Better Mental Health Services For Local Inmates?

restraint chair

Daniel Robayo, rector of Emmanuel Episcopal Church, and I had a productive meeting with Rockingham County Sheriff Bryan Hutcheson and Lieutenant Steven Shortell on Monday to discuss the following:

1) How can our community support an increase in the number of hours and personnel available to provide much needed mental health services to jail inmates, including enlisting professional mental health volunteers if necessary?

2) How could an expanded staff help provide alternatives to the use of the restraint chair and the isolated padded cell when dealing with mentally ill and suicidally depressed persons?

3) How could the jail and/or the Community Services Board better respond to numerous concerns expressed by inmates who reporting problems accessing medications as prescribed?

Uses of Restraint Chair and Isolated Padded Cell (January 1 through June 30, 2012)





Unlike the above photo, our local jail does not strip inmates who are confined to their restraint chair, but when suicidally depressed or incorrigible inmates are placed in the isolated padded cell for similar safety or medical (suicidal) reasons they are stripped of their clothing and given only a paper gown to wear. While there they have no access to reading material, mattress, pillow, blanket, or eating utensils. A hole in the floor serves as a commode.



We can understand the occasional need for such restraint or confinement for incorrigible inmates, but the primary purpose of Monday’s meeting was to discuss more humane ways to treat mentally ill and suicidal detainees.



We had recently asked for, and kindly received, documentation from Sheriff Hutcheson’s office about all uses of the jail’s restraint chair and padded isolation cell from January 1 to June 30, 2012.
 Their report showed there were 19 cases of mentally ill persons (usually suicidal) being confined to the restraint chair during that time, an average of three per month. In restraint, belts and cuffs have the prisoner's legs, arms, and torso immobilized.



In an additional 8 cases inmates were in restraint for things like “were intoxicated,” “wouldn’t listen,” “were bouncing off the walls,” or who were otherwise seen as possibly harming themselves. The average time spent in the chair for these 27 persons (for medical and these other reasons) was four hours, with the shortest time being two hours and the longest ten hours.      



In addition, there were 22 other reported cases of the chair being used for inmates demonstrating violent behavior and who were considered potentially harmful to others. Some of that number may also have been suicidal, but this was difficult to determine because many were under the influence of alcohol or other drugs. The average time spent in the chair in these cases was six hours, with two hours being the shortest time and 24 hours being the longest.
     


As to the isolated padded cell (the “rubber room”), there were 7 cases of it being used for medical reasons (inmates deemed suicidal) during this six-month period. In an additional 13 instances an ordinary segregated cell was used and a guard assigned to regularly check to make sure the prisoner did no harm to him or herself. Here the inmate does have access to a Bible, mattress, blanket and a commode.



Segregation cells are used routinely for disciplinary purposes in jails and prisons, and sometimes for the protection of an inmate who is in danger of being harmed by his or her cell mates. Such sentences to the “hole,” for either the prisoner’s protection or for in-jail violations, may be for weeks at a time.
     


In all fairness, extreme overcrowding at our local jail, along with challenges of limited budget and personnel have Sheriff Hutcheson and his staff stretched to their limit. Our jail, built for 208, is double bunked and typically houses from 325-375 inmates, some having to sleep on the floor. As a result, jail staff feels they have few choices at times but to resort to the use of the restraint chair, segregated cells, and even to the dreaded isolated padded cell. They do report, however, a definite trend toward fewer uses of such measures.



Current Medical and Mental Health Resources

Our local jail has a contract with Southern Health to provide one or more nurses on site around the clock to meet the medical needs of inmates. In addition, a retired MD from Staunton is available on a very part-time basis.

For mental health needs, the jail contracts with our local Community Services Board to provide a Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner for 2 1/2 hours once a week and two professional mental health counselors for a part of two days per week and to be on call for emergencies.

Two very part time volunteer chaplains are also available for male inmates and one for female detainees.

Ongoing Challenges

Over the past year a number of concerned citizens in our community have been meeting to explore alternative sentencing options and other ways of reducing jail overcrowding, as well as brainstorming better ways of dealing with mentally ill and suicidally depressed inmates. 

