We Mad Climb Shaky Ladders

JAIL IS THE LAST THING THAT MENTAL PATIENTS NEED, AND TOO OFTEN, IT IS THE VERY LAST THING THEY EXPERIENCE. Please join our effort to decriminalize mental illness. No one deserves to be punished for having a disability.

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We Mad Climb Shaky Ladders, by Pamela Spiro Wagner

(LaurelBooks) [Paperback] Amazon.com

"The poet's ability to examine her behavior is both edifying and harrowing." ~Baron Wormser

http://www.amazon.com/Mad-Climb-Shaky-Ladders-LaurelBooks/dp/1933880104

Pamela Spiro Wagner is an accomplished writer, artist and poet who has mental health challenges. She shares her experiences in her poetry and http://wagblog.wordpress.com/author/wagblog/ - the link for her pupular blog.


After a lifetime of psychiatric disability, Pamela Spiro Wagner co-authored DIVIDED MINDS: Twin Sisters and Their Journey Through Schizophrenia (St Martins Press, 2005) with her identical twin sister, Carolyn S. Spiro, MD, a psychiatrist. There are now and have always been people like Pam who made valuable contributions to society despite mental illness. No one deserves to be incarcerated for having a common, treatable health condition.

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Bipolar Disorder? Schizophrenia? Manic Depression? Alzheimer's? Dementia? PTSD? Post Partum Depression? Autism? See who else has/had mental disorders:

Buzz Aldrin (astronaut) • Adam Ant (musician) • Ludwig van Beethoven (composer) • Napoleon Bonaparte (political leader) • Tim Burton (artist, director) • Lord Byron (poet) • Dick Cavett (television journalist) • Winston Churchill (politician) • Charles Dickens (author) • DMX, Dark Man X (Earl Simmons) (musician, actor) • Robert Downey Jr. (actor) • Richardy Dreyfuss (actor) • Patty Duke (actress) • Ralph Waldo Emerson (author) • Carrie Fisher (Actress, writer) • Larry Flynt (publisher, activist) • Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald (Writer) • Connie Francis (singer) • Stephen Fry (actor, comedian writer) • Peter Gabriel (musician) • Alan Garner (novelist) • Matthew Good (musician) • Philip Graham (publisher, businessman) • Macy Gray (musician, actor) • Graham Greene (English Novelist) • Ivor Gurney (English composer, poet)• Sean LeVert (singer) • Patrick Kennedy (Congressman) • Elvis Presley (singer, actor) • Britney Speers (singer) • Somebody you love!

DogJustice Blog is a place for the mentally challenged and their family members and professional service providers in the psychiatric, drug rehabilitation, and legal fields to meet and share information with the public. Please use the blue "follow this blog" icon to be notified about posts by people in your community who need assistance and to learn about goods and services that are available. Help decriminalize mental illness by inviting your friends. Remove barriers to adequate care and legal services to eliminate incarceration and homelessness and greatly reduce the necessity for hospitalization. Contact me at MaryLovesJustice@gmail.com , phone 678.531.0262, and/or comment in the comments field below. If you are interested in becoming a co-host for DogJustice site, a contributing member, or an advertiser, please state your interest. Advertisers pay a nominal quarterly fee, and your ads stay online indefinitely. Non-advertising members join free and are asked to regularly post the DogJustice links for your stories and those of other members in social media. Working together, we will reduce the stigma associated with mental illness, relieve suffering families, and replace imprisonment with adequate care.

JAIL IS THE LAST THING THAT MENTAL PATIENTS NEED, AND TOO OFTEN, IT IS THE VERY LAST THING THEY EXPERIENCE. Please join our effort to decriminalize mental illness. No one deserves to be punished for having a disability.

Rodriquez Nelson: 56-yr sentence for domestic altercation

Mary Nelson's heart endured too much stress when her son was victimized by the injustice system due to his inappropriate conduct caused by mental illness. She suffered a heart attack during her son's first ordeal as a domestic violence defendant. Mary said she expressed concern to her son's girlfriend soon after meeting her. Rodriquez Nelson was an eligible bachelor in his mid-twenties, but Mary knew he was unable to handle a romantic relationship and the demands of fatherhood. Mary explained to the young woman several times that Rodriquez was mentally challenged, and she detailed his psychiatric history. Rodriquez's story is in this article, which has nine(9) links.

