Mental illness and the justice system
By AdminREGINA — Crown prosecutors, defence lawyers and judges sit on opposite sides of the bench, but often they grapple with a deep-seated problem — how to deal with people who exhibit symptoms of mental illness.
At the crux of the debate is how to define mental illness, says Dean Sinclair, the director of appeals for the Public Prosecutions division of the Ministry of Justice. Are personality disorders a mental illness? Does someone with a substance-abuse problem have a type of mental disorder? The definition varies, depending on the expert. And that makes it impossible to track the number of people with mental health problems who appear before the courts, Sinclair says… more
(0) Reader Feedback |
Email Article | 
Email Us | 
Print friendly
| Admin Most recent columns |