One idea is to assign such persons to regular segregated cells with trained volunteer mental health providers or interns taking turns being next to the cell and relating to that person until he or she is able to be returned to general population. Such volunteers, coordinated by the CSB, could also be useful in the booking area, where persons may be kept for as long as 24 hours (occasionally longer) until they are sober and can be appropriately assigned to regular population.



In this holding area, inmates are normally not allowed a mattress, pillow or blanket for fear they may attempt to harm themselves, and are typically denied their medications during that time, especially if they are intoxicated.



I believe a community like ours can work together to provide more effective and humane treatment of our incarcerated citizens. Monday’s meeting gave us new hope that together we might be able to make that happen, with Sheriff Hutcheson suggesting in his last email that “the CSB is a primary factor in this matter of discussion”. 



Check out the following links for more background information: 



http://harvyoder.blogspot.com/search?q=can+we+make+this+dream+come+true


http://harvyoder.blogspot.com/2012/03/some-reflections-on-tuesdays-forum.html

http://www.nmha.org/go/position-statements/24

P. S. SAVE THIS DATE: A community forum is being planned for the Massanutten Regional Library from 12-1:30 pm Monday, November 19, to discuss the expanded use of GPS bracelet monitoring technology for pre-trial and post-trial non-violent offenders. The program features a panel of speakers that includes the founder of Nexus Programs (a non-profit agency that provides such monitoring), a representative from the bail bond industry that offers similar technology, and a Clerk of Court and national expert on these issues from North Carolina. Their input will be followed by a Q & A time with participants. The event is free and open to the public.

Post Election Reflection

On the morning afterward, I wish everyone in the country could just live together in the spirit of two families who live nearby who posted the above signs on their front yards.

Let’s face it, the world is neither going to end nor will the nation be ushered into paradise as a result of this bitterly fought and often ugly race. Voting isn’t some great patriotic duty that assures ideal outcomes. The greater task for all of us, I believe, is to invest in the kind of prayer and persuasion all year round that influences our friends, families, neighbors and nations in good and godly directions.

A part of me agrees with my oldest son, who told me last night that for him voting most often seems like choosing between having a bad case of flu or contracting some unknown form of cancer. In other words, every nation, every world empire, is permeated and controlled by all kinds of evil forces that continue to be at work regardless of which party is in power.

As “resident aliens” we can only influence wherever we can, speak out whenever we must, and keep being a voice for God's lasting “peace on earth and goodwill towards all.”

Meanwhile, can we realize we can all benefit and learn from each other, and find creative ways of becoming "Knit Together by Differences"?

Voting For God

^{Blessings on a beautiful Sunday morning. I was profoundly moved yesterday in reflecting on the following psalm, which I see as the best kind of "voter guide" imaginable, a clear description of how God would have the world governed (especially note the lines in bold to learn more about the "God Party" platform!):}

Psalm 146

Hallelujah!

Praise the LORD, my soul;

I will praise the LORD all my life,

sing praise to my God while I live.

 

Put no trust in princes,

in children of Adam powerless to save.

Who breathing their last, return to the earth;

that day all their planning comes to nothing.

 

Blessed the one whose help is the God of Jacob,

whose hope is in the LORD, his God,

The maker of heaven and earth,

the seas and all that is in them,

Who keeps faith forever,

secures justice for the oppressed,

who gives bread to the hungry.

The LORD sets prisoners free;

the LORD gives sight to the blind.

The LORD raises up those who are bowed down;

the LORD loves the righteous.

The LORD protects the resident alien,

comes to the aid of the orphan and the widow,

but thwarts the way of the wicked.

The LORD shall reign forever,

your God, Zion, through all generations!

Hallelujah!

White Lies and Huge Whoppers

“(F)or we have made lies our refuge
    and falsehoods our hiding place.”
                       (Isaiah 28:15)

Truth, we’re told, is the first casualty of war.

And I would add, of political campaigns.

