The current proliferation of separate court systems - often referred to as "restorative justice" - within the U.S. criminal justice system tells us all we need to know about how government is addressing the health care and housing needs of America's poor.
Because many poor, mentally ill, unhoused or drug addicted people get arrested, the courts became more and more overcrowded with what were deemed "social issues." The response was to create separate systems for the administration of these cases. Ironically, these substance abuse courts, mental health courts and, most recently, homeless courts all coincide with drastic reductions in state and federal government funding of community-based treatment and housing programs. In one classic example, the King County (Wash.) court system established mental health courts while at the same time the state cut $6 million in community-based mental health programs.
This is not an isolated incident. It has become a national trend. While the social-service branches of government have divested themselves of responsibility to fulfill their initial mandates, the branch of government charged with incarceration and rehabilitation has created a whole new role for itself, that of an access point to treatment, social workers and shelter services. In 1997 only two mental health courts existed in the United States. Today we have over 100. It is ironic that today the three largest residential mental health facilities in the United States are the Los Angeles County jail, Cook County jail in Chicago and Rikers Island in New York City!
Mentally ill jail inmates are 2.5 times more likely to have been homeless prior to incarceration compared with all other inmates.
The criminal justice system is ill-equipped to address the social issues being dumped on its courtroom floors, so now we are getting these behavioral courts that all come with a special twist: no option to plead "not guilty."
Homeless courts are the newest incarnation of these special courts.
Homeless courts are not courts as most people understand courts to be. In fact, they are just the opposite. Defendants in homeless courts are presumed guilty and must plead guilty in order to avail themselves of whatever services are to be offered through the courts. Due process, anyone?
"Defendants" are brought in for such "crimes" as sleeping, camping, disturbing the contents of a container (ie. going through trash for food or recyclables), panhandling, being in a park after hours (parks that until a very short time ago were open 24 hours and used to be considered public space), jaywalking, loitering, sitting or lying on a sidewalk and, of course, the grande dame of egregious offenses committed by homeless people, peeing and defecating. Once they plead "guilty," they are then assigned to services or community service (in lieu of jail or fines) as an alternative sentence handed down by the benevolent court.
In San Francisco and Los Angeles, though, attorneys doing citation defense have won dismissal of all charges in more than 80 percent of the cases they represented. In legal terms, more than 80 percent have been found not guilty of the original charges against them.
In other words, local governments are creating two-tiered court systems that are determined by economic status. There are criminal courts for people who can afford attorneys or have access to a public defender. They recognize due process. And now there are behavioral courts for people who cannot afford attorneys and have no access to a public defender. They do not recognize due process.
This separation that sends poor people who are homeless or mentally ill to special "courts," where they must plead guilty in order to obtain the services they so desperately need, violates the very foundation of our criminal justice system.
Paul Boden is the executive director of the Western Regional Advocacy Project, or WRAP. The organization is a coalition of organizations along the West Coast committed to exposing and eliminating the root causes of civil and human rights abuses of people experiencing poverty and homelessness.
Artwork by Nili Yosha