Adam Ward, a Bipolar American, Executed in Texas: Bernie Sanders Objects

Make an immediate #humanrights demand that no persons with diagnosed mental illnesses should be executed in the USA. Make Adam Ward America's last disabled victim. https://www.usa.gov/elected-officials >> Ward was a 33-year-old severely bipolar man. He was killed by the State of Texas on March 22, 2016, during Passion Week. Like most execution victims, Ward was killed in the Bible Belt. The fact that his murder happened during the week when we commemorate the torture and wrongful execution of Jesus Christ underscores the hypocrisy of capital punishment and the urgency to end State murders, especially of mentally ill people.

The Huffington Post recently ran a story entitled "Bernie Sanders Speaks Out Against The Death Penalty After Hillary Clinton Stands By It." Senator Sanders said, "I believe it is time for the United States of America to join almost every other Western, industrialized country on Earth in saying NO to the death penalty." We at Assistance to the Incarcerated Mentally Ill ("AIMI") concur, and that is another reason why we endorse Sanders for president in 2016. Unfortunately, some people disagree that sick people should be spared from executions. Below is part of a conversation regarding capital punishment of mentally ill people from my Facebook wall:

Terry Harris I feel horrible about mental illness, however if they kill then they should be executed like everyone else!

Like · Reply · 1 · 21 hrs

Walt Stawicki i don't know where to start ripping that one apart.

Unlike · Reply · 2 · 20 hrs

Assistance to the Incarcerated Mentally Ill Define "everyone else," please, Terry Harris. Then please cite a case where a murderous #police officer or wealthy person was #executed in the USA. Thanks.

Supporting Sanders for president is one way to express your disapproval of capital punishment. We congratulate Bernie Sanders and everyone who can #FeelTheBern for our victories in the Alaska, Washington, and Hawaii primaries. We urge officials everywhere to say DEATH to the death penalty.

Condolences to the family and friends of Adam Ward and Ward's victim. It is likely that if Ward had received timely, adequate treatment for his mental illness, both he and his victim might still be alive. Our most vulnerable citizens are continually killed by untrained and/or sadistic police and corrections officers or by State executions. AIMI finds this completely unacceptable. Articles throughout "Dog Justice for Mentally Ill" blog prove that avoidable tragedies are caused by the denial of treatment and the fact that mentally ill people in crisis are allowed to refuse treatment unless and until they PROVE themselves to be an immediate danger to self and others. Then they are jailed if they live through their lunacy arrests. AIMI believes that such rules were not made to protect civil rights but to increase prison profits, resulting in 1.25 million mentally ill prisoners in America today.

Mainstream media can no longer ignore the correlation between mental illness being denied treatment and prison profiteering. Mary Sanchez wrote an op ed that was published in the Kansas City Star:
"A scary truth: When businesses see profit in prisoners with mental illnesses"
http://www.kansascity.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/mary-sanchez/article66940237.html

"And there’s growing public awareness that we’ve let our jails and prisons become warehouses for people who need treatment — and needed it long before they took a criminal turn. Incarceration rates are dropping. To most, this is good news. But it’s not if your business model revolves around keeping people locked up."

It is good news that Sanders has also taken a stance against private prison profiteering by joining other officials to introduce a solution. H.R. 3543, "Justice Is Not for Sale Act," pending before Congress now. would eliminate government contracts with private prison companies. Period.

Read more about Sanders' stance against the death penalty by Mollie Reilly in the Huffington Post 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bernie-sanders-death-penalty_us_56326622e4b00aa54a4d48ff

Note that media companies publish op eds by Mary Sanchez and not Mary Neal because Sanchez is white and the government did not kill her brother during a secret arrest (kidnapping). Nevertheless, the truth is going mainstream. Mass arrest and murders of mentally ill people continue under the color of law, whether their deaths are reported like Ward's or covered-up like Larry Neal's. See my Facebook page for Easter Week 2016 for information about other deaths (some of them secret) among people who were mentally ill or suspected of being under the influence. 

https://www.facebook.com/marylovesjustice

We hope you had a pleasant Easter, if you celebrate that holiday, and that you will take action to prevent more executions, especially of mentally ill citizens, in the USA. 

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Thank you for giving Assistance to the Incarcerated Mentally Ill.

It would be illegal to keep a dog in a tight space 23 hours a day and gas or Taser him for barking. It would be illegal to put a dog in deadly restraint for control. That happens to mentally ill people routinely in the nation's correctional facilities. What happened to Larry Neal? Why are we still asking that question after nearly 13 years? Cover-ups regarding the wrongful deaths of mentally challenged inmates and free people in the USA are common and vile.