Dog Justice needed for Rodriquez Nelson, a retarded, mentally ill man

sentenced to 56 years in prison because of a domestic dispute; no lasting injuries

A petition link will be added the week of March 20, 2012
Mary Nelson - email address mary0771@att.net  - Phone number (870) 703-6626
Please share this link to Rodriguez's story http://goo.gl/0s27x

The romance between Rodriquez and the young woman happened despite his mother's concerns, and they had three children together. Rodriquez continued to live with his mother. He was unable to meet his girlfriend's expectations, and their relationship was tense at times. Rodriquez was arrested on domestic violence charges twice in incidents that were a year apart. There were no lasting injuries from either fight the couple had. The second time they fought, Rodriquez received a 56-year-sentence. Rodriquez and Arkansas taxpayers are paying dearly for Rodriquez's offense, which arose because of his mental incapacity. Physical altercations between couples should not happen, but they are common. Most men and women are released in days after domestic violence, if an arrest occurs at all. Rodriquez's 56-year prison sentence is excessive. He has already been imprisoned one year for the physical altercation he and his girlfriend had, but he still has 55 years remaining. The facts of the case are presented in fifteen(15) numbered paragraphs below:

1. Age 32, unmarried black male
2. June 2011 - date of imprisonment
3. 56-year sentence
4. Charges: domestic violence, aggravated residential burglary, child endangerment - Nelson had a physical altercation with his children's mother. There was no burglary, according to inmates' mom. The child endangerment charge was added because the couple's children were present in the home while the altercation happened.
5. Nelson and his girlfriend have three daughters - age 7, twins age 3
6. Nelson's public defender had him plead guilty to all charges. He and his mother thought the guilty plea was in exchange for a light sentence, but apparently that was not the case
7. Nelson was born with retardation and was diagnosed as being mentally ill at an early age
8. He has the mentality of a person age 12 or less; illiterate
9. Social security since childhood - total disability
10. Nelson's first domestic violence offense occurred a year before, in June 2010. He was arrested and released; he received no follow-up regarding psychiatric treatment the judge ordered
11. After the second incident in 2011, Nelson was sent to a mental hospital for one month before imprisonment
12. East Arkansas Regional Unit - general population
13. ADC Inmate Population - Nelson's prison number is 150296
14. Nelson's girlfriend objects to Nelson getting a 56-yr sentence for the altercation they had
15. Mary Nelson reports that her son is kind and gentle and does well when he takes his medication properly, but like many mental patients who are not under a mandate to continue treatment, he lapsed

Mary Nelson would appreciate your help: email address mary0771@att.net phone (870) 703-6626. A petition for Rodriquez Nelson will be posted at this site. Compare Nelson's sentence to the sentence served by a San Francisco B.A.R.T. officer who shot an unarmed, fully subdued young man named Oscar Grant on January 1, 2009. He served 11 months in prison. Rodriquez Nelson, his mother and girlfriend ask for your prayers and support on a petition to REMOVE EXCESSIVE SENTENCING FOR RODRIQUEZ NELSON. Mary Nelson requests legal assistance. She feels that her son should not have been induced to sign a guilty plea and sentenced to 56 years in prison for his offense.

Rodriquez Nelson - Arkansas http://goo.gl/TL7is 

Ouachita River Correction Unit

Expected date of release is listed as 06/05/2031

These are the facts of the case concerning Mr. Nelson according to his mother. Mary spelled her son's name "Rodriguez," but the "g" is a "q" on the Arkansas DOC database, so I changed it in this article. 

See a short film about dogs who receive no care. Medicaid insurance was removed for inpatient psychiatric hospitals in the 1970s, and the nation's first private prisons were established as hundreds of thousands of mentally ill Americans were released from hospitals without provisions for subsistence assistance and continuous psychiatric treatment. This made our communities less safe, added billions per year to America's prison costs, and wrongly penalizes people for having a common, treatable health condition. Acute mental patients in America who are indigent or middle class and unable to pay for psychiatric health care have a plight similar to thrown-away dogs, but they lack animal rights protections. Abuse, murders, homelessness, suicides, and imprisonment are common outcomes, even for veterans suffering from post traumatic stress syndrome.



Unfortunately, 1.25 million of America's inmates are mentally ill. They generally serve longer prison terms than other inmates and often have their sentences lengthened after imprisonment due to their lack of understanding of and inability to comply with prison rules. Roughly 60 percent of inmates in cruel solitary confinement are mentally ill. Prisons have basically replaced mental hospitals and community care in America, although the expense is staggering. PEW reported that incarceration costs were over $50 billion per year in 2009. The estimate rises to around $300 billion per year when factoring in police services, court costs, and attorneys for indigent defendants. Assisted outpatient treatment programs reduced arrests, hospitalization, homelessness, and imprisonment by over 85% among New York program participants compared to their rates three years before program participation. AOT program participants receive subsistence assistance if needed and mandated psychiatric monitoring. Precisely because imprisoning rather than treating mentally challenged Americans is lucrative for prison owners and investors, cyber censorship is applied to online work to decriminalize mental illness. Like all successful human and civil rights advocacy, rendering Dog Justice for Mentally Ill people has opponents. Please use the comment field below to express your opinions and notify us if any of the nine(9) links herein fail.

