Examining the Impact of Mental Illness a

This paper describes the recidivism patterns over a 4 year period for a cohort of people admitted to a large US urban jail system in 2003 and analyzes how these patterns vary based on presence of mental illness and substance abuse. Jail detention and behavioral health service records were merged for all admissions to a large urban jail system in 2003 (N = 24,290). Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the recidivism patterns for people admitted to jail in 2003 (N = 20,112) over a four year period. Recidivism patterns of people without mental illness or substance use disorders were compared with people with serious mental illness, substance abuse disorders, and dual diagnoses. The analyses found that over half of the people who returned to jail during the 4 year follow-up period did so in the first year. This finding did not differ by any diagnostic category. Analysis of the number of people readmitted to jail found that people who had a diagnosis of mental illness alone had the lowest number of readmissions to jail in the 4 years after release with 50% having at least one readmission after their initial release. People with dual diagnoses, in contrast, had the highest number of readmissions to jail after leaving a US urban jail. These findings illustrate the importance of developing interventions that provide timely access to intensive co-occurring substance abuse and mental health treatment during the period directly after release that are capable of addressing both individual and environmental factors that promote the return to drug use after release.