Mentally Ill People Deserve Dog Justice!

http://DogJusticeforMentallyIll.blogspot.com

Mentally Ill Americans Need Dog Justice. Treat mental illness medically, not legally. 
(1) Support the H.R. 2646 "Helping Families in Mental Health Crisis Act." The U.S. congressional bill provides for crisis intervention team (CIT) training for police and corrections officers, assisted outpatient treatment (AOT) programs (subsistence assistance plus mandated treatment) to stop recidivism, resumption of Medicaid insurance for certain facilities, and other needed changes. 
(2) Support "AIMI vs. USA" to compensate mentally ill people and their families for health discrimination. 

(3) Support Bernie Sanders' bill H.R.3543 to end contracts with private prison companies. 

AIMI for Bernie Sanders in Michigan

ATTENTION, MICHIGAN AIMI FAMILIES, if you think presidents have no power regarding America's mental health care system, consider the damage done by President Ronald Reagan in closing mental hospitals without provisions for community treatment and subsistence assistance for tens of thousands of psychiatric inpatients he released, including some who had been hospitalized for decades. Their deinstitutionalization without proper provisions for continued treatment and subsistence gave rise to today's tragic denials of treatment, which usually end in incarceration. Today, 1.25 million of America's inmates are mentally ill. Closing hospitals without providing for continued care of former psychiatric inpatients caused patients, families, and communities to suffer. And still we suffer, although over $100 billion per year of tax dollars is spent to continue mass incarceration.

Many former inpatients wandered homeless on our streets after Reaganomics closed mental hospitals, and even in 2016, America's chronically homeless population are mostly persons with mental illness and substance abuse issues. Some former inpatients starved to death after "deinstitutionalization" or were burned to death in vacant houses and abandoned warehouses. Others died from neglect of physical diseases, and some were killed by police‬ during lunacy arrests, but most were arrested for vagrancy or panhandling. Once arrested, mentally ill citizens' sentences are lengthened if they "disobey" prison rules they don't understand. Yet, taxpayers saved nothing when hospitals closed or reduced services because Medicaid insurance would no longer pay for inpatient psychiatric services.

Working class people simply cannot afford private psychiatrists and care centers, but we can rely on Bernie Sanders. The Washington Post wrote, "Michigan's primary Tuesday is critical for Bernie Sanders. The state is offering 147 delegates, the most since Texas. (Mississippi is also voting Tuesday.) Michigan's middle-class, union-voter makeup has the potential to play to Sanders's strengths."

Assistance to the Incarcerated Mentally Ill urges voters to elect only people who have proved their devotion to human rights, like Senator Sanders has. Read some of his platform stances below:
~ Sanders is against the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP). TPP is expected to negatively impact U.S. workers and limit Americans' use of Internet services.
~ Sanders is against racism and always has been. He was arrested as a 21-year-old college student at Chicago University for demonstrating with Blacks for better educational opportunities.
~ Sanders is against privatizing prisons and jails. He and others in Congress introduced H.R.3543 in September 2015, the "Justice Is Not for Sale Act." If it passes, our local, state, and federal government will be barred from contracting with private prison companies, and predatory pricing on prisoners' phone calls, etc., will end.
~ Sanders would raise minimum wage.
~ Sanders would give free tuition for qualified students and lower the interest on student loans.
~ Sanders is for universal healthcare.
~ Sanders voted AGAINST the Iraqi War.
~ Sanders voted against the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) in October 2015.

~ Sanders is for unions and workers' rights.
~ Sanders is censored like AIMI is, and his supporters are apparently censored. News reports largely ignored the fact that demonstrations supporting SANDERS FOR PRESIDENT were held in from 45 to 70 cities throughout the nation before Super Tuesday.

Voters have a duty to consider which candidates are likely to positively impact their families and communities as well as the nation as a whole. For AIMI members and all middle class and poor families with mentally challenged loved ones, it won't matter if our elected officials have wombs or a certain complexion or religion or ethnicity. It may not matter as much as we think it does which political party the candidates represent. What matters is whether we elect representatives who care about what we constituents consider our main concerns. For people who have alcohol/drug addictions and/or mental illness or relatives with those issues, we must elect someone who will address the problem of privatized prisons, jails, and probation services. Bernie Sanders has already done that by introducing the H.R.3543 "Justice Is Not For Sale Act." Sanders walks his talk. Learn how he voted on other matters. Sanders' voting record is online at "Vote Smart." https://votesmart.org/candidate/key-votes/27110/bernie-sanders/47/military-personnel

Mary Neal, a/k/a MaryLovesJustice, (678)531-0262, MaryLovesJustice@gmail.com, Wrongful Death of Larry Neal http://WrongfulDeathofLarryNeal.com/main.html, Director of Assistance to the Incarcerated Mentally Ill, Human Rights for Prisoners March, the Davis-MacPhail Truth Committee (an anti-death penalty organization), and "Human Rights Demand" radio channel at Blogtalkradio.