County jail is violating own policy on mental health access | HeraldNet.com

County jail is violating own policy on mental health access

I am currently seeing the violations in which Snohomish County Jail officials try to sweep the mental health needs of inmates under the rug.

I suffer from mental health and personality disorders, but the jail wants to deny me mental health services in direct violation of their own policy to offer a range of mental health services to any inmate who requires them.

If this is the case, why do I have complaint forms where the mental health department denies my services. There are inmates in my vicinity who need services yet they are being ignored. This is one specifically who has been in the jail for more than 12 months who is just now being recognized by staff.

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Qualified health care professionals should be assigned to daily rounds in the segregation unit to determine the mental health status of inmates housed there. This does not mean a nurse passing out meds; this should be somebody stopping at each door who is a mental health professional.

If this was happening then the guy who is five cells away from me screaming for the devil to get out of him would be housed in a mental health module and not in segregation.

This facility abuses the segregation unit by placing people in it who do not belong. I am right there with them. My mental health capacity is a factor, but I can function. My reason for being in segregation is an anxiety attack, and now I’m classified right here until the jail figures it out.

The Snohomish County Corrections Office is violating its own policy as well as many of our civil and constitutional rights; the only problem is there is no one who will speak up for us.

Timothy McCamey

Everett

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