Background: Individuals with serious mental illness (SMI) have disproportionately high rates of criminal legal system involvement. For many, this becomes a repeated cycle of arrest and incarceration. Treatments that address symptoms of mental illness are a critical component of the continuum of services for people with SMI in the legal system; yet on their own, psychiatric treatments have not been successful at reducing criminal legal system involvement for this population.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBlack men and people belonging to sexual minority groups are disproportionately impacted by criminal legal involvement and sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Traumatic experiences are often associated with later criminal legal involvement, depression symptoms, sexual risk behavior, and STIs. Research on the joint influence of trauma and incarceration on STI risk among racial and/or sexual minority people is limited.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPeople with mental illness are over-represented in the U.S. criminal legal system.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntellectual functioning impacts defendants' competence to stand trial, though research on this population remains limited. This study replicated and advanced prior work, focusing on defendants' demographic, clinical, cognitive, and criminal justice variables and their association with length of hospitalization and restoration determinations. Participants were 74 male and female criminal defendants in a midwestern state who were adjudicated incompetent to stand trial, had a diagnosis related to intellectual deficits, and completed competency restoration.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIncarceration can lead to different risk behaviors often due to increased distress and disruption of social networks. It is not well known, however, how these associations may differ by age. In this study, we measure age differences in longitudinal associations between incarceration and substance use, sex risk, and sexually transmitted infection (STI) among Black sexual minority men and Black transgender women (BSMM/BTW).
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