Am J Psychiatry 1978; 135:1218-1220
Copyright © 1978 by American Psychiatric Association
Comparing arrest rates of mental patients and criminal offenders
HJ Steadman, D Vanderwyst and S Ribner
The authors compared the arrest rates of former mental patients with those
of criminal offenders released in the same jurisdiction. The data for all
ex-patients and all offenders released in Albany County, New York, in 1968
and 1975 support the contention that it is the relationship between prior
and subsequent arrests that explains the increasing crime rate of
ex-patients and the three to six times higher rate of arrest of released
offenders. Since the three-quarters of former patients with no arrest
records were arrested about as often as the general population and
substantially less often than offenders, care is warranted in drawing
inferences from overall mental patient arrest rates.
