OKLAHOMA CITY – A federal report released Friday slams the state, Oklahoma City and its police department for how the entities deal with people experiencing mental health issues.
The report comes after an investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice following a Nov.17, 2022, complaint.
“Oklahoma unnecessarily institutionalizes, or puts at serious risk of unnecessary institutionalization, adults with behavioral health disabilities in the Oklahoma County area” in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act, according to the report.
Oklahoma City and its police department discriminate against people with behavioral health disabilities when providing emergency response services in violation of federal law, the report said.
The state doesn’t provide sufficient services to prevent unnecessary hospitalization, the report said.
“As a result, many people with behavioral health disabilities never receive treatment until they are in crisis, when they instead end up needlessly hospitalized or in contact with law enforcement,” according to the report.
About 30,000 adults in Oklahoma County, the state’s most populous, have a serious mental illness, according to the report.
Police are sent instead of behavioral health professionals when responding to many residents with mental health needs, the report said.
When officers respond, “they sometimes fail to help, escalate crises, or even unnecessarily resort to force. People do not get the help they need and then are taken to the hospital to begin the cycle again,” the report said.
Oklahoma City officials said in a statement Friday that they were reviewing the findings, but remained focused on providing the best services to residents.
The Oklahoma City Police Department did immediately respond to a request for comment.
State officials though were critical of the findings.
Gov. Kevin Stitt said the findings were “another Biden administration overreach” and that state officials are working hard to reform the mental health system.
“They can’t do that if they’re burdened with heavy-handed, out-of-touch mandates from the federal government,” Stitt said.
Allie Friesen, who leads the Oklahoma Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services, said she also disagreed with the report’s adverse findings.
Attorney General Gentner Drummond said while he strongly supports reforming the mental health system, he’s “wary of yet another top-down approach in this 11th-hour report by the Biden Administration’s Department of Justice. We will closely review the findings, but the DOJ report appears to be an attempt to bully Oklahoma into compliance with ever-changing and undefined targets.”
The report comes after officials in November agreed to resolve a high-profile federal lawsuit over competency restoration services.
The lawsuit, filed in March 2023, alleged that the state violated the rights of mostly indigent defendants who were declared incompetent to stand trial and held in county jails.
Tulsa attorney Paul DeMuro represented the plaintiffs.
He said the report’s findings should be of no surprise to anyone. He said he hopes it leads to meaningful reforms.
“We need to be doing a lot better to take care of this population of people,” DeMuro said.
Oklahoma needs to dedicate more funding to the problem, he said. Leadership needs to focus more on the problem, he said.
“Oklahoma is not alone in these struggles,” he said.
Republished in partnership with Oklahoma Voice under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Oklahoma Voice is a part of States Newsroom which is a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Oklahoma Voice maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Janelle Stecklein for questions: info@oklahomavoice.com. Follow Oklahoma Voice on Facebook and Twitter.
Barbara Hoberock is a senior reporter with Oklahoma Voice. She has covered the statehouse since 1994 and served as Tulsa World Capitol Bureau chief. Hoberock covers statewide elected officials, the legislature, agencies, state issues, appellate courts and elections.
