LA County Supervisors vote to adopt 'Laura's Law'

LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- Los Angeles County supervisors have voted to adopt a measure known as "Laura's Law" on Tuesday. The measure allows court-ordered treatment of severe mentally ill people.

Individual counties have the authority to adopt the California law named for 19-year-old Laura Wilcox, a mental health worker fatally shot by a client outside a clinic in 2001.

Advocates for the mentally ill were split.

The board's 4-0 vote allows the Department of Mental Health to implement an Assisted Outpatient Treatment program, conducting community outreach to identify chronic mentally ill individuals in need of treatment, and also approves funding for more slots in existing mental health treatment programs.

Supervisor Gloria Molina said the county needed tools to help the chronic mentally ill, but stressed that cases would have to be carefully evaluated.

"We don't want to go back to the days when people were hospitalized at harm to themselves," Molina said, but added, "Many of the people who need these kinds of things don't necessarily volunteer."

City News Service contributed to this report.