CAN'T UNDERSTAND SYSTEM'S WORKINGS

For the past several months, I have been spending some time looking
at various segments of our criminal-justice system and trying to
understand why we are building so many prisons.

But the more I look, the less I understand.

A few months back, for example, I spent a day in a courtroom
observing a mental competency hearing. Maybe you read what I wrote
about being struck by the obvious high cost of that day. Public funds
had to pay the prosecutor, and the appointed defense lawyer, and a
psychologist to testify for each side, and the judge, and court
reporter, and court clerk, and bailiffs, and jurors, and likely some
others I missed.

Many thousands of dollars it cost for that one day. And the kicker
was this: the crime the woman was charged with involved her trying to
split a $10 crack cocaine purchase with a man who turned out to be an
undercover cop.

The jurors weren't told of the charges. Their only duty this day was
to determine whether the woman was, or eventually would be, mentally
competent to stand trial. They found that she was not.

Woman's journey to nowhere All that was difficult enough to
understand -- so much public money spent on trying to determine
whether someone is competent enough to go to trial in order for the
prosecutor to try to prove that she tried to buy $5 worth of crack,
which is a nonviolent crime and a pretty darned piddling one, at that.

But what has happened to the woman since the jury found that she was
not competent to stand trial, and would not be competent in the
foreseeable future, takes the level of believability to a new plateau
of difficulty. A lawyer I spoke with said the woman should have been
released or, if the court determined she was mentally ill or mentally
retarded, the next step would have been to proceed toward a possible
civil commitment in a mental hospital.

Instead, she was taken to jail pending transfer to the state hospital
under a criminal commitment. She sat in jail for more than three
weeks, which was how long it took the prosecutor to get the paperwork
done.

That's right. The jury found that she was incompetent and there could
be no trial, yet she winds up spending more time in jail.

After about a month in the state hospital, a doctor reported to the
court that she now was competent to stand trial, and so she was
brought back to Houston, where the judge agreed to release her on
bond, pending trial.

But a psychologist who evaluated her before determined that she still
was incompetent, just as the jury had found she was before she went
to jail and the state hospital. But the prosecutor refused to dismiss
the case, and the court ordered the woman to be evaluated yet again.

Misguided funds flood courts Finally, the prosecutor consulted the
division chief for the DA's office, who agreed with the defense
observation that it had been an error to send the woman to the state
hospital. He said the case should be reviewed for civil commitment
proceedings.

The next court date is set for the end of this month. Thus far, this
case has involved 14 trips to court, five of them since the jury
declared the woman mentally incompetent to stand trial.

She suffered severe head injuries in an automobile accident in 1986.
Her attorney said the brain damage is irreversible and will not get
any better if she is warehoused in a state hospital. But there likely
will be a couple more judge-ordered psychological evaluations and
additional courtroom proceedings before the system finally runs its
course with this case.

And how many tens of thousands of public bucks will have been
consumed by this case? How will society have been served by the
system? Who needs protecting from this person charged with the
nonviolent crime of trying to buy five bucks worth of crack? How many
similar situations could we find in the system?

While there seems to be no shortage of funds to prosecute such cases,
ask mental health providers about the acute lack of services and
treatment available to those who need them.

The more I look, the less I understand.