Mental Health

Trouble in Mind

Mental health benefit and submachine guns -- the perfect combination

Suicide Mission

Shrink to Fit

When Mental Health Services, Inc. went out of business, no one was around to help the therapists who were hurt.

A Badly Altered State

A judge may force Colorado to take care of its homeless mentally ill population.

Call Me Crazy

When the accused reject a not-guilty plea, Colorado's insanity law breaks down.

Teach Your Children Well

The state is finding ways to treat behavioral problems when they first appear -- in daycare.

Letters to the Editor

From the week of October 5.

Follow That Story

Order in the Court

A Chemistry Experiment

The Denver Drug Court tests a formula for reclaiming addicts.

A Hospital Without Walls

Denver’s Court to Community program is showing promise.

Toast of the Town

Denver C.A.R.E.S. picks drunks off the streets, then puts them right back out there.

The Good, The Bad & The Mad

What happens to the mentally ill in the justice system is just crazy.

This Is Crazy

Stan Israel spent two days in a psych ward. There was just one little problem.

Killer Instinct

After Michael Tate lost all hope of a family life, he found the Devil.

You Do the Meth

Police raids bust up drug labs. But they also bust up families.

Head Games

At least one out of every five Colorado prisoners is mentally ill -- some violent, some undetected or untreated. How did the Big House become the Bug House?

Follow That Story

Wild Child Revisited

Depressed About Anti-Depressants

Big Pharma explores the dependency on mood-altering drugs.

The Centers of the Storm

Are we having funds yet?

Nowhere Boy

His biological parents didn't want him -- but to get him the help he needs, his adoptive parents must give him up.

Looking for a Fix

Forty bucks buys a flicker of heaven and a life of hell.

The Shifting Drug War

The pendulum is swinging back from stiff mandatory sentences for drug offenses.

Mind Games

The squeeze in managed mental-health care is choking patients and providers alike.

A Mile High

Trick or treatment?

Suicide Watch

Can a 24-hour crisis hotline put callers on hold? The state will get back to you on that.

The Wide World of Grief

Colorado has become one of the country's hubs for teaching, and learning, how to feel bad.

Freudian Hips

Rosanna Gamson's multimedia show examines the source of mental illness.

Head Case

A lawsuit is driving DU's Graduate School of Professional Psychology crazy -- or was it already?

Letters

A lawsuit is driving DU's Graduate School of Professional Psychology crazy -- or was it already?

The Big Fix

A new detox program for heroin abusers storms into Denver. Methadone proponents are irked.

Used and Abused

What's it like to work at the state's largest detox? These counselors were scared straight.

Fill'er Up

In Trinidad, you don't have to drink in bars in wind up behind bars

Mental Anguish

Rescuing the mentally ill has brought millions to the Mental Health Corporation of Denver--as well as complaints of coercion, mismanagement and neglect.

Letters

Rescuing the mentally ill has brought millions to the Mental Health Corporation of Denver--as well as complaints of coercion, mismanagement and neglect.

The Committed

The state pours millions of dollars--and controversial social theory--into a prison for mentally ill felons.

OUT OF SIGHT, OUT OF MIND

CLOSING THE HIGHLANDS BOARDING HOME PUT SOME OF DENVER'S MENTALLY ILL RESIDENTS ON THE ROAD TO A BETTER LIFE--AND LEFT OTHERS OUT IN THE COLD.LOST IN BEDLAM FOR MANY OF THE HIGHLANDS 100, DENVER'S PLAN TO RELOCATE THE MENTALLY ILL HAS BEEN A MOVE TO OBLIV

LETTERS

CLOSING THE HIGHLANDS BOARDING HOME PUT SOME OF DENVER'S MENTALLY ILL RESIDENTS ON THE ROAD TO A BETTER LIFE--AND LEFT OTHERS OUT IN THE COLD.LOST IN BEDLAM FOR MANY OF THE HIGHLANDS 100, DENVER'S PLAN TO RELOCATE THE MENTALLY ILL HAS BEEN A MOVE TO OBLIV

