LAHORE: Lahore High Court Chief Justice Mamoon Rashid Sheikh on Saturday regretted that mentally ill prisoners in Pakistan were not given due consideration and care.

He said provision of basic rights to the mentally ill citizens was the responsibility of whole society.

He was speaking at a seminar hosted by the Justice Project Pakistan (JPP), an organisation working for prisoners’ rights, on mental health and “mens rea” (an element of criminal responsibility).

CJ Sheikh said mental health and mens rea was an ever-important and ever-evolving topic in the judicial system. However, he said, the citizens with mental illness were most neglected part of society. He said a mentally ill person did not commit a crime with intention or planning. Therefore, he said, in Pakistan and all over the world courts took lenient view while awarding punishment to mentally handicapped persons if they committed a crime.

Though it was difficult to determine mental health of a criminal during the trial, he said, the stakeholders of the justice system needed to be trained to deal with such cases.

JPP Executive Director Sarah Belal said mental health was a crucial, yet widely misunderstood, area of medicine that had tremendous repercussions on culpability and mens rea.

She said the purpose of the event was to gain valuable information and insight about mental illness, intellectual disability, and about how persons with either or both were identified or overlooked in the criminal justice system.

Other speakers also deliberated on duty to investigate the difficulties associated with representing impaired clients, and the need for additional time and resources.

A latest report by the Prison Reforms Commission constituted by the Islamabad High Court, said there were 594 prisoners with mental disorders in various jails across Pakistan.

These prisoners were often labeled as ‘inherently dangerous’ and were consequently subjected to cruel and unusual punishment, including capital punishment which is strictly prohibited under international law.

It said around 50 million people suffered from some sort of mental illness in the country and the lack of mental health treatment and training in the criminal justice system generally means that many individuals never get diagnosed.

Published in Dawn, February 23rd, 2020