Remember James Boyd.

The 2014 murder of James Boyd, Albuquerque, NM. 

"I have never and nor do I today seek to unjustly persecute any other human being in any given context. This is simply not my character, bottom line. But at that same time, I have a known history in terms of public interest advocacy and activism, one that far predates my diagnosis of serious mental illness. It is thus apropos that I now seek opportunity to identify issues that I know to be harmful to the welfare of the ASH patient community. Likewise, in terms of cultural and societal discrimination against persons affected and disabled by mental illness cross the board, I am more then willing to stand against whatever elements of this area of prejudice I feel contributes to the issue. 

This is the least I can do, I feel, given my education, strengths and attributes, and the privileges I have been afforded as an American in this day in age.  It blows my mind- even today- how deeply corrupted the realm of public mental health care is, in graphic defiance of established and known history about just how deeply persons affected have been abused and harmed, arguably since the dawn of documented evidence to the effect."

(From our article  published on September 17, 2018) 

On March 16, 2014, a homeless man, James Boyd, affected by serious mental illness, known as such by both local law enforcement (Albuquerque, police Department- "APD"), as well as state health department officials (James had been repeatedly treated in several New Mexico psychiatric facilities, including NM State Hospital, Las Vegas, NM), was illegally camped on the SE outskirts of Albuquerque, NM. Nearby homeowners, none of whom stated any actual conflict with James, had complained about his presence there (although his campsite was over 1/4 mile away from any nearby neighborhood) to local authorities on more then one occasion.

The subsequent police response led to what many residents of the city characterize as murder. James, holding a four inch table knife at this side while remaining in one specific position no less then 50 feet from all involved officers, was clearly in a psychotic break triggered by the overly aggressive behavior of the those officers, which as the above photo shows, numbered at six, all of whom had their weapons aimed at James as he expressed clear confusion and lack of understanding about what what was actually going on. 

For no justifiable reason, officers fired on James with both assault style rifles, shotguns, and revolvers, hitting him fourteen total times. He did not die immediately, rather, began moaning and writhing in pain, leading officers to release a police dog as a further means to control James, in spite of him never actually posing clear risk of harm to those officers. 

During the period 2011-2014, Albuquerque police were responsible for at least 23 arguably unjustified killings of Albuquerque citizens, over half of whom were known to be affected by serious mental illness. This general crisis, more then somewhat typified by the killing of James Boyd, led to a US Department of Justice investigation that determined APD's policies and directly associated lack of training amounted to deeply abject form of overuse of deadly force.

This also led to the formation of the citizen represented group, APD Forward in June, 2014, which I was able to take part in at that time. Knowing as I did that persons affected by mental illness were disproportionately at risk of being killed by local law enforcement was the primary impetus to my taking serious interest in it all. Again, the least I can do in this phase of my life.

While I had been away for over a decade, New Mexico is my home. I attended both high school and college in Albuquerque, as well. As such, it was a sickening thing indeed to return and come upon this debacle after having spent time in Arizona's sole long term public mental health care facility, Arizona State Hospital. Where, as I have extensively written about for the last six years, psychiatric physicians and administrators act in tandem and in complicity with state health care officials in order to get away with violations of law and policy. They engage in this egregious misconduct on the simple basis of persons affected and disabled by mental illness under their direct care, or lack thereof. Which, as it turned out following several state and federal legal proceedings, , Albuquerque police also got away with in relation to the murder of James Boyd. Sickening.

IN CLOSING: It is alarming to say the least for anyone of reasonable intelligence that someone like Dr. Steven Dingle with the responsibilities- and power quite frankly- associated with the care needs and rights of persons disabled by mental illness has been accused if not found guilty of egregious misconduct. This extends as well to ASH's chief quality control officer, Lisa Wynn, and it only follows, any number of other employees at ASH who have not yet been identified as miscreants. The most shining example of this issue, of course, is Roger Forney, was was hired by ADHS despite his known record as a sexual predator of children. 

Abuses of power are precisely what we are witnessing at this time. Personified no better then when ASH CEO Dr. Aaron Bowen very aggressively violated the first amendment rights of an ASH patient who raised his or her concern about Dingle's public record a sexual abuser of women working under his direct authority, and the willful attempt of ADHS attorney Greg Honig who in clear complicity with ADHS Director Dr. Cara Christ attempted to strike that incident record from the minutes of November, 2017, meeting of the ASH Human Rights Committee (now known as the ASH Independent Oversight Committee).

How much more attention might it take to get these people in alignment with their distinct obligations specific to the public trust? To hell with law and policy, in context, it is humanity that we are talking about herein. 

Get With It, Already! 

 paoloreed@gmail.com