Mentally Ill on Death Row in USA

Great news! Ohio did not kill Abdul Awkal, the mentally ill man who was scheduled to be executed June 6, 2012. The governor granted him a two-week stay. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/07/opinion/a-stay-of-execution.html "Mr. Awkal, who was convicted of killing his estranged wife and brother-in-law in 1992, has a long history of severe mental illness and has been found mentally incompetent by three courts in the past 20 years." Abdul is so sick that he thinks he is a main adviser for President Obama and former president George Bush. Abdul believes he collaborates with the CIA and runs the nation's operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. That is very sick, and I hope they put the poor man in a mental hospital like they used to do with sick people.

America has 1.25 million mentally ill inmates. Texas has at least two mentally ill people on death row: Andre Thomas and Jeff Wood. Read about Jeff Wood at one of a few articles I wrote about him:
"Scheduled for Texas Execution: Jeff Wood, a Mentally Challenged Young Man"
http://www.nowpublic.com/world/scheduled-texas-execution-jeff-wood-mentally-challenged-young-man

Some of Jeff's family members wrote comments to the article. Jeff was sentenced to death under the "law of parties." That means the State of Texas knows Jeff never killed anyone. In fact, officials know that Jeff was not even at the scene of the murder. Jeff was a retarded teen, and a cunning friend got Jeff to drive with him to a store. The man went into the store while Jeff waited in the truck like he had been told. He robbed and shot the store manager. Poor Jeff is on death row, although Texas already executed the shooter in that robbery.

See the Petition for Andre Thomas launched by Assistance to the Incarcerated Mentally Ill at this link    http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/No-Executing-Mental-Patients/

Target: Governor Rick Perry

• Sponsored by: Assistance to the Incarcerated Mentally Ill

ANDRE THOMAS, an acute mental patient on Texas Death Row, pulled out his only eye and ate it on January 9.  An officer at the Polunsky Unit found Thomas in his cell with blood streaming down his face and took him to the infirmary.  The schizophrenic inmate had already eaten his left eye in 2004 while in jail awaiting trial after killing his wife and two young children before stabbing himself in the chest. 

Following the murders, this sick man walked to the Sherman Police Department and told a dispatcher what he had done.  Thomas explained that he cut his family's hearts out and put them in his pocket.  He then took his family's hearts home and put them into plastic bags.

A judge subsequently ruled that Thomas was competent to stand trial.
Bobbie Peterson-Cate, Thomas' trial attorney, said, "He is insane and mentally ill."
We, the undersigned petitioners, hereby make the following demands:

1)  Andre Thomas must be immediately removed to a secure mental hospital and prohibited from eating any more of his body parts; and 

2)  Andre Thomas and all other condemned persons with a history of mental illness must be immediately and permanently rendered ineligible for capital punishment and reassigned to mental institutions for permanent containment and psychiatric treatment.

We strongly object to imprisoning people because they are mentally disturbed and executing people whose criminal offenses were caused by mental illness.
Thank you.