For more information, please contact Rodriguez Nelson's mother or Mary Neal. This is an advocacy article by
Mary Neal, Director of Dog Justice for Mentally Ill http://DogJusticeforMentallyIll.blogspot.com

Director of Assistance to the Incarcerated Mentally Ill http://www.care2.com/c2c/group/aimi

Website: Wrongful Death of Larry Neal http://WrongfulDeathOfLarryNeal.com

Please share the Nelsons' story using this link http://goo.gl/0s27x

JAIL IS THE LAST THING THAT MENTAL PATIENTS NEED, AND TOO OFTEN, IT IS THE VERY LAST THING THEY EXPERIENCE. Please join our effort to decriminalize mental illness. No one deserves to be punished for having a disability.

INVITATION: Dogged out mentally challenged people, families, friends, human and civil rights advocates, and the community are invited to join DogJusticeforMentallyIll blog and post your stories and viewpoints  at no cost. Notify me at MaryLovesJustice@gmail.com or by phone 678.531.0262 if you would like to publish your story or observations about mental health care.
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PROFESSIONALS: Limited memberships are reserved for advertisers. See a complimentary Salvation Army ad at this link http://goo.gl/00BgK (the next blog). Post up to two public service ads per quarter for a nominal fee. Tell Dog Justice members and the world about your second chance act, substance abuse program, counseling and treatment center, adult day care, psychiatry practice, law firm, church missionary outreach program and prison ministry, book regarding prisons or mental health (other ads will be considered). Ads remain online at Dog Justice blog unless you request removal. DogJustice blog members continually publish this blog address online as they seek to help themselves and other members, meaning that your ads will enjoy wide visibility indefinitely. Working together, we can decriminalize mental illness in America and end health discrimination.

MENTAL HEALTH THERAPY SAVES LIVES AND MONEY

Help Amber Alvarez, PTSD Veteran

Amber Alvarez's grandmother asks for your help on her petition for her grand daughter, a veteran who suffers from mental illnesses, including post traumatic stress disorder, alcohol/chemical dependency, and postpartum depression. She petitions the authorities to allow Amber to enter Kane County Drug/ Mental Health Court. Please endorse her petition at Change.org http://goo.gl/7Ssjo - Thanks for your help. Please read, sign, and share the petition below. Amber's petition is followed by an invitation for you!

Dog Justice for the Mentally Ill

Chief of Police, The Aurora Illinois, USA Police Department: Allow Amber E. Alvarez to enter the Kane Co. Drug/Mental Health Court.

Change.org Petition by C.S. Ralls of Plano, Illinois: Petitioning the Aurora Illinois Police Department, Kane County Illinois State's Attorney's Office, et al., to allow my 33 year old daughter, Amber Elaine Alvarez (an Army veteran, a single mother with NO PRIORS who has a dual diagnosis of chronic postpartum and clinical depression and an alcohol/ chemical dependency she acquired in the Army at age 17), to be diverted into a chemical dependency rehabilitation center where she can receive the appropriate medical care.

At 16 years old, Amber scored the highest out of all her peers on the Military Entrance Exam and was hand-picked for service as a Linguistic Specialist at the prestigious Foreign Language Institute, Monterrey, CA. As others who have also served in this capacity can tell you, this is an incredibly demanding, stressful post where drinking is encouraged by all. She was a minor and the Army was supposed to take care of her! They were her guardian! Now, she finally has a chance to get the help she needs that the Army did NOT give her but these entities will NOT do the right thing! Help us please!

It was a combination of the alcoholism, clinical depression and full-blown postpartum depression that landed her 3 children in my care. I don't know if my daughter is guilty or not of anything but I do know she is being treated unfairly! Persons who have the exact same non-violent charges and even WORSE are routinely diverted into drug and/or mental health court. Many of these are repeat offenders who have a Public Defender but, the majority of them are those who can afford bail and a private attorney.

If Amber is convicted of a felony, she will not be able to live with and/or visit her 3 minor children who live with me in our federally subsidized home EVER. Basically, this conviction, and not receiving the appropriate treatment, would exacerbate Amber's depression (and suicidal ideation), as well as, condemn her to carrying that felony conviction for the rest of her life even though she has NO PRIORS. This would permanently place Amber at an insurmountable disadvantage in this economy to become employed, to provide a home and thus, be reunited with her children as a family. [ Please help by signing the petition http://goo.gl/7Ssjo ]

If she is sentenced to the Illinois Department of Corrections instead of a rehabilitation center, this will inflict more psychological and emotional harm upon these 3 beautiful, young children. They need and want their mother so very badly. Please, won't you assist my 3 grandchildren in their fight to get their mother the help she needs so she can come home to them?

