(Feb. 21, 2013) A New York Post article this week with typically offensive headline, “Scoop the Nuts,” has brought distress to some mental health advocates and families ("Scoop the Nuts: Mentally ill roundup plan after train pushes,” Feb. 18).
A quick glance at the story conveys an impression that the New York City Police Department has launched a campaign to “sweep the streets” of people with untreated mental illness. The story makes unsettling mention of a newly compiled “most wanted list” of 25 mentally ill individuals believed to be untreated and homeless.
The alarm is unwarranted. Cutting through the breathless rhetoric, it turns out that the initiative reported here is simply an effort by the city to meet its court-ordered obligations to provide treatment to people in desperate need.
Individuals on the city’s list reportedly all have documented histories of treatment non-compliance leading to violence and/or repeated hospitalization sufficient that they have qualified for assisted outpatient treatment (AOT) under New York’s Kendra’s Law. All are currently believed by their doctors to be in violation of their AOT court orders by not complying with their treatment plans and are possibly dangerous.
In this new city campaign, the police have not been asked to arrest anyone. Instead, they are fulfilling the function set out for law enforcement officers in New York’s AOT law: to bring people who are in violation of their treatment orders and believed to possibly be dangerous to a health-care facility for evaluation. Those found by doctors to not currently meet New York’s hospital commitment standard will be immediately released (with, one hopes, a re-connection to their treatment team and continued monitoring.)
Needless to say, this is exactly how AOT is supposed to work in New York. The only thing new about the “most wanted list” is that, according to the Post, in the past only non-adherent AOT patients with known addresses were pursued. Now, the NYPD is actively searching for those whose whereabouts are unknown.
To which we can only say: it’s about time! Considering that the alternative is the abandonment of people with untreated mental illness to the perils of street life, we commend NYC for its heartening new policy.
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