Crazy In America Summary

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Recommended: Analysis mental health and criminal justice system

The book, Crazy In America by Mary Beth Pfeiffer, shows how people who suffer from bipolar disorder, clinical depression, schizophrenia, and other serious psychological illnesses are constantly imprisoned because alternate care is not accessible. This surprised me because I did not realize that people with psychological illnesses are put in prison when alternate care is not available. Once these people who suffer from psychological illnesses are put behind bars, they are often punished over and over again for behavior that is psychotic, not criminal. There are many problems that can occur with mental illness, substance addiction, and other psychological disorders that are ignored and often misinterpreted within the criminal justice system, …show more content…

The best thing about this book is that it is not from a doctors point of view, it is a point of view of the patients themselves and/or families. Pfeiffer included pictures of each person which only made me feel more sorry for each of them. Each six of the case studies outcomes brought me to the conclusion that this type of criminalization of the mentally ill has left me helpless. For example, one of the case studies talked about a schizophrenic, Shayne, who was institutionalized at age 14 for a drug addiction and mental illness. She ended up serving time in jail, but ended up blinding herself by plucking her eyes out. After plucking her eyes out, she then removed four of her teeth by trying to bite off her finger. After that, she then tried to bite a hole into her cheek. She is still alive, but the fact that she was under care of the state and this still happened is not acceptable. Also, let me remind you that all of these incidents happened while Shayne was isolated. It is very clear that isolation is not a type of treatment, it is harmful. Another example is Luke, who suffered from bipolar disorder. He was often in and out of mental hospitals. He ended up serving time in prison after his behavior increased into drug and violence abuse. Luke was put on suicide watch, yet he ended up committing suicide

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