The Legal Aid Society has lent support to ground-breaking legislation currently making its way through the New York State Legislature that would mandate a more comprehensive, scientifically driven, and due process-oriented continuum of support for those enmeshed in the legal system who live with mental illness, substance use disorders or other disabilities, as reported by CBS 2 News.

The “Treatment Not Jail Act” would lower barriers between incarcerated people and treatment for mental health, substance abuse, and other disabilities that prevent rehabilitation and reintegration into society. The bill represents a pragmatic shift towards a more holistic and harm-reduction-oriented understanding of recovery and community safety. It adopts a smart-on-crime approach to ensuring that people most in need of treatment have access to specialized services while also making our communities safer and more resilient.

Jeffrey Berman, a mental health attorney with The Legal Aid Society, noting that Rikers Island is the “largest mental health provider in the United States,” said that barriers to treatment should be the purview of health care providers – not prosecutors and judges.

“Prosecutors are the ones who decide who wins the lottery to receive court-mandated treatment as part of their criminal case and who will instead go to prison,” Berman said.