Judge Steven Leifman awarded the 2018 Pardes Humanitarian Prize in Mental Health

Abstract

The Brain & Behavior Research Foundation announced Sept. 5 that Judge Steven Leifman has been awarded the 2018 Pardes Humanitarian Prize in Mental Health for leadership in reducing the number of people with mental illnesses in jails and prisons. The award recognizes an individual or organization whose extraordinary contribution has made a profound and lasting impact by improving the lives of people suffering from mental illness and by advancing the understanding of mental health. Judge Leifman is a national leader in solving the complex and costly problem of people with untreated mental illnesses involved in the criminal justice system. In 2000, he launched a pioneering initiative in Miami‐Dade County called the Eleventh Judicial Circuit Criminal Mental Health Project, which steers people with mental illnesses, who do not pose significant threats to public safety, away from the criminal justice system and into community‐based treatment. The award will be presented at a ceremony in New York City on Oct. 26.