Shot With Pepper Spray: The Grim Reality For Prisoners With Mental Illnesses

     A California inmate refuses orders that require him to take anti-psychotic medication for his mental disorder. After he smears his own excrement inside his cell, the attending psychiatrist and correctional officers decide to remove him forcibly from his cell and give him an injection. The officers order him to extend his hands through the cell’s food slot so that he can be handcuffed and when he ignores them, officers spray his cell with OC spray, commonly called pepper spray. He still refuses so they shoot additional bursts directly into his face and on his body until he finally submits.

He is finally forced from his cell and knocked to the floor. He is taken to another cell where he is strapped onto a gurney with all of his limbs bound.

This thirty minute record of the incident may be difficult to watch if you have a mental illness or love someone who does. But the procedures that it documents are actually carried out in a much more humane and professional manner than what I observed in the Miami Dade County jail when I did my research for my book.

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U of Arkansas Picks CRAZY For “One Book, One Community” Discussion


Two minute video about event

From University of Arkansas Newswire

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – The intersection of the America’s mental health care system and it’s law enforcement system is the subject of Crazy: A Father’s Search Through America’s Mental Health Madness, by reporter, novelist and non-fiction author Pete Earley, this year’s selection for the University of Arkansas ‘One Book, One Community’ project.

“Recent tragic events such as those at the Sandy Hook Elementary School, the Washington Navy Yard, and most recently near the U.S. Capitol are all reminders of the serious problems this country faces in terms of mental illness and treatment,” said Kevin Fitzpatrick, co-chair of the One Book, One Community committee. “Recent history shows that these issues can touch any one of us, at any time, with terrible results. Pete Earley’s book details a personal story and goes on to examine what he finds to be a seriously flawed system. We on the committee hope this book will inspire a local discussion to begin dealing with these issues.”

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Va Gov. Candidates Say They Favor Mental Health Reform; Sadly One Is Helping Promote Stigma

 

In the hotly contested race for Virginia governor, The Washington Post quizzed the candidates about their positions on mental health. This is one of the first times that I have seen a major news organization ask candidates about mental health during a general election and not in the aftermath of a mass shooting. I am happy the media is finally including mental health in its list of  important campaign issues.

Now the bad news.

Backers of the Democratic candidate in the race are broadcasting an especially ugly, stigmatizing television ad.

 

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A Reader Complains: You’re Insulting Me By Writing About Jails, Prisons, and Homelessness: I Am Not Like Them

angrywriter

Dear Mr. Earley,

Why do you always assume mentally ill people either are homeless or in jail?

That’s insulting.  I have a serious mental illness but hold down a job, have a family and am dong fine. If I break the law, then I deserve to go to jail. If I end up homeless it will be because I’m lazy and don’t work or because I don’t take my meds.  Either way, it will be my fault.

People with mental illnesses should be held accountable and treated no differently from anyone else. To do otherwise is to promote stigma and make all of us look like we are criminals or bums.

Sincerely

Alan M.

Dear Alan M.,

I am thrilled that you are doing so well. When my son was sick, I ached for success stories such as your’s. I wanted hope. I wanted to know that persons with severe mental illnesses could and do recover and live regular lives. Please share your personal story with others, especially those who are struggling, because they need to be inspired.

Sadly, I do not agree with much else that you have written.

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FROM MY FILES FRIDAY: Where Are We Housing Individuals With Mental Illnesses? Too Often In Slum Housing!

slumhouses

FROM MY FILES FRIDAY:  Regular readers might have noticed that I didn’t post an original blog on Monday this week. That is because I have been in the hospital with my mom who is 94 and is undergoing testing for severe pains in her back. I hope to get back on schedule next week. Thanks for your patience.

Meanwhile, here is a blog that first appeared on May 9, 2011, and unfortunately is still germane. The more that I have traveled, the more convinced that I have become that  providing adequate housing in a community to persons with sereve mental illnesses is crucial to their recovery. Sadly, what they often get is substandard treatment in slum dwellings.

FROM SHODDY HOSPITALS TO SHODDY HOUSING

The main reason why I wrote CRAZY was to expose how thousands of persons with severe mental illnesses are being locked-up in jails and prisons because of inadequate community services and laws that require a person to be dangerous before they can be helped.

To me, the incarceration of persons whose only real crime is that they have become ill is a national scandal.

Of course, not everyone with a severe mental disorder in Miami, where I did my research, ended up in jail. When I did my investigation, there were 4,500 persons with severe mental disorders living in 650 boarding homes, called Assisted Living Facilities.  At one time, most of these folks would have confined in state hospitals. Now they are in the community — which is wonderful.

Wonderful, that is,  until you explore the conditions under which many of them are living today.

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Video Shows Dallas Cop Shooting Man With Mental Illness

http://youtu.be/4U1GOTzvBLQ

I have received dozens of emails from readers who are outraged by this video and news story. Most are asking if the public will feel the officer was justified simply because he shot someone with a mental illness even though this individual did not make any threatening moves toward the police. 

This shooting terrifies those of us who love someone with a mental illness or have a mental illness. I’ve been asked to help this video go viral so that the public will recognize the need for better police training. Please do your part and send it out.

You can also read the AP story that I have added to this blog

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