Heroic Lawyer Discovers Abuses In Federal Prisons: Horrible Stuff Documented In My New Book

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“After he ate his finger, they were taking him out of his cell and one of the officers asked him what his finger tasted like.”

(4-25-23) My new book: No Human Contact: Solitary Confinement, Maximum Security, and Two Inmates Who Changed the System, goes on sale today and while it documents the stories of two prisoners who were held for decades in complete isolation, there is a chapter about how the federal Bureau of Prisons mistreated seriously mentally ill prisoners at its most secretive, maximum security prison.

I fear the inhumanity at the ADX in Florence, Colorado, which became public only because of a landmark class action lawsuit that ended with the federal government promising reforms, is not that uncommon in many jails and prisons where individuals with severe mental illnesses are easy targets.

Ed Aro forced govt. to improve mental health care in prisons

This excerpt is a tough read, but necessary for those of us who love someone with a serious mental illness. It also is a warning and a tribute to Edwin Aro, a lawyer who took on the government.

NO HUMAN CONTACT: Solitary Confinement, Maximum Security and Two Inmates who Changed The System. By Pete Earley, Copyright, Pete Earley Inc. PublisherKensington Publishing.

Edwin Aro was not an activist attorney. His specialty at the Denver office of Arnold & Porter, one of the country’s largest and most prestigious law firms, was corporate litigation.  The Colorado native had a reputation for coming in late to multimillion-dollar lawsuits between large companies and helping his clients turn a losing hand into a winning one.

His bosses asked him in 2011 to investigate a complaint by an ADX inmate who had been diagnosed with a serious mental illness. Under the BOP’s own regulations, prisoners with severe psychiatric problems were never supposed to be housed in the Super Max because of the austere, isolating living conditions there.

Aro and another lawyer drove to the prison expecting to find one or two mentally ill prisoners who had simply slipped through the cracks. Minutes after meeting inmate Richie Hill, the attorneys realized they were dealing with a much larger and alarming problem.

“Hill was a lunatic,” Aro said later in an interview. “He was not medicated and was completely insane and almost incoherent. It was impossible to spend five minutes with him and not realize how sick he was.”  Aro found talking to Hill disconcerting because he’d tried to gouge out one of his eyes with his fingers causing his eyes to look in different directions.

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Childbirth Caused Rage, Depression: Podcast Interview Examines Mental Health & Having A Baby

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(4-13-22) Dr. Nicole Washington and my good friend and nationally recognized mental health advocate, Gabe Howard, recently interviewed Jessica Ekhoff, on his popular podcast, INSIDE BIPOLAR as heard on Healthline Media podcast.

I posted a blog last year about Jessica’s book, Super Sad Unicorn: A Memoir of Mania, that describes her experiences after giving birth to her first child. I believe this is an important topic.

Ekhoff describes her experience with postpartum-onset bipolar disorder, mania, and psychosis, rare – and even more rarely discussed – mental health complications of having a baby.

Thanks Gabe for discussing this important topic on your show and sharing it with me. Here’s the interview:

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Advocate Creates ‘Patients Not Prisoners’ Non-profit, Using My Book To Spark Community Discussion

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(4-11-23) A few months ago, I was contacted by Lisa Taliaferro, who was launching a new non-profit called Patients Not Prisoners based in St. Augustine, Florida. She’d read my book and wanted to use it to help draw attention to the inappropriate incarceration of Americans with mental illnesses.

What I didn’t know at the time was that Lisa Taliaferro, who has mental illness in her family, is an energetic and tireless advocate. Within a few weeks, she had gotten her fledging group off-the-ground and had begun planning community events.

I was excited last night to speak via Zoom to the first meeting of a book club that Lisa started. The group is studying, CRAZY: A Father’s Search Through America’s Mental Health Madness and hopes to use it to create discussions about why jails and prisoners have become warehouses for the seriously mentally ill and what communities can do to change this trend.

The zoom based book club is free and will meet every Monday from now until May 15th. Lisa wasn’t content just with starting a single book club. She developed a free study guide to use with CRAZY that can be downloaded and she is offering advice about how to start book clubs that will feature CRAZY and other books focused on mental illnesses and law enforcement.

“Patients Not Prisoners‘ goal is to bring communities and first responders together to create and capitalize on empathetic solutions to bridge the gaps of our current systems,” she told me.

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Creativity and Mental Health: 3 Musicians Sing About Their Struggles In Powerful Videos Worth Watching

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Emmy Villa Atchinson’s original song is poignant and powerful.

(4-7-23) When Emmy Villa Atchinson’s grandmother sent me a Youtube of Emmy singing an original song about her teenage years, I was awestruck.  My son, Kevin, uses music to describe his experiences, as does Andrew Neil. All three talented artists are using music to tell important stories about mental illnesses.