We’re being inundated these days with political ads and speeches laced with lies, distortions and misrepresentations. Both parties do their share of this, and we’ve come to just accept it as politics as usual.

Maybe it's because we’ve always been so exposed wall to wall commercials of all kinds that we’re beyond being shocked when politicians employ the same kinds of propaganda tactics. Running for office has become a matter of successful marketing, which relies on spin rather than just presenting useful information.    

What is most distressing is that even faith-based organizations are prone to mislead.

Take the familiar “voter guide”. Candidate A is listed as "opposing religious liberty," while candidate B supports it. A is for "government control (or takeover!) of health care," B is against it. A will "cut $716 billion from Medicare," while B will not. Nothing is nuanced, explained or put in context.

By definition, this becomes little more than propaganda, since not everything can be reduced to simplistic, good versus evil categories.

For example, someone may not at all be in favor of abortion but be labeled anti-life because he or she does not favor indicting everyone who has one as a murderer, just as one can be strongly against divorce but still not in favor of criminalizing it, or be adamantly anti-alcohol but not for re-instituting Prohibition.

In summary, before we go on any more crusades to get the Ten Commandments back in our schools, maybe we should work harder at applying them to every part of our lives.

As in, "Thou shalt not bear false witness."

Here's a link to examples of 2012 campaign mistruths http://www.factcheck.org/ .

An Open Letter to Franklin Graham

Dear Franklin,

As a lifelong admirer of your father,  I was interested in seeing him back in the news again after years of a well deserved sabbath. I’m referring to his recently agreeing to have full-page ads published (with a picture of a younger Billy Graham) that are designed to support Mitt Romney’s candidacy and are being paid for by unnamed friends.

While you may argue that neither of you is thereby endorsing any presidential candidate, I’m reminded of the dictum that “any difference that makes no difference is not a difference.” The ad constitutes an endorsement, pure and simple.

Having said that, I totally support your father’s right to do this, and I myself aim to be a Christ-following and compassionate conservative on issues like legalizing same sex marriage and abortion. I do question, however, how this lines up with many of your father’s previous statements, or whether, at nearly 94, he has actually changed some of his earlier positions.

In 1960 your father opposed the election of a Roman Catholic president even though that church’s support of marriage and opposition to divorce has been consistently stronger than that of most Protestant denominations. He later became much more tolerant of Catholics, a good thing in the eyes of many, and has blessed them and worked closely with them on many issues.

When it comes to Biblical marriage, of course, the Bible has sadly sometimes been used to support positions other than “one man and one woman for life,” as have statements in the Church of Latter Day Saints’s other inspired book, Doctrine and Covenants (132:61-62) which support polygamy.
Thankfully, though, most of us are now on the same page in our definition of heterosexual marriage, the kind that is relevant to well over 95% of us, just noticeably silent in dealing with the epidemic of broken homes and families all around us.

On the issue of making cause with the religious right, your father, as you know, declined to join Jerry Falwell’s Moral Majority in 1979,  saying: "I'm for morality, but morality goes beyond sex to human freedom and social justice. We as clergy know so very little to speak with authority on the Panama Canal or superiority of armaments. Evangelists cannot be closely identified with any particular party or person. We have to stand in the middle in order to preach to all people, right and left. I haven't been faithful to my own advice in the past. I will be in the future."

On a related issue, you have been widely quoted as saying you believe Islam is “an evil religion.” I’m certainly no advocate of the Muslim faith, but that seems so unlike your father’s Christ-like spirit, which has always been warmly invitational toward people of all faiths, never hostile or adversarial.

I do note that you recently wrote a piece in which you explain why it is now OK to vote for a Mormon to be president, and I have also learned that the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, under your leadership, has since removed its statement about cults from its website, as follows:

"A cult is any group which teaches doctrines or beliefs that deviate from the biblical message of the Christian faith. It is very important that we recognize cults and avoid any involvement with them. Cults often teach some Christian truth mixed with error, which may be difficult to detect... Some of these groups are Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mormons, the Unification Church, Unitarians, Spiritists, Scientologists, and others."

