Cynthia was one of a few community members who Clayton invited to attend the Managing Mental Health Crisis training session for law enforcement officers through the sheriff's office in mid-April. There were 31 participants from 20 Michigan communities. She wanted to know what misperceptions officers had about mental illness and how they were correcting them.While the training was being played on her laptop at home, she was watching anxiously from her iPad at work. Anthony was seen on that screen shifting uncomfortably in a Zoom square as he appeared for a virtual bond hearing regarding his drug charges.Anthony's lawyer advocated for a humanistic approach that focused on inpatient mental health care and not jail. Anthony's lawyer was armed with letters from a local substance abuse and mental health treatment center that had previously worked with him and had located a facility that would allow him to have a bed.Judge Archie C. Brown was not having any of it.Mr. Hamilton has been with me over the past 11 years on numerous issues. Let's not forget that, Brown said, adding that he was appointed by Republican Gov. to the 22nd Circuit Court. John Engler was elected to the 22nd Circuit Court in 1999 during tough-on-crime Bill Clinton's years. He has been reelected four times since. To be honest, I think Hamilton is a person who will do whatever he damn well pleases. Ignore what the court will do.The judge refused to release bond.I was just thinking: How can this judge be in the same county with these people who are talking about mental illness awareness? Cynthia raised her hands in frustration, and said, "I'm just sitting there.It is not known if a different dispatch system would have kept Anthony from being in the crosshairs of the criminal justice systems that night in 2009. What would have happened if the responding officer recognized Anthony's mental health issues? What if the 911 operator had called a 24-hour crisis intervention group that could have dispatched an experienced counselor to Anthony's police station, or even before he arrived? What if the police officer had tried to find Anthony's parents rather than booking him? He had not treated Anthony as someone more in dire need of protection than the trash bins.I need to be busy, and have a job with other things. It is important to have people who can understand me and help me get on my feet. When I feel like I can do it all on my own, I lose. I'm tired of losing. Anthony HamiltonClayton and others are working to address the obvious shortcomings in how people with mental illnesses are treated in criminal justice. Cynthia is aware that the root causes of these systemic failings are dangerous attitudes that can be counterproductive to reformers' best intentions. These are the attitudes that make a Black man feel uncomfortable in a sweatshirt and a hoodie. These attitudes assume that a child like Anthony does not live in a house with high ceilings and large picture window on a quiet cul-de–sac. They don't consider the fact that Anthony has parents who will drop everything to pick him up at any time. The ones that don't consider Anthony's safety as well as public safety.Ann Arbor is not the place to be considered racist. Cynthia says that I probably lived my entire life wearing rose-colored glasses. Every day I feel pain that my hometown, where I was born and raised, is no longer safe for my son.Anthony has been held in jail for almost seven months. Anthony is currently in jail for seven months. The prosecutors have offered him a plea to one of two felony drug charges while he waits to be tried. Anthony refuses to accept it as it implies that he is dealing with drugs. He insists that he is not. He has also been in prison for a long time and knows that prosecutors are known to charge high charges so they can get you to plead to a lesser charge. Anthony argues that if the prosecutor drops possession as a charge, Anthony might be able to get diversion which is what he really wants.
