The lawsuit, announced Wednesday, represents a fresh escalation of the dispute over Washington’s mental health system, which has bedeviled state officials and lawmakers for years. Despite two court orders roughly a decade ago requiring better care and hundreds of millions of dollars put into the system since then, the state has struggled to provide care for individuals with mental health issues.
King County Executive Dow Constantine said in the statement that people in the criminal legal system who also have mental health concerns have been failed repeatedly by the state of Washington.
Filed in Pierce County Superior Court, the legal challenge deals with what are known as “civil conversion” patients,
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