At one level, this could be welcomed by many as an expression of a new found tolerance on the part of the BGEA, but one might at least expect some consistency here. Is Scientology next on your list of approved faiths for evangelical believers?

But the real bottom line here is that elections are not to be about issues of faith. According to the US Constitution, Article VI, paragraph 3, “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.”

On the other hand, each of us do need to apply a values test. Unfortunately, this and all elections pose impossibly difficult choices for believers who are pro-life, in that support of things like obscenely bloated military budgets, drone strikes, the proliferation of assault weapons and handguns designed primarily to kill people, capital punishment, and the crying needs of millions of hungry and truly needy human beings at home and abroad are all profound life and death issues.

In short, I find myself completely agreeing with your father when he said, “(M)orality goes beyond sex to human freedom and social justice.”

Mennonite Attire--Not As Strange As You Think

Whistler’s mother was certainly not a Mennonite, but notice how her outward appearance is much like that of plainly attired Old Order Mennonite or Amish women.

Interestingly, the painter of this well known piece, James McNeill Whistler, born in Lowell, Massachusetts, was an outspoken atheist, but I have not been able to determine what faith, if any, his parents practiced.

My point is that there is nothing original about the plain dress of certain Mennonite groups. In other words, there were never any Amish or Mennonite committee of elders who got together to create a dress code for their respective churches. Every distinctive aspect of their plain dress is a preservation or adaptation of a dress style that was once common in their cultures of origin.

The beards, hair styles and broad rimmed hats worn by Amish men make them a living demonstration of how peasant farmers along the Rhine River Valley looked in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. And what has evolved into distinctive Mennonite or Amish attire for women is also simply a version of what all European peasant women wore in earlier times.

Even the now distinctive “head covering” is not a Mennonite invention, nor was it even associated with Paul’s teaching in I Corinthians 11 in early Mennonite or Amish practice. It was simply what all ordinary women wore. Menno Simons' "Complete Works" makes no mention of the practice of women veiling their heads or of the Biblical text which supports it, though it could be argued that he didn't need to, since women wearing some kind of protective head covering was a part of standard dress for all women of all faiths--or of no faith--in the sixteenth century (see Rembrandt's paintings, for example, or that of Whistler's Mother, above, as late as the nineteenth century).

Julia Ward Howe, author of the
Battle Hymn of the Republic,
dressed like my mother, but
was far from a Mennonite.

It appears that a form of women’s headgear that began as something functional and practical for peasant and other women in the past became a standard part of western European and Mennonite culture. Later, for many Mennonites, it became a Christian symbol, an expression of Paul's teaching that women should have their heads modestly covered out of reverence to God and respect for their husbands and other men when engaged in prayer or worship, especially in public. But in general, the group’s emphasis was simply on dressing in a modest way that did not draw undue attention to themselves.

This is not to say that early Mennonites and Amish had nothing unique to say about appearance. Anabaptist men, being committed to non-violence, were not to carry the sabers that were a customary part of being dressed up when in public. Amish men were to wear coats with hooks and eyes rather than the newer and more fashionable trend of using fancy buttons. And women were not to spend money on ornate jewelry and elaborate hairdos, as taught in Scripture, but to dress as common people generally did in the day.

In short, Mennonites have traditionally stressed modesty, economy and simplicity in all things, including in their attire. And the plainer ones have stressed the additional value of their appearance being an expression of their identity. They have chosen to avoid trending with the times, to remain non-conformed to the ways of the culture around them, and to be immediately recognizable as a distinctive, God-fearing people.

You may also want to check http://harvyoder.blogspot.com/2011/10/mennonites-and-amishten-myths-and.html.

Last Sermon, Part II: Praying and Doing

Here's the link to Part I of this "Last Sermon" I gave as a part of Zion Mennonite Church's 125th anniversary, a congregation where I had the privilege of serving as pastor for 20 years.

The key scripture I want to leave with you in this “last sermon” is one you all already know from memory, that’s how basic it is. It’s what we call the Lord’s Prayer, which should be our daily "pledge of allegiance" to God and to God’s rule, the prayer found in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount.

