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" 'A jail is a poor mental hospital,' says Bibb County Probate Judge Bill Self, who presides over involuntary commitment hearings for people with mental illness."

- From "Making mental illness a crime: For more Georgians, disorders mean time in jail, not treatment centers,"
The Macon Telegraph, Jan. 27, 2002

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PREVENTABLE TRAGEDIES The Preventable Tragedies database includes summaries of news articles of which an individual with a neurobiological brain disorder (usually untreated) is involved in a violent episode, either as a victim or perpetrator. Search for Georgia episodes by choosing GA in the drop down box.

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NEWS Mandatory treatment: not an easy decision - When someone has a mental illness and doesn't acknowledge it, a thorny question arises: Should someone else force that person to get treatment?
The Macon Telegraph, January 30, 2002

NEWS Breaking the cycle: new programs may prevent jail time for mentally ill Georgians - A homeless, mentally ill man walks into a Decatur restaurant, makes a loud disturbance and refuses to leave. As nervous customers look away, the exasperated restaurant manager picks up the phone and calls the police - again.
The Macon Telegraph, January 30, 2002

NEWS People find safe haven in Houston - 1985, a group of Houston County citizens got tired of waiting for the state to provide the services that they believed their mentally ill relatives needed and deserved. So they decided to do it themselves. The result was a 7-acre haven where people with serious mental illnesses can live, get help finding a job, find friendship and generally get the kind of support that a caring family provides. It's run by NAMI-Central Georgia, an affiliate of Georgia's chapter of the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill.
The Macon Telegraph, January 30, 2002

NEWS How to get help -If you have a mental illness or you know someone who does, click on the link for some Macon-area agencies that offer help.
The Macon Telegraph, January 30, 2002

NEWS Prisons: A costly answer to mental health care - As Georgia's county jails struggled to cope with a growing number of mentally ill inmates in the 1990s, a similar struggle was under way in state prisons. The prison system's mentally ill population more than quadrupled, from 1,251 in 1991 to 5,737 in 2001. During that same time, state spending on prison mental health services grew nearly tenfold. But in the 1990s, when Georgia's population swelled by 26 percent and the state government budget nearly doubled, total state spending for mental health services in communities and hospitals remained flat.
The Macon Telegraph, January 28, 2002

NEWS Mental illness history comes full circle: 161 years after Dorothea Dix pulled mentally ill out of U.S. jails, they are back again - In 1841, a Boston schoolteacher named Dorothea Dix set out for the local jail to teach a Sunday School class. What she discovered there changed history. Dix was horrified to find mentally disabled people crammed into unheated, unsanitary quarters with all kinds of criminals. Her revulsion and crusading spirit ignited a social movement that spurred the creation of "asylums" - places of refuge - all over the nation for people with mental disorders. The asylums themselves ultimately became scandalously overcrowded, abusive and in need of reform. And in the late 20th century, the mental hospitals emptied out. But in their place, jails have once again become the institutional answer to mental illness.
The Macon Telegraph, January 28, 2002

PERSONAL STORY Commitment to recovery: Donnie Buchanan, a consumer from the Atlanta area, offers his perspective.

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