Stan Garnett: Colorado has mishandled the medical-marijuana issue

Stan Garnett and Jann Scott: e-mail buddies?​Beware of sending an e-mail to Jann Scott. The longtime public-access gadfly (profiled by yours truly back in 1992, prior to the launch of our online archives) tends to forward his correspondence to anyone and everyone -- and that's precisely what h ... More >>

Supermax showdown: Don't confuse us with facts

"We were lucky that day": Colorado Department of Corrections Sgt. Bill Nelson describes responding to a 2007 inmate attack on Limon staffer Pam Kahanic (left).​At first glance, the idea of tapping into the badly stretched state budget for a few million to open one wing of a new supermax prison ... More >>

Medical marijuana fight: Health department lobbies against MMJ use in treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder

Photo by John J. Kruzel, courtesy of the U.S. Defense DepartmentThe use of the lifelike simulator shown here has been approved for PTSD treatment.​Update, 4:00 p.m.: Representative Sal Pace's amendment relating to medical marijuana and post-traumatic stress disorder has been defeated, and the ... More >>

Medical marijuana: Chris Romer wants to raise the age for MMJ patients requiring two doctor recommendations to 23

Chris Romer's adding a couple of years to his proposal.​Senator Chris Romer is the sponsor of Senate Bill 109, a measure that aims to clarify the relationship between doctors and medical marijuana patients. It was approved by the Senate in February. Last week, however, Romer admitted to being ... More >>

Troy Anderson: Mentally ill inmate sues state over decade in the hole

Troy Anderson hasn't been exposed to direct sunlight since 2000.​Troy Anderson knows he's never going to get out of prison alive. He's spent 23 of his forty years on the inside, and though he's never killed anyone, he's currently serving a 75-year sentence on multiple counts for two shootouts ... More >>

Denver Health breaks ground on a new adolescent psych unit

​Denver Health broke ground this week on a four-story building that by late next year will be home to an adolescent psychiatric facility. Although the psych ward's new digs won't be a whole lot bigger, Denver Health officials say they will be a lot better. In terms of hard numbers, the facili ... More >>

Supermax opening in Colorado: Is lawsuit-filing Troy Anderson on "the list" to move there?

Troy Anderson​This week, without much fanfare and after months of budget-related delays, state officials opened one wing of Colorado's second supermax prison, designed to hold "the most disruptive offenders" who have "demonstrated the inability to function at a less secure facility." The mov ... More >>

Denver brings meth addicts and cops together in an unprecedented fight against drugs

Troy Anderson​This week, without much fanfare and after months of budget-related delays, state officials opened one wing of Colorado's second supermax prison, designed to hold "the most disruptive offenders" who have "demonstrated the inability to function at a less secure facility." The mov ... More >>

Solitary confinement study "deeply flawed," says ACLU

​As reported here last summer, a controversial state study suggesting no harmful psychological effects from solitary confinement was drawing heated protests from prison activists even before it was published. Now that it's been released, psychiatric experts and the ACLU of Colorado are saying ... More >>

Mentally ill prisoners in solitary confinement: New bill seeks to stop the madness

​Roughly four out of every ten prisoners in solitary confinement in Colorado is either developmentally disabled or mentally ill, a figure that's been rising steadily over the past decade. Senate Bill 176, headed for a statehouse committee review later this week, seeks to drastically reduce tha ... More >>

Boulder Youth Body Alliance: Teens to lobby Congress to improve eating-disorders treatment

Big pics below.​Tomorrow, Vally Dikovitskaya and seven other members of the Boulder Youth Body Alliance (BYBA), a program dedicated to helping teens with body image concerns and eating disorders, will be in Washington, D.C. They're hoping to convince Colorado officials to co-sponsor the Federa ... More >>

Heidi Hafenstine talks about art as therapy and her Goddess Project

​Most people stopped practicing art in grade school, and according to Heidi Hafenstine, that's why art therapy works so well for adults. Art, according to Hafenstine, offers a form of communication that taps into the subconscious. Because unlike language, most adults have lost their mastery an ... More >>