Meadows Institute’s Yolanda Lewis and Timothy Bray featured in NAMI’s Ask the Expert Series

Pretrial detention is a high-risk time for individuals with mental illness, and suicide remains one of the leading causes of death in U.S. jails.

“Over half of the people in jails are detained on a pretrial [basis]; they have not been convicted of any crime, are awaiting further court proceedings, and are presumed innocent. Unfortunately, this period is of significant risk to correctional officials and detainees, as the suicide rate among the pretrial population is three times higher than those who have been convicted and ten times higher than the general population,” said Yolanda Lewis, executive vice president for justice and health and executive director, Center for Justice and Health at the Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute.

In the latest edition of National Alliance for Mental Illness (NAMI)’s Ask the Expert webinar series, titled Suicide in Pretrial Detention and Expanding the Crisis Care Continuum, Meadows Institute’s Yolanda Lewis and Timothy Bray, vice president for justice and health policy, discuss The First 48, a new opportunity to gather support from national entities to expand resources, training and policy initiatives aimed at improving collaboration among justice and health officials, so individuals are more efficiently diverted from justice systems to safe places for care at initial detention.

Watch or listen to their full interview with NAMI’s Chief Medical Officer Ken Duckworth, M.D. here.