Essay Sample about Avery Jenkins’s Trial

The case of Avery Jenkins was the case of a young man who had shown signs of mental illness before being convicted of a murder that was brought on by a manic episode. His trial went without mention of any mental illness and he was sentenced to death row. His mental state impeded on his ability to communicate with his lawyer and defend himself in court. Avery was in and out of prison for much of his adult life leading up to his conviction, all of which was time when he was not being treated for his mental illness. Stevenson classifies the structural inequalities of how mental health is treated in the criminal justice system by describing two cases in that scenario.

To highlight the injustices in how the criminal justice system handles cases that are impacted by mental illness, Stevenson demonstrates the issues in a specific trial with a person who’s crime is complicated by mental illness. In reference to Avery Jenkins’s trial, Stevenson claims that, “Brutally murdering someone would, of course, require the state to hold that person accountable and to protect the public. But to completely disregard a person’s disability would be unfair in evaluating what degree of culpability to assign and what sentence to impose” (Stevenson 199). Stevenson shows that the way the court dismissed Jenkin’s diagnosed bipolar disorder seriously impacted the trial and the sentence. Stevenson makes it clear that mental illness is relevant to not only the trial, but the sentence. Without this, the court can easily mishandle a sentence and therefore make a situation much worse and a convict much more dangerous upon release. In another case, Kara McHorse describes, “While sitting in his probation revocation hearing, [she] witnessed the court acknowledge Tyre’s mental health problems… Nonetheless, Texas law on mental health does not provide a chance for offenders like Tyre, and he was sentenced to the Texas Department of Corrections after the judge revoked his probation” (McHorse 527).  Stevenson’s arguments are cemented by another specific case where even though the trial raised awareness of the defendant's bipolar disorder, the sentence did not, which resulted in a worsening situation. This case shows that without proper treatment of mental illness in sentences, convicts leave prison in a worse state than when they were convicted. This often causes convicts to re-enter the prison system for new crimes proving that mistreatment of mental health creates a more dangerous situation for the general public. From a different approach, Emily Stahly states, “There are several potential areas of reform. Expanding and improving community-based treatment programs for drug abuse and mental health problems... Reforming mandatory minimum sentencing laws to give judges more discretion over whether the prescribed sentence or an alternative like rehabilitation would be more appropriate for a particular offender is also worth considering” (Stahly 608). This supports Stevenson’s choices in how he presents information about how mental leath is poorly handled in the criminal justice system in the way that it highlights how sentencing plays a major role in how mental illness affects a case. Stevenson highlights how not mentioning mental illness during the trial skewed the sentence which is backed up by the proposal for sentencing to be altered in favor of accommodating the mentally ill. The way that Stevenson demonstrates how Jenkin’s case was affected by mistreatment of mental health proves how the criminal justice system is pitted against mentally ill defendants. 

Stevenson also shows how mental health is affected within prisons by explaining the experience of someone in that situation. In a different case, Stevenson’s client describes, “They put [him] on death row for six years! They threatened [him] for six years. They tortured [him] with the promise of execution for six years. I lost my job. [He] lost [his] life. [He] lost [his] reputation. [He] lost [his] – [he] lost [his] dignity” (Stevenson 254). Stevenson uses this to support the idea that prison inherently negatively affects people being detained. He shows how this situation is exasperated by mental illness and uses this case to make that point. For some elaboration, Alan Felthous and Debra Pinals discovered, “Every day in our nation's jails, persons with psychosis and other serious mental illness are locked in small cells, often in deplorable conditions, awaiting something all too often unknown to the individual” (Pinals & Felthous 375). This supports Stevenson’s argument by explaining further how mental health is specifically affected in prisons. Describing the specific conditions in which mentally ill people are held in prison shows that there are systemic disparities pointed against people with mental illness. By explaining a specific case, Stevenson is able to present the systemic hardship that people with mental illness in prison face. 

Stevenson demonstrates how mental illness is underrepresented in trials by presenting and explaining a case where the defendant’s mental illness went completely unmentioned when it was relevant to the case. This is supported by published proposals to make sentencing more flexible to allow mental illness to be taken into account. Stevenson also shows how prison stays affect mental health through someone who was held for six years for a crime they didn’t commit. This is further proven by detailed description of the prison conditions for an inmate with a mental illness. Stevenson is able to use specific cases that are relevant to the topic to identify systemic disadvantages that mentally ill defendants face in the criminal justice system.

Works Cited

McHorse, Kara. “Recognizing the Need for Mental Health Reform in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.” St. Mary’s Law Journal, vol. 51, no. 2, Apr. 2020, pp. 517–548. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=142914551&authtype=shib&site=ehost-live&scope=site.

Pinals, Debra A., and Felthous, Alan R.. “Introduction to This Double Issue: Jail Diversion and Collaboration across the Justice Continuum.” Behavioral Sciences & the Law, vol. 35, no. 5/6, Sept. 2017, pp. 375–379. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1002/bsl.2322.

Stahly, Emily. “Criminal Justice Reform in Missouri.” St. Louis University Law Journal, vol. 63, no. 4, Summer 2019, pp. 607–609. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=139879331&authtype=shib&site=ehost-live&scope=site.

Stevenson, Bryan. Just Mercy : a Story of Justice and Redemption. New York :Spiegel & Grau, 2014.