ted the offense. According to the state code, a person who waives his right to a trial may be found guilty but mentally ill. However, in order to accept the plea, the judge must examine all reports and hold a hearing on the sole issue of mental illness. If the judge then rejects the plea, the defendant is still entitled to a jury trial, or a trial before a different judge. This verdict can be rendered if the defense raises a reasonable doubt about the defendant's ability to premeditate, act with malice or form criminal intent. A defendant found guilty but mentally ill will serve out his sentence in a prison or hospital. One example was Joel T. Sherako of Natrona Heights, who pleaded guilty but mentally ill to third-degree murder in the multiple-stabbing of his grandfather in 1998. Common Pleas Judge David Cashman sentenced him to 20 to 40 years in a prison with a mental health unit, where he was to be monitored on a regular basis. "He is a very sick man," Cashman said after sentencing Sherako, who had a history of schizophrenia.An obvious question is whether effective treatment costs less than incarceration. In 1996, the cost of incarcerating an individual in the New York City jail system for one year was approximately $64,000.23 The comparable cost of a year in state prison was $32,000.24 This is equal to $175 per day to keep someone in jail and $88 per day in prison. These figures are for the average inmate, however, and people with mental illness are not average inmates; inmates with mental illness require far more than their "share" of jail and prison resources, in the form of treatment, suicide prevention observation and crisis intervention. As a result, inmates with mental illness substantially inflate average incarceration costs. In comparing the costs of diversion to those of incarceration, it is important to remember that incarcerating a person with mental illness does not "save" the cost of providing health and mental health c...
