The Criminal Justice Section (CJS) has been instrumental in advocating for changes in criminal law and in shaping criminal practice. Our membership of judges, prosecutors and defense attorneys, private, institutional and 18B practitioners, celebrated the passage of Discovery and Bail Reform in 2020, among other things. Since then, the proliferation of gun violence has been mirrored by an equal rise in ERPO proceedings. Both of those areas have underlying mental health triggers. As CJS continues to review legislation tweaking bail reform based on those issues, we also discuss how to ensure that ERPO proceedings have constitutional safeguards, especially involving their mental health components.

Mental health is the hottest topic in criminal justice. For far too long, it has not been given the attention that it deserves. Finally forced to confront it, how should the criminal justice system deal with it? How are we addressing it currently? How do we treat its underlying reasons to prevent them from persisting or worsening in the future?