"When you pray," he instructs his followers (and the you here is plural, like the Southern y’all), keep it focused on the main thing, on God’s business. It’s not about us, but its about “Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.” It's addressed to one holy, loving God who is sovereign over every man, woman and child in the whole world.

The next main thing in this text follows from the first. Triple underline this: “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Note its not just, “May your will be done in my personal life, or in my family, or my church, or my country, but on the whole earth.” It’s a big prayer, about what God wants for all creation.

And God wants three main things:

First, God wants everyone to have enough. “Give all of us, every day, enough bread to live on,” on earth as it is in heaven. Could we possibly imagine in God’s heaven, some of the saints and angels suffering from eating and having too much while another group is suffering every day from not having enough? Of course not. That would be unthinkable, could never, ever be God’s will. So we, created in God’s image and given dominion over God’s earth, need to pray and do the same things God would do if he were in charge and so many of God’s children were hungry.

The second thing God wants is to have everyone on earth live in peace, to get along. “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.” It’s God’s will that the world be a place of healing, where we extend God’s love and forgiveness to all who wrong us and owe us, including those who owe us financially. In Bible times people got into debt because they were destitute and had to borrow in order to survive. In the Pentateuch, Jesus’ Bible, people were commanded to forgive others their debts on a regular basis, every seven years, to reboot the economic playing field and give everyone a fresh start.

Jesus took his Bible seriously and believed it taught freely forgiving debts, trespasses, and sins on earth as is true in heaven. Can you imagine God’s heaven being a place of wars and conflicts and church splits and miserable divorces and impossible burdens of debts the very poor owe to the very rich? 

Of course not. God wants everyone to experience a clean slate, to be forgiven their debts, just as ours are forgiven.

And finally, God wants everyone to make it to the finish. “Lead us not into temptations (tests or trials) that are too hard to bear, but deliver us from all evil.” So in addition to praying that all may live (have enough food), and that all may forgive, (live in peace), we pray, as God wills, that all people everywhere to be able to survive hardships, tests, hurricanes, persecutions, depressions, earthquakes, and come to a successful end. This could be paraphrased, “Lead us not into devastation, but deliver us from all evil.”

Can you imagine in God’s heavenly kingdom, where God rules, that there would be some who are provided for, protected, helped to survive and others not? Of course not. God wants everyone to make it to the very end, pass every test, overcome every obstacle.

That's what God wants, and God wants us to want it so much, all of us, that we pray passionately for it every day. In the end, it will be all that matters.

Recently I was at a friend’s funeral service, a former parishioner at Zion. At his memorial one of the ministers shared the story of a child who often played Monopoly with his mom. Most of the time she was the clear winner, ended up with the most properties and cash and her son was the sad loser. Finally one day, as he became more savvy at the game, he had the satisfaction of coming out on top, with numerous hotels, a couple of railroads, the electric company, and lots of other properties and cash. But then his mother said, as usual, “Now we have to put everything back in the box.” And he said, “But I don’t want to. I want to just keep everything I’ve gained on the board.” But she said, “No, when the game is over, we have to put everything back in the box.”

I couldn’t help, as I was hearing the story, focusing on my friend’s flower-covered casket there in front of us. In a sense, that is literally where they will put all that is physically left of us when our short time here is over. There will be no U-Hauls carrying our stuff behind the hearse that takes us to cemetery. Everything will be boxed up and put away. The only thing we’ll benefit from in the next life is what we’ve given away--what we've invested in the lives of others who will be blessed forever by how we’ve shared God’s blessings with them--and through whatever legacy of influence we've left with our children and others. It's what Jesus calls “treasure in heaven.”

Daniel Berrigan once wrote these powerful words that I want to use as a closing prayer:

“Somewhere in your life, hope you might see one starved person, the look on her face when the bread finally arrives. Hope you might have baked it or bought it or even kneaded it yourself. For that look on her face, for your hands meeting hers across a piece of bread, you might be willing to lose a lot or suffer a lot, or die a little even.”

Let's all say Amen to that.