A Tarrant County Jail inmate whose mother says he should not have been locked up because of an intellectual and developmental disability has been released and transferred to a state assisted living facility.
Kai’Yere Campbell, 21, spent six months in the Tarrant County Jail but didn’t understand why, his mother Shantel Taylor said.
“He is a child who cannot understand the adult world,” Taylor said in a statement to the Star-Telegram. “But now he is being punished by the legal system for behavior that is a symptom of his developmental disability.”
Taylor says her son has the cognitive ability of an eight-year-old.
Campbell was arrested in December on charges of assault on an elderly person, which occurred at a group home. When police were called to the incident, group home staff asked officers to take Campbell to JPS Health Network for treatment. Instead, he was taken to the county jail, Tarrant County Commissioner Alissa Simmons said.
“Kai’Yere is now in an environment where he should have been in the first place and not in the prison where he was taken after experiencing an episode at his group home and running over a worker,” Simmons said in a statement Friday .
Although Campbell was deemed incompetent to stand trial and sent to a mental health facility, authorities said in May there was no room to send him anywhere.
Simmons says Taylor is relieved and grateful her son has been released from jail.
“I am grateful to United Fort Worth and the Texas Jail Project for bringing Kai’Yere’s case to my attention so that I could assist in expediting his transfer from the Tarrant County Jail to a facility equipped to handle the to provide proper care for his disability,” Simmons said.
Campbell was taken to a residential center in Mexia, Texas.
The person who allegedly attacked Campbell was a 72-year-old nurse at a group home where the 21-year-old lived. However, the nurse never wanted charges to be filed against Campbell, United Fort Worth organizer Pamela Young told the Star-Telegram.
Taylor and Young previously asked the Tarrant County Prosecutor’s Office to drop charges against Campbell, emphasizing Campbell’s need for care and not punishment.
‘While I’m glad to see him [Campbell] gets the support he needs, I reiterate my call for Tarrant County District Attorney Phil Sorrells to use the power he has, known as prosecutorial discretion, to dismiss the charges against Kai’Yere point,” Simmons said in the statement. “Then, and only then, can Kai’Yere Campbell and his family find peace while he receives the care he needs.”
