Characteristics and re-offending outcomes of 'limiting-term' forensic patients found unfit to stand trial in New South Wales, Australia

Timothy Wu; Sara Singh; Georgia Lyons; Olav Nielssen; Richard Kemp; Anina Johnson; Kimberlie Dean

doi:10.1080/13218719.2020.1837032

Characteristics and re-offending outcomes of 'limiting-term' forensic patients found unfit to stand trial in New South Wales, Australia

Psychiatr Psychol Law. 2021 Jan 19;28(5):733-747. doi: 10.1080/13218719.2020.1837032. eCollection 2021.

Authors

Timothy Wu^{1

2}, Sara Singh¹, Georgia Lyons¹, Olav Nielssen^{1

3}, Richard Kemp², Anina Johnson⁴, Kimberlie Dean^{1

5}

Affiliations

¹ School of Psychiatry, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia.
² School of Psychology, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia.
³ Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia.
⁴ New South Wales Mental Health Review Tribunal, Sydney, Australia.
⁵ Justice Health and Forensic Mental Health Network, Matraville, New South Wales, Australia.

Abstract

There are little published data on the characteristics or outcomes of offenders found unfit to stand trial who receive a 'qualified finding of guilt' in a Special Hearing in New South Wales (NSW) and are detained for a 'limiting term' (LT) under the supervision of the NSW Mental Health Review Tribunal (MHRT). We examined NSW MHRT records linked to re-offending data, to report on the characteristics and outcomes of 69 LT patients in a cohort spanning two decades. The most common diagnoses were schizophrenia (54%) and intellectual disability (33%). Patients were detained on average for 4.2 years, which is slightly shorter than the average maximum term imposed. Of the 55 people for whom criminal record data were available, 9.1% were charged with an offence during the first year post-release and 60% overall were charged for at least one post-release offence during a follow-up period ranging from 4.7 to 11.1 years.

Keywords: detention; forensic patients; incompetent; limiting term; mental health review tribunal; re-offending; trial; unfit.

Grants and funding

Ms Sara Singh and Ms Georgia Lyons were supported by the New South Wales Mental Health Commission Professor Kimberlie Dean is supported by Justice Health and Forensic Mental Health Network and an NHMRC Investigator Grant (APP1175408).