Emmy Villa Atchinson – Everyone is worthy of help.

A college student at the University of Missouri at Kansas City, Emmy Atchinson told me why she shared her music.

Everyone is worthy of help. I think a big roadblock for me in the mental health recovery process was feeling like I was able to get help, but undeserving of it. I was not undeserving, and neither is anyone else who feels that way. My therapist told me that it doesn’t matter if a person is drowning in 2 feet of water or 20 feet; they’re still drowning and they need help. It may feel like your problems aren’t important enough or that you yourself feel inherently unimportant, and that’s a very scary and isolating feeling. But everyone’s feelings are valid and their life is valuable. Everyone deserves happiness. There was a point in my life when I thought I wouldn’t be alive at 20. I’m so glad I was wrong. When I say that I hope to see another year, I truly mean it. I wouldn’t have been able to say that if I hadn’t decided I was worthy of help.

Bravo Emmy! You can learn more about Emmy and her music here.

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U.S. Senator Openly Discusses His Depression – Courageous Candor That Challenges Stigma

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(4-4-23) Thomas Eagleton was forced to resign as George McGovern’s presidential running mate in 1972 after Eagleton acknowledged that he’d been treated for depression. This Sunday on CBS Sunday Morning,  Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) told Jane Pauley (who has written about her own mental issues) about his debilitating depression. In this editorial, The Washington Post rightly praises Fetterman for disclosing his struggle. Another step forward against stigma and shame.

 John Fetterman shines a light on dark days and nights

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April 3, 2023 at 4:28 p.m. EDT
John Fetterman at a news conference on Nov. 9, after winning a U.S. Senate seat representing Pennsylvania. (Joe Lamberti for The Washington Post)

Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) on Sunday offered a moving and exemplary profile in courage, one that could help millions of other Americans by defying the stigma on mental illness.  In an interview broadcast on CBS’s “Sunday Morning” with Jane Pauley, the senator described in raw, personal terms how he had confronted depression and checked himself in for treatment following his victory in the marquee race of the 2022 election.

Mr. Fetterman, then Pennsylvania’s lieutenant governor, suffered a stroke last May, and his health became an issue during the campaign. Declaring he was fighting for everyone “that ever got knocked down,” he defeated Mehmet Oz, the celebrity television host, for the Senate seat. Then, a dark cloud appeared to envelop him after Election Day.

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Born Bad or Made Bad? Did Years Of Abuse As Kids Turn Thomas Silverstein and Clayton Fountain Into Killers? Genetics/Choice?

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“Sitting silently thinking and screaming 4 freedom from this constant insanity and endless solitary confinement.” Drawing by Thomas Silverstein about being in isolation for years. (Copyrighted Pete Earley Inc.)

THIS IS THE LAST DAY to enter the GoodReads giveaway to win a free copy of No Human Contact. Click here.

(4-3-23) Were Thomas Silverstein and Clayton Fountain born bad or did they become bad because of the childhood physical abuses inflicted on them, including the savagery and depravity that each endured as youngsters and later in prisons? 

Silverstein was physically abused by an alcoholic and vicious mother who relentlessly beat him. Fountain’s mother shot him with a pistol in the leg and his Marine father would dispatch him into the woods to be stalked during a sick game before beating him. Both men murdered correctional officers. Silverstein was accused of committing three other violent murders while in prison. Fountain committed four additional killings.

Was this violent behavior linked to years of abuse?

Silverstein and Fountain are not the only men born into violent homes, who endured corporal punishment when it was common practice in schools, and who were sent to youth correctional facilities and ultimately prison. Few commit multiple murders.

In this excerpt from my new book, NO HUMAN CONTACT: Solitary Confinement, Maximum Security, and Two Inmates Who Changed the System, Silverstein describes his twisted love/hate relationship with his abusive mother.

NO HUMAN CONTACT by Pete Earley, available April 25th.

     “No mommy! No!”

    The five-year-old lifted both hands to block the leather belt that his mother was swinging. It slapped into his bare thighs and he screamed.

    “You wet the bed!” she hollered, lifting her belt and again hitting the child cowering in front of her.

     She grabbed a paper cup. “Pee in here,” she yelled.  

     Sobbing, he dropped his yellow stained white underwear to his feet and peed into the cup.

    “Now drink it! You drink it or I’ll swat you again. You’re going to drink every drop every time you pee in the bed!”

     “Mommy don’t make me drink my pee pee.”

      He yelped when she struck him again. He raised the cup to his mouth.    — One of Thomas Silverstein’s first vivid memory of his mother, Virginia.Click to continue…