Governor Gets Bill on Mentally Ill Prisoners

Legislation intended to block the release of hundreds of violent, mentally ill prisoners won final passage from both the Senate and Assembly on Friday and was sent to Gov. George Deukmejian, who had made the issue one of the top priorities in his anti-crime package.

Two companion bills by Sens. Dan McCorquodale (D-San Jose) and Bill Lockyer (D-Hayward) both passed easily, by 64-4 and 64-2 votes in the Assembly and 38 to 0 on both measures in the Senate.

Opposed by the American Civil Liberties Union as an unconstitutional infringement on the rights of the mentally ill, the bill was intended to fill a loophole created when the state’s determinate sentencing law went into effect eight years ago. Before then, those convicted of violent crimes could be held in prison if they were found to be a potential danger to the community.

But under the 1977 statute, intended to assure long terms for people convicted of serious crimes, even the most severely disturbed individuals cannot be held in prison or confined to state hospitals for prolonged periods, but must be released when they have served their sentences.

Under the new legislation, the state Board of Prison Terms could, with the recommendations of mental health professionals, commit severely mentally ill prisoners convicted of a violent crime to state mental hospitals as a condition of parole. Prisoners who object would be entitled to a jury trial.

After the parole period, or when a prisoner is about to be released, state officials could try to convince a jury to hospitalize the individual for up to one year at a time. The state would have to show that the prisoner suffered from mental illness related to a violent crime. And the jury would have to be convinced that the disorder was not in remission or that it would not remain in remission if the prisoner were released into the community.

Proponents of the measure have said that 1,000 or more prisoners might eventually be hospitalized as mentally ill, violent offenders. However, Assemblyman Bruce Bronzan (D-Fresno) complained that the state’s mental hospitals would be unable to handle the increased number of potentially violent patients.