More than 10.74 million people globally are detained in penal institutions. An estimated 40% to 90% of these detainees suffer from mental illness. This makes the prevalence of mental disorder in detainees extremely high compared with the general population (18% to 29%). As a consequence, defendants and detainees with mental illness are not ‘yet another vulnerable group’ that should be ‘taken into account’ in developing laws and policies On the contrary, they are a dominant force and t...