Woman with schizophrenia spends six months in a county jail waiting for an Oklahoma forensic bed
The Frontier told the story of Grace Franklin, a 24-year-old woman with schizophrenia who spent about six months in the Stephens County jail after a public-intoxication arrest, waiting for a competency restoration bed at the Oklahoma Forensic Center in Vinita. She was billed for 171 days in jail, and a department official said her case should have been dropped and her diverted to treatment.
The article reported that as of March 2021, 55 men and 29 women were on the Forensic Center's waiting list, some waiting as long as six months, and that restoration treatment averages about 90 days. It also described a 65-year-old woman, Christa Sullivan, who died in the Oklahoma County jail in April after waiting 11 months for a Vinita bed. The center was adding 16 beds in July, and lawmakers had approved $7.5 million for crisis beds and $3 million for mobile crisis units.
The piece is one of the clearest pre-lawsuit accounts of Oklahoma's single-facility waitlist and its human cost for people charged with minor offenses.
Source: She spent six months in an Oklahoma jail waiting for mental health treatment — The Frontier, by Brianna Bailey
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