the image of inmates chained to tables is going to live with me for a while. it was a really disturbing things to see. but this isn t a mental health institution, it s a jail. and the people who work here are doing the best they can to take care of a population that is just growing exponentially. the sad fact is that 75% of mentally ill inmates will return to the l.a. county jail. big changes are under foot to keep another group from coming back. if i would have maybe encountered any kind of rehab, i might have had a better life, you know. at least a better chance of staying out. [engine revving]
my addictions and everything that i ve gone through, i think it starts from a really, really young age of when my mom passed away. lack of having my mother and being around gang members most of my life led me to the criminal lifestyle. counseling sessions like this are a new effort by the jail to keep inmates from coming back. how many times have you been incarcerated? about nine times. nine times as well. 18. 18 times? from beginning until now, about 20 times. i ve been in prison three times. i have six prison terms and like 13 or 14 booking numbers in l.a. county alone. why have you kept coming back? when you go home, the first people that greet you are the people you were partying with before you left. it kind of just sucks you back in. do you think you ve become institutionalized? definitely. definitely. i choose to keep coming back to jail. but this is the last time. definitely the last time.
results. so when you first came on to the department, did you ever think that you d be doing anything like this with inmates? no, i didn t. the line of communication that s been opened directly to us makes us feel that we re making a difference right now. it s part of the paradigm shift within l.a. county jail itself. do you think this council makes the environment safer? i believe it does. it s improving their behavior, and they re holding each other accountable. so i think it makes it safer for everybody. thank you for the dvd players and for fixing our phones. we do take into consideration that this is a give and take relationship. we re expected to keep ourselves at a higher respect level with staff. programs like inmate council demonstrate just how far the jail has come since the scandal. but the current sheriff, jim mcdonnell, knows his department still has a lot to prove. what do you want people to know about the largest jail system in the country? it s a tough pla
i don t want a damn breakfast. i don t have lunch yet. okay. i ll come back. do you feel fear when you re doing your job? every once in a while, but i love what i do. i have the patience for it and i enjoy trying to make a positive difference in people s lives who are hurting inside. most of the mentally ill that are on the high observation housing floors are homeless. and a lot of these guys are bipolar and manic depressives. schizophrenic. as the mental population behind bars has grown, so too has the scrutiny. a 2012 report revealed that over 30% of use of force cases at the jail involved inmates with mental illness. to improve conditions, last year the sheriff s department initiated a training program called divert. it puts emphasis on communication over force.
to be able to balance the needs of our employees for their safety with constitutionally taking care of the inmates in our care and custody, i believe the more people see the challenges we face, the more likely they ll want to help fix those challenges. currently, we do what we can. we try and get them the best treatment we can. come on out. but they re leaving our custody, going back predictably into that same cycle, only to reoffend and come back again. while the department is taking big strides to improve conditions on the inside, unless change also happens on the outside, it will likely remain the largest jail system in the country. sign right here. all right. you can go in the turnstile for us. the reality is that about half of those released from the l.a. county jail will return. and as i watch men leave, more and more quickly arrive to replace them. three, two, one.