{"id":594,"date":"2006-09-19T10:50:00","date_gmt":"2006-09-19T16:50:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2006\/09\/albuquerque-city-council-approves-kendras-law-las-cruces-might-want-to-do-the-same\/"},"modified":"2006-09-19T10:50:00","modified_gmt":"2006-09-19T16:50:00","slug":"albuquerque-city-council-approves-kendras-law-las-cruces-might-want-to-do-the-same","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2006\/09\/albuquerque-city-council-approves-kendras-law-las-cruces-might-want-to-do-the-same\/","title":{"rendered":"Albuquerque City Council approves ‘Kendra’s Law;’ Las Cruces might want to do the same"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Albuquerque City Council has done what the New Mexico Legislature failed to do last year \u2013 create a law allowing judges to order treatment and medication for mentally ill people.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The council approved what\u2019s called \u201cKendra\u2019s Law\u201d Monday night, according to the Albuquerque Journal<\/a>. Before ordering care, a judge would have to determine whether a mentally ill person is potentially dangerous and meets other criteria, in addition to being in need of treatment, according to the newspaper.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cI doubt that this is a 100 percent cure for what happened, but this is a step in the right direction,\u201d Dave Fisher, whose son was shot to death last year, told the Journal. A mentally ill man has been charged in his son\u2019s death.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Critics, including one of nine Albuquerque councilors, say the ordinance targets what people might do, not what they\u2019ve done, and contend that is wrong.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

But Albuquerque<\/st1:city> and Las Cruces<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> are both aware of the dangers that can result from mentally ill people going untreated. Highly publicized incidents in both cities in 2005 led to innocent deaths.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Currently in New Mexico<\/st1:place><\/st1:state>, judges can\u2019t force mentally ill people to take medication or enter into long-term treatment, with one exception: They can order evaluations and treatment for mentally ill defendants found to be incompetent to stand trial.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Proponents of Kendra\u2019s Law say that, by then, it\u2019s usually too late to stop a crime that could have been prevented.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Versions of Kendra\u2019s Law, named after a woman who was pushed in front of a subway train by a mentally ill man, are in place in 42 states. State Rep. Joni Gutierrez, D-Las Cruces, proposed such a law in this year\u2019s legislative session. Gov. Bill Richardson and U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici held news conferences to announce their support for the bill, but the legislature failed to approve it.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The City of Las Cruces<\/st1:city> might want to consider adopting an ordinance similar to the one approved in Albuquerque<\/st1:city><\/st1:place>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Albuquerque City Council has done what the New Mexico Legislature failed to do last year \u2013 create a law allowing judges to order treatment and medication for mentally ill people. The council approved what\u2019s called \u201cKendra\u2019s Law\u201d Monday night, according to the Albuquerque Journal. Before ordering care, a judge would have to determine whether […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-594","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=594"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}