As hurricane Irma was downgraded to
a 6o mph swirling tropical storm, blowing through the Atlanta area (where I
currently reside), I was hunkered down in my house, working on records
and evidence needed to hopefully procure legal representation for my brother, who’s
been at the Oklahoma Forensic Center (OFC) in lovely Vinita, OK, since November
14, 2016 - awaiting competency for trial.
I felt cooped up in my house,
having battened down the hatches, gotten flashlights/batteries and candles at
the ready, and having all devices fully charged in case of a power outage.
When I have to spend most of my day
working at this computer and copier, with mounds of paperwork, I usually step
outside and trim a bush, or pull some weeds, or lie in the hammock and
decompress for a few minutes, staring at the sky, and just …breathing. Because I have that option. I need those breaks to keep my head
clear, and my heart from aching too much.
Today I realized, even though I was
feeling “trapped” in my house, head buried in ink cartridges and binders and
flash-drives and sticky notes, I’m not for “real,” trapped. For REAL trapped is what my dear
brother had to endure for one hundred and eleven days last year. That’s right: 111. Over three and a half months in
SECLUSION at David L. Moss, Tulsa County Jail, prior to being deemed
incompetent and being sent for a new bout of forced drugging at the
OFC/Vinita.
Anyone that grew up in Oklahoma
knows “Vinita” as the place they send “those” people. Tell me I’m wrong.
Because, I remember thinking it myself, and hearing others talk, as I
grew up. Vinita is a dirty word in
Oklahoma. And, my brother having
been sent there several times since 1991, Vinita has changed, but not for the better. OFC used to be called Eastern State
Hospital (ESH). But if you hadn’t
heard, there are no long-term hospitals any more. I get that, but now there’s JAIL, instead. Lovely.
More on that at a later date.
ESH then became OFC, the
“jail/hospital” where they send the “criminals”, either NGRI, or those they’re
attempting to medicate into a state of enough wherewithal ONLY to answer the
seven competency questions correctly, to “assist in their trial”. The director of OFC told me, that their goal is not to “cure” these suffering souls. Their goal
- in the penal system, which OFC is - is to get those seven dastardly questions
answered right, so they can be sent to more criminalization. LOVELY. But I digress...
No, my feelings of being cooped up
here working hard for a cause so monstrous and medieval, is NOTHING compared to
the 111 days of SHEER TORTURE my brother, who has a label of mental illness,
had to survive. And survive it, he
did. He’s the strongest person I
know. 111 days of solitary
confinement, without being allowed a book to read, only a couple of hours each
week seeing the outside of his private, enclosed cell. Alone. Detoxing cold-turkey off the neuroleptic drugs that had been
force-injected over and over again in the months prior to his arrest. An arrest that was during a delusional episode
brought on my the Abilify our mother warned the facilities that Jeff could not
tolerate, and told them of his past reaction to this specific drug, having been
the scariest days of his life.
Abilify does NOT help my brother.
It destroys him. It’s
actually an opioid. Wrap your head
around that one, in a state with an opiod epidemic. UGH.
Abilify almost destroyed my mother,
too, because Jeff’s former experience on this RX a decade ago, had him for the
first time ever thinking he wanted to kill our mother. Thank God Jeff escaped back then, to Massachusetts,
because he loves our mother and his new thoughts frightened him. So he left Oklahoma to get away from
Abilify, and the thoughts it was giving him. That’s also another story for another day. So so many
stories. But in 2016, prior to his arrest on July 26, Mom told the facilities
of these facts. She begged them
not to use this drug on him. But
she was ignored, as always.
Then today, as the news was
reporting power outages across Atlanta, and as I was making calls and printing
copies, something positive happened.
I got a call from someone I had left a message for last week. A top attorney in New York City
returned my call, and when I told him about our main issues, his response was swift: “Solitary confinement is torture,” he
asserted. He went on to say it’s
torture after just one or two hours, much less 111 DAYS! And yes, he is going to see what he can
do to help us. It was so nice to
hear someone that GETS IT…unlike the notebook full of attorneys I’ve called in
Okahoma over these past 12 months, most who don’t think solitary confinement is
like “getting beat up, or raped or killed”. I was asked time and time again on those lawyer calls, “what
would I have them pursue?”
WHAT?! “Don’t you get it?”
I would think… “Are you not
human? What if it were YOUR
brother?” I had told every one of
them about the articles I had read online about solitary confinement being
WORSE THAN PHYSICAL abuse. But no,
these lawyers in Oklahoma that I checked off my list, were recommended, but
none of them understood it the way the NYC top-notch attorney does. This is a problem.
My brother was held completely
ALONE for over three months, while detoxing from forced chemical brain
concoctions, making him more psychotic in the name of “treatment”. After two months, the jailers tased him
after these experiences created more psychosis.
We have a great case. And we are finally hopeful, because of
folks like the lawyer I spoke with today, and another that called me last week. And this one IS from Oklahoma. FINALLY. HOPE IS ALIVE!
It will take the RIGHT team of
lawyers to show all the others how wrong they were. And the broken spirit and angry sister in me wonders how
those lawyers in Oklahoma that didn’t think solitary is on the level of
physical abuse, how THEY’D do being forced into a room, alone for 111
days? Am I evil for wondering
this? The answer is, NO ONE would
fare well. EVERYONE would get
worse. But after segregation, the
system THEN sent him to lovely Vinita, where he is to this day. He is still being force medicated. Nauseated every single
day. Filled with fear and anxiety
like we cannot imagine. But do me
a favor, and try to imagine it. Difficult as it is to think of, it will give you empathy, and
that’s always a good thing.
We’re only human, as are all those
attorneys that don’t get it. But
it’s time they understood…for humanity, for families, for their home state,
which is on the verge of being the world’s bigger jailer. Not good, Oklahoma. A major mind-shift needs to
happen. And this story is just
one, of many. But THIS story will
tell the tale and (we hope) will be a catalyst for MUCH NEEDED CHANGE.
So, my little pity party of being
“alone” in MY HOUSE even for one day during a withering hurricane, having the freedom
to work on this case for my beloved brother…shame on me. Jeff doesn't have that freedom. It’s my honor, and I will carry
on. My mom has been an example of
fighting against all odds for her dear son for almost three decades, and my
brother deserves no less from me.
So, this family now fights in solidarity.
Solitary confinement must end.
There is no place in modern times for anyone to be tortured in this way,
especially the fragile minds of those deemed “mentally ill.” It’s inhumane and evil. I mean, what year IS THIS??
So backward… Let’s move forward, shall we?
#ForJeff #NeedNewKindOfHospital
#Mindshift
#SolitaryIsTorture
2 comments:
Thank you, Jackie.
You, too :)
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