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DeKalb County Probate Court Judge Bedelia Hargrove said she had no idea that when she began organizing a mental health symposium several months ago, it would be conducted less than two weeks after a jury convicted a police officer of aggravated assault in the shooting death of a naked, mentally ill man.

"It was a complete coincidence" said Hargrove, who initially planned to holding symposium at a smaller venue but gladly accepted when told the Manuel Maloof Auditorium, which also serves as the meeting room for the DeKalb County Board of Commissioners, was available.

It was a good decision: there were no open seats left for Friday's symposium, which included a number of judges, lawyers and mental health professionals as panelists. Attorneys attending were eligible for continuing education credits, but the audience also included many nonlawyers, including service providers, mental health advocates and activists.

Panel topics included mental health diagnoses and community resources, how to handle emergency commitment requests and orders to apprehend, and adult guardianships of individuals with mental health problems.

But the topic for the day's second discussion seemed particularly prescient: "The Nexus Between Mental Health and the Criminal Justice System" allowed panelists to explore the difficulties of dealing with defendants suffering from mental health issues and the opportunities getting them into treatment programs can offer.

DeKalb County Magistrate Judge Rhathella Stroud, who presides over the county's misdemeanor mental health court, and moderated the panel, said about 1 in 25 people suffer from severe mental illness.

Such individuals are both 10 times more likely to be arrested than an average citizen, and 10 times more likely to be a victim of crime, Stroud said.

The stress is not only debilitating for those enduring mental illness, but it also places grinding pressure on their families, she said.

"They finally burn out; they can't take it anymore," Stroud said, often either calling the police to simply get some peace or throwing a relative whose behavior has grown uncontrollable into the street.

Assistant DeKalb County Assistant Solicitor General Denienne Steele said the provisions to get into and remain in the mental health court's program, which is available to offenders who have confirmed mental health issues and are not accused of serious violent crimes, can be daunting for someone suffering from schizophrenia or a similar affliction.

"Just getting them stable for a whole year is an accomplishment in itself," Steele said.

Newton County probate Court Judge Melanie Bell, a former prosecutor, said judges and prosecutors should embrace the availability of programs to help the "not-so-violent people, the not-so-desperate people—they're the ones that need our help."

Noting that she helped set up the county's drug court, Bell said that, while there were similarities, there are also marked differences.

While drug court graduates can get clean and stay sober, "our participants are not going to stop hearing voices; they're not going to stop being schizophrenic," she said. Only medication and treatment can accomplish that.

There is often a reluctance on the part of family members to admit someone has a problem or to call the police, panelists said.

Steele said there needs to be "some in-between stop" for people having an episode that spurs a call to the police.

"When an officer shows up, they have nowhere to take them except jail or Grady, and the officer often has to stay there for hours," she said.

Jail is even worse, she said, "because people with mental health issues can go crazy just being in jail."

"There needs to be a mental health crisis center to keep them for evaluation," she said.

The shooting of unarmed, mentally ill veteran Anthony Hill by DeKalb County police officer Robert Olsen did not come up in the discussion. But after his death in 2015, there was much discussion on how the officer could not have known the young man running toward him was having a psychotic episode.

Retired DeKalb County police Major K.D. Johnson said more training for officers is essential.

"On a daily basis, police officers get called to the same location for the same individual who hasn't taken their medication," he said.

A responding officer has a duty to protect the people in the home as well as the individual causing the disturbance, he said.

"They're saying, 'Oh, he's OK, he has a hammer but he's not going to hurt anybody.' That puts the officer in a bad situation," Johnson said.

DeKalb County does have mobile crisis teams available to assist in such situations, but they must be summoned and are not available 24 hours a day, Johnson said.

When he was on the force, Johnson said, an officer was assigned to identify and photograph individuals whose mental health problems had required their response, "so we'd know these persons may have issues."

Johnson said DeKalb officers now undergo 40 hours of training in how to handle individuals with mental health issues, but more is needed.

As the panel concluded, DeKalb CEO Michael Thurmond stepped forward to express his gratitude for the symposium and the work of those in attendance and to offer his own experience.

"My late brother older brother suffered from schizophrenia throughout his entire adult life," Thurmond said.

Recalling the desperate calls to emergency numbers to deal with his sibling, Thurmond said it was "frustrating for me, somebody who claims to be an influential person, to realize there was nothing I could do."