school. While in school, she began to have trouble sleeping and felt that demons were attacking her.

One day, Miriam ran into the hallway of her apartment building and began banging on a neighbor's door while holding a knife and uttering threats of killing herself. A security guard tried to intervene, but she assaulted him, which led to the police being called. She was placed on a 72-hour hold. During her hospital visit, she was not only heavily sedated, but was diagnosed with having a mental illness.

After a few days, the medication wore off and she once again felt that someone was out to harm her.

This led to a second incident where she jumped into a car whose owner had left it unoccupied and running. Miriam had driven a few feet before the driver confronted her. As he struggled with Miriam for the keys, he overheard her utter the phrase: "Please give me a piece of my mind." Not able to overpower the owner, she ran away leaving her purse in the man's car.

Two days later, she was arrested and charged with a felony--carjacking.

I remember the day Miriam's mom called on me asking for help. She said that her daughter was not a criminal, but suffering from mental illness and if the District Attorney's office dropped the charges, she would personally see that her daughter was medicated. As a mother, I identified with her pain. As a prosecutor, I weighed the crime against Miriam's actions.

That was several years ago. Recently, I wanted to find out what happened to Miriam. I learned that she was under the care of a psychiatrist and has not committed any new offenses.

In cases like Miriam's, prosecutors face difficult decisions. We could dismiss the case and let people like Miriam go free knowing that someday they...