News & Commentary

Due to an excessively long waitlist, Kansas inmates who await mental health treatment and evaluations could spend more time in state-run facilities than in prison if convicted.

The Kansas Highway Patrol is appealing a federal injunction that will block its troopers from using the “two step” traffic stop tactic that a judge ruled had resulted in the agency violating the constitutional rights of motorists.

“In general, jails are not meant to be hospitals,” Sharon Brett said. “They are not meant to be places where individuals go to receive comprehensive medical and mental health care services. And we shouldn’t be relying on that as such. It is putting a Band-Aid over a bullet hole, essentially.”

The ACLU of Kansas believes the state could address these socially destabilizing and anti-democratic disparities by eliminating cash bail for non-violent offenses. Pretrial incarceration caused by unaffordable bail remains one of the greatest drivers of convictions.

“Because of the court’s ruling, hundreds of people on the waitlist for Larned will continue to languish for indeterminate months in our county jails, under conditions that exacerbate rather than treat mental illness,” said Sharon Brett, Legal Director of the ACLU of Kansas

In 2022, the ACLU of Kansas filed a lawsuit against the state over delays in mental health evaluations at Larned. People who face criminal charges have had to wait behind bars for as long as 13 months before getting a pretrial competency evaluation, according to the lawsuit.

A leading Kansas civil rights organization says an estimated 30,000 people living in the state should be informed they have the right to vote. The American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas launched a campaign to reach out to Kansans with felony records and encourage them to register to vote.

The ACLU of Kansas says that around 30,000 Kansans who have completed their sentences for felony convictions are unaware that they have the right to vote. To that end, a new effort has been launched to inform them of their restored voting rights, recruit volunteers and to get more voters to vote.

The ACLU had argued the “two-step” was used to target drivers coming from or heading to states where marijuana is legal, despite previous court rulings limiting how police can use information about a vehicle’s origin and destination.