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The Los Angeles Times

September 28, 2002

Reprinted with permission. All rights reserved.

EDITORIAL
Helping people off the streets:
Governor, sign Laura's Law

Interest groups are bringing pressure to bear against an important mental health bill.

By press time Friday night, Gov. Gray Davis still had not signed "Laura's law," an important bill that would let judges order outpatient treatment for seriously mentally ill people who can't fathom the gravity of their condition.

The deadline is midnight Monday.

Davis had pledged to do everything in his power to protect Californians from crime, so supporters of the bill had expected him to embrace the measure. It would enable some of California's most vulnerable people, including many who live on sidewalks or alongside freeways, to get help before they harm themselves or others. But opponents of the legislation have grown particularly vocal in recent weeks.

Two weeks ago, for instance, a subgroup of the Church of Scientology, which opposes virtually all psychiatric treatments, sponsored a rally at the Capitol against Laura's law--named after a 19-year-old killed by a man whose mental illness had been left untreated.

Davis also might be concerned about a recent report from the Judicial Council, a rule-making body for California's courts, which concluded that the bill could be a financial drain on the state.

But the council's analysis overlooks a broad array of information. For instance, it does not consider that the bill's implementation would result in fewer criminal prosecutions of nuisance crimes and more serious offenses, fewer probation violation hearings and fewer sentences of persons with severe mental illness to jails and prisons.

As Harold Shabo, a mental health expert and former Superior Court judge in Los Angeles, recently pointed out in a letter to Davis, "Obviously, the cost of criminal proceedings, which are often protracted, are higher than the cost of the brief mental health proceedings that [Laura's law] would require."

Gov. Davis often says his top priorities are protecting law and order. Few bills now before him would do that job better than AB 1421.

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