In a timely town hall meeting, Sacramento County Sheriff Jim Cooper and District Attorney Thien Ho gathered to discuss a troubling trend regarding California’s mental health diversion program, a system designed to divert those with certain mental health disorders away from jail and into treatment. However, both Cooper and Ho are raising alarms about the program’s increasing misuse by criminal defendants attempting to evade accountability for serious offenses.

The pair has voiced strong concerns over the program’s current provisions, specifically advocating for significant reforms that would exclude child abuse cases from eligibility. Their calls for change stem from alarming reports of individuals leveraging the mental health diversion option to dodge the repercussions of their actions, e

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