Reducing Justice Involvement For People with Mental Illness.

Content on this page requires a newer version of Adobe Flash Player.

Get Adobe Flash player

The Pennsylvania Mental Health and Justice Center of Excellence is a collaborative effort of Drexel University and the University of Pittsburgh. It is funded by the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime & Delinquency and the Pennsylvania Office of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services. The purpose of the Center is to work with Pennsylvania communities to identify points of interception at which an intervention can be made to prevent individuals with mental illness from entering or penetrating deeper into the criminal justice system.

The Center will work collaboratively with the Commonwealth and locales in planning and implementing programs, providing information to promote their use of evidence-based practices and serve as a resource for technical assistance and training. The Center will also host a central repository for collected data and information on criminal justice/mental health responses throughout the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

Click here to view the official announcement of the PA Mental Health and Justice Center of Excellence.

News and Information
County and Program Information
Center of Excellence Blog
Resource Center

Mental Health and Criminal Justice in the News

Upcoming Webinar: Bridging Criminal Justice Systems and Community Healthcare: Integration’s Role in Reentry (Tuesday, June 18, 2:00-3:30 pm EDT)

  • In 2014, an estimated 22-30% of people newly eligible for Medicaid will have had contact with local criminal justice systems. Creating new levels of community engagement will be vital to community-based primary care and behavioral health providers, given the complex healthcare needs of individuals transiting out of criminal justice systems. Expanded access to healthcare brings new opportunities and showcases the need for community partnerships with local criminal justice systems.

    Learn why a public health approach will address this community need, and what providers need to bridge the integration of primary, behavioral health, and criminal justice. Examine case studies, explore research-based practices, and gain insight into how these systems can work toward improved care coordination together.

Feds say Pa. prison misused solitary confinement (Associated Press)

  • The State Correctional Institution at Cresson violated the constitutional rights of inmates with mental illness and intellectual disabilities by keeping them in their cells 22 to 23 hours a day, the U.S. Justice Department said Friday. It said the prison used solitary confinement as a means of warehousing mentally ill inmates because of serious deficiencies in its mental health program.

State prisons could outsource more mental health services (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)

  • The Pennsylvania Department of Corrections has proposed a plan to outsource mental health services at 27 state prisons. DOC spokeswoman Susan McNaughton said the plan to contract out as many as 187 positions now filled by DOC employees could save money and improve services. A number of legislators oppose the plan, saying it could put prison workers and communities at risk. Of the more than 51,000 inmates in the state prison system, about 21 percent -- more than 10,000 individuals -- require some type of monitoring or treatment for a mental health issue.

Mental illness summit a missed opportunity: Column (USA Today)

  • Criminal justice representatives not invited to White House summit on mental health

Click here to find information by county including descriptive data (e.g. crime & mental health stats) and contact information for county agencies.

Click here to find program information by intercept.

Looking to have questions answered or to discuss issues with your peers in other counties? Our blog will give you the opportunity to initiate conversations with the Center of Excellence staff and your peers.

Click here to view our blog or start a conversation!
  • Having trouble opening .PDFs on our site. Click here for information to assist you!
  • If you are viewing our Interactive Map of County Data, it is best viewed in Internet Explorer version 7 or higher, Firefox, Safari or Chrome. If using Internet Explorer version 6, please utilize the alphabetical listing to obtain county-level information.