DENVER — 23,000 people are taken into custody each year in the City and County of Denver, according to Sheriff Elias Diggins, and some of them have already been through the system before.

All of them get mental health assessments, and 60% of them receive some kind of mental health treatment, according to Denver Health.

The hospital partners with the jail to treat inmates.

“We have about 60 people in the behavioral health team between psychiatric nursing, psychiatry, psychology, social work, case management,” Director of Behavioral Health for the Denver City and County Jails Jennifer Gafford said. “So we’ve got a pretty robust team that’s kind of embedded in both of the facilities.”

Even so, CEO of Mental Health Colorado Vincent Atchity said he has concerns about what happens when the inmates are released.

Advocates seek solutions for safer re-entry of inmates into Colroado communities

He called it a “revolving door experience” because inmates lose that consistent access to care, or don’t seek it out, and go back into our communities and re-offend.

“We’ve got a cyclical experience of individuals who are discharged, their medication runs out, they revert to illegally self medicating through whatever is available out there, or simply go off their medication altogether. And one way or another, their condition and behavior deject,” Atchity said.

Sheriff Diggins said the jail does try to offer solutions, like letting the inmate leave with a 30-day prescription of the medications they were given, but it’s on the inmate to get it filled. Diggins admits that can be challenging.

“When they leave here, they have to go back to their lives. They have to have a job, they have to have a place to stay, they have to figure out how they’re going to eat,” Diggins said. “Then you put on top of that, staying in a space where they’re stabilized on medication, it’s a lot for anybody to deal with.”

Diggins said he does a lot of traveling to other jails across the country and said Denver is at the forefront of the mental health work and services they provide. He encouraged advocates to continue communicating what resources their neighborhoods need, not only to keep the inmate safer after release, but communities too.