THE WAR ON DRUGS IS REALLY A WAR ON THE POOR!   [Please add your name to the petition to try Amber in Mental/Drug Court http://goo.gl/7Ssjo Then pass the petition on to your friends. Thanks for helping Amber have Dog Justice for the Mentally Ill]

Furthermore, I am a chronically ill single grandmother with disabilities who really needs my daughter, Amber, to be able to live with us here in our home. This conviction would have many more deeper, far-reaching consequences that are totally unfair, unjustifiable and disproportionate under these circumstances:

NO PRIORS, A VETERAN & A SINGLE MOTHER OF 3 YOUNG CHILDREN WHO NEEDS MEDICAL CARE *NOT* INCARCERATION. PLUS, IT WOULD NOT COST THE STATE OF ILLINOIS TAXPAYERS A DIME AS THE DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS WOULD PAY THE COSTS OF HER REHABILITATION STAY. THE FOLLOWING IS THE ANNUAL COST OF FEMALE INMATE INCARCERATION AT DWIGHT CORRECTIONAL FACILITY AS OF 8/31/11:

Dwight Correctional Center
Opened: November 1930
*Operational Capacity: 1,212
Maximum Security Adult Female
*Current Population: 1,018
Average Age: 34
Average Annual Cost Per Inmate: $33,977.00

*As of 8/31/2011. Reflects bed space capacity analysis as outlined in the October 1, 2011 Quarterly Report to the Legislature.

OTHER COUNTIES HAVE VET COURTS, COOK, McHENRY, LAKE, MADISON, ETC, BUT NOT KANE. WHY??

Please add your name to the petition to try Amber in Mental/Drug Court http://goo.gl/7Ssjo- Then pass the petition on to your friends. Thanks for helping Amber have Dog Justice for the Mentally Ill. Change.org Petition's Full link http://www.change.org/petitions/chief-of-police-the-aurora-illinois-usa-police-department-allow-amber-e-alvarez-to-enter-the-kane-co-drug-mental-health-court

Share Amber's story on this web page: "Help Amber Alvarez, PTSD Veteran"
http://dogjusticeformentallyill.blogspot.com/2012/03/help-amber-elaine-alvarez-ptsd-vet.html

YOU ARE INVITED TO JOIN DOG JUSTICE BLOG AS A REGULAR BLOG MEMBER OR AS AN ADVERTISER. ADS ARE BEING ACCEPTED FOR DOG JUSTICE BLOG. ADVERTISE YOUR RE-ENTRY PROGRAMS, CLINICAL SERVICES, BOOKS, AND LEGAL SERVICES IN THIS BLOG. LIMITED COMMERCIAL MEMBERSHIPS ARE AVAILABLE FOR A NOMINAL QUARTERLY FEE. YOU MAY POST TWO PUBLIC SERVICE ADS PER QUARTER THAT WILL REMAIN ONLINE EVEN IF YOUR MEMBERSHIP EXPIRES OR YOU REQUEST THE ADS REMOVED. PEOPLE ARE LOOKING FOR YOUR EXPERTISE RIGHT NOW. JOIN DOG JUSTICE BLOG AND MAKE IT EASY FOR PEOPLE WHO NEED YOU TO FIND YOU! JOIN TODAY AND PLACE ADS THAT SHOW HOW YOUR SERVICES CAN HELP DECRIMINALIZE MENTAL ILLNESS, REDUCE HIGH RECIDIVISM RATES, OR HELP OTHERS UNDERSTAND MENTAL ILLNESS. LAWYERS, TELL US HOW YOU CAN HELP MENTALLY ILL PEOPLE AVOID LONG PRISON SENTENCES AND/OR HELP FAMILIES AFTER WRONGFUL DEATHS AND POLICE OR PRISON VIOLENCE.

FREE MEMBERSHIP FOR EVERYONE WHO DOES NOT PLAN TO ADVERTISE, INCLUDING ALL DOGGED OUT MENTAL PATIENTS AND THEIR FAMILIES AND FRIENDS. JUST JOIN AT THE BLUE "JOIN THIS BLOG" BUTTON ON THE TOP, RIGHT. CONTACT ME WITH YOUR STORY AND I WILL POST IT FOR YOU: MaryLovesJustice@gmail.com Phone 678.531.0262 - Visit Assistance to the Incarcerated Mentally Ill at http://www.care2.com/c2c/group/aimi - Share DogJustice with your friends to help the families you read about here, please http://dogjusticeformentallyill.blogspot.com/ - Your comments are invited below and at any of Mary Neal's blogs. Visit also my FreeSpeakBlog, JusticeGagged, and MaryLovesJustice. Homelessness, Prison and Death Cease Being America's Answer to Mental Illness. Thanks for visiting, caring, and sharing! Become a bridge back to wholesome living for America's mentally ill and their families. Blessings!

Bridge in the Mist, by Morningjoy