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| Police Foundation - Mentally Disordered Offenders |
09-Feb-10
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| This new briefing discusses one of the most difficult and contentious areas of everyday policing - Mentally Disordered Offenders........ |
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This Police Foundation Briefing - to be serialised over 4 weeks - looks at Policing Mentally Disordered Offenders - the relevant legislation and guidance, policing problems and other key issues
What is the Police Foundation?
The Police Foundation is the only independent charity focussed entirely on developing people's knowledge and understanding of policing and challenging the police service and the government to improve policing for the benefit of the public. The Police Foundation acts as a bridge between the public, the police and the government, while being owned by none of them.
About the Briefings
The Briefings series provides an independent assessment of specific aspects of policing in the UK. The series ensures frontline officers and staff in police forces and policing agencies are up to date with legislation, policies and practical approaches to key issues facing modern policing. Topics will include: Stop and Search, CCTV, Tasers, Police Community Support Officers, The Use of DNA in Forensic Policing, Stalking, Intercept Evidence.
Policing Mentally Disordered Offenders
Introduction
It is estimated that up to 15% of incidents dealt with by the police include a mental health concern(1), however mentally disordered offenders are difficult to define: are they offenders who happen to have a mental disorder, or are they people with a mental disorder which has led them to commit an offence? Should they come under the jurisdiction of the police or mental health services? Specifically, a mentally disordered offender is someone who meets the diagnostic criteria set out in the Mental Health Act 1983 and who has also been convicted of a criminal offence. In practice, the term has a broader definition and there are generally considered to be three types of mentally disordered offender(2):
1. People who have an existing mental disorder, and who have committed an offence (but not necessarily been convicted).
2. People who have been convicted of an offence or are on remand and subsequently develop a mental disorder(3).
3. People with a mental disorder serious enough to prevent them from making a valid plea when brought to trial, or who may be found ‘not guilty’ for the same reason.
An individual who has committed a minor offence is most likely to fall into the first category and a proportion of these offenders will never be charged. The second type of offender might be someone who has been diverted from prison to hospital following a diagnosis of a mental disorder. A much smaller number of offenders will have committed an offence serious enough for the police to consider prosecution and a minority will fall into this final category. This Briefing, however, is primarily concerned with those who fall into the first category.
Why is mental health an important issue for the police?
Since the large-scale closure of psychiatric hospitals and the implementation of ‘care in the community’ in the early 1990s, the police are often the first professionals to respond when the mentally ill are in crisis. The police are charged with protecting the safety of the individual and the community, so it falls upon them to control and contain an individual who presents a risk to himself and/or others, particularly if they are at large in the community or live alone. While being mentally ill is certainly not a criminal offence, a mentally ill person in crisis might easily be deemed to have broken the law, for example by threatening members of the public or behaving in a disorderly manner.
Mental health is an increasing concern for the police service. Fig. 1 (overleaf) shows that the number of mentally disordered offenders convicted of a crime is rising. In 2007 over 3900 mentally disordered offenders were detained in hospital, the largest increase in 10 years.
While the rising number of mentally disordered offenders is clearly a concern, it should be recognised that the mentally ill are far more likely to be the victims rather than the perpetrators of crime(4).
Lord Bradley’s review of people with mental health problems or learning disabilities in the criminal justice system notes that there is no national requirement for the police to keep statistics on the mentally ill who come into contact with the police(5).The IPCC have however published some information on the different reasons for detaining suspects under Section 136 of the Mental Health Act 1983, based on police records. It shows that the most common reason for detention is ‘breach of the peace’ (29%), followed by ‘threats to harm self’ (16%). More serious offences, such as ‘actual bodily harm’ (5%) or ‘sexual offences’ (2%) were found to be quite rare(6), which suggests that the criminal behaviour of mentally disordered offenders is usually relatively minor.
Notes and references
1. Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health (2008) The Police and Mental Health
2. Tim Newburn T. and Neyroud P. (2008) Dictionary of Policing, Willan Publishing
3. A very high proportion of prisoners have a mental disorder but their mental illness is not serious enough to meet the criteria under the Mental Health Act 1983.
4. Mind (2007)Another Assault
5. Department of Health (2009) The Bradley Report: Lord Bradley’s review of people with mental health problems or learning disabilities in the criminal justice system, Department of Health
6. Docking M., Grace, K. and Bucke T. (2008) Police Custody as a “Place of Safety”: Examining the Use of Section 136 of the Mental Health Act 1983, IPCC
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