Evaluation of the Brooklyn Mental Health Court

The Brooklyn Mental Health Court Project: Evolution and Refinement of a Court Innovation for Felony Offenders with Serious Mental Illness

Principal Investigator: Colleen Gillespie, Ph.D.

PROJECT GOALS

To serve as a Center liaison to the Brooklyn Mental Health Court - a court partly dedicated to diverting felony offenders with serious mental illness from incarceration and into treatment that is being implemented by the Center for Court Innovation (CCI);

To build and maintain a relationship with CCI and the Mental Health Court in order to cooperatively develop a more rigorous` evaluation after the court model has become more well-defined and begun to show promise;

To collect qualitative, formative evaluation data to help define and refine the model of the mental health court and address some core research questions about decision-making within the court system.

RESEARCH ACTIVITIES AND RESULTS

Method: Process interviews with the key personnel of the court including the judge, the Director, and the Clinical Director have been conducted and analyzed and field notes from court observations have also been coded and analyzed. The goal of these interviews and observations was to describe the structure, function, and mission of this evolving court. Like most problem-solving courts, actual court operations, procedures followed and populations served, are somewhat different from what had been originally planned and initially implemented. For example, instead of serving those charged with misdemeanors, the mental health court now considers all charges, including felonies. At this point in time, just over 100 defendants have participated in the court and it has been only recently that the structure and function of the court has become more clear and stable. For this reason, the results generated from the process interview are most useful for describing the process of implementing a mental health court, the issues under consideration, and the factors that determine the court’s ultimate mission and procedures. Therefore, the data was shared with the Brooklyn Mental Health Court’s Evaluation Director so that it could be included in the report the Center for Court Innovation is generating. In addition, as part of our working relationship with the Brooklyn Mental Health Court we will continue to consult on the design of a future impact evaluation of the court. In addition, the PI is currently a member of the Center for Court Innovation’s new Institutional Review Board.

Results: As part of the recent legislation ("America's Law Enforcement and Mental Health Project," Public Law 106-515, 2003), more than two dozen mental health courts were created throughout the nation. The implications of our research for these courts are that such courts will, in all likelihood, take on a number of different forms and serve a number of different functions and that the ultimate operation of the mental health court in each jurisdiction will evolve over time in response to local pressures, needs, and contextual factors. The challenge in demonstrating the effectiveness of mental health courts lies in being able to define that which is common across all courts as well as the unique features of each particular court.

SIGNIFICANCE OF FINDINGS/ POLICY IMPLICATIONS

Documentation of the dynamic process of implementing a mental health court including, in particular, a focus on how the structure and organization and mission of the court evolves in response to more in-depth understandings of the needs of felony offenders with serious mental illness will assist localities in planning and adapting the model for their needs and situations. In addition, the study will document the ways in which the courts and service providers do and do not work effectively with each other as well as point out some of the underlying causes and facilitators of effective interaction. Finally, by developing an ongoing relationship with the Brooklyn Mental Health Court and following the court’s evolution over time, the investigator will be well-prepared to assist in the development and design of a more rigorous, controlled evaluation of the true impact and effectiveness of the evolved Mental Health Court.

PLANS

The PI will continue to consult with the Brooklyn Mental Health Court and will seek opportunities to use the court for comparative purposes, for example, to isolate the impact and unique approaches of particular efforts to reduce the inappropriate incarceration of individuals with serious mental illness.

PUBLICATIONS

In preparation:

Gillespie, C.C., Hopper, K., and McDonald, M. The Nathaniel Project: What does it take to make an innovative alternative to incarceration program for people with serious mental illness work?

Jost, J., Gillespie, C.C., Anthony, J., and Hopper, K. What Matters is a “Nice” Place to Live: Court Supervised (Re)entry into the Community Mediated by a Consumer-Oriented Housing Program.

Entered: 09/23/2002
Updated: 7/8/03, 7/04