JUSTICE FOR NELI!!
Neli Latson an Autistic adult who has been wasting
away in jail for the past 4 years, he is in Solitary Confinement, all because
he was waiting outside a library until it opened a few short years ago and was
approached by police and then attacked one due to his Autism, he was scared and
the flight or fight instinct kicks in, we should not be punished for being
Autistic. Being Autistic is NOT a
crime! Police are not as versed in how
to interact with us as much as you might think.
This is an example of justice that needs to be served. Please appeal to the Governor of Virginia,
Terry McAuliffe to release one of my community.
Being Autistic is not a crime and should not be treated as such. He is scared and confused and does not
deserve such treatment. Let’s flood the
governor’s office with appeals for justice for Neli he is languishing in prison. #FreeNeli!
#JusticeforNeli! Please help to stop this cruelty!
Please telephone Governor Terry McAuliffe’s office at: (804) 786-2211 Or write to his postal address: 1111 East Broad Street, Richmond,
VA 23219 Or email him using the following form: https://governor.virginia.gov/constituent-services/Communicating-with-the-governors-office
JUSTICE FOR NELI!!
Ruth Marcus: In Virginia, a cruel
and unusual punishment for Autism
November 14, 2014, by Ruth Marcus,
Washington Post – Opinions
Reginald Latson’s path to solitary confinement began four years ago as he waited for the public library
to open in Stafford County, Va.
Latson, known as Neli,
has an IQ of 69 and is Autistic. Teachers and therapists describe him as
generally sweet and eager to please.
He is also a black
man, now 22, who on the day in question was wearing a hoodie — which prompted a
concerned citizen to call police about a suspicious person loitering outside
the library.
The ensuing encounter
should have been nothing more than a harassing annoyance. Instead, not
surprising given the rigid thinking and “fight or flight” instincts
characteristic of those with Autism, it escalated after Latson refused to
provide his name and was restrained by the police officer when he tried to
leave.
The altercation that
followed left the officer seriously injured and propelled Latson into an
inescapable cycle of misbehavior followed by ever more punishment. Latson has
engaged in acts that can be characterized as criminal, yet he is less a
criminal than a victim of his disability.
Meanwhile, he is being
punished in the most severe manner the criminal justice system can concoct. He
has spent most of the last year in solitary confinement and has lost almost 50
pounds from an already trim frame.
“In effect Neli spends
24 hours a day locked in a segregation cell with minimal human contact for the
‘crime’ of being Autistic,” his lawyers wrote to Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe
(D). “Absent intervention, there is every reason to think he will remain there
until the opportunity for effective treatment has been lost.”
Solitary confinement
can be torture, with serious psychological consequences. For those already
suffering from disabilities, the impact can be far more devastating. So it has
been for Latson — an especially tragic outcome, given that state mental health
officials had arranged, and secured federal funding, for him to be transferred
to a locked treatment facility in Florida.
Because of Latson’s
intellectual and emotional disabilities, he cannot safely go into the general
jail population. But he also does not have the coping skills to deal with
solitary confinement.
Held in solitary after
his initial arrest, Latson responded by urinating on the floor and then licking
it up. Moved last spring, after threatening suicide, from regular solitary to a
“crisis cell” consisting of an empty concrete room with no bed and a hole in
the floor for a toilet, he was Tasered after hitting a guard, leading to
another assault charge.
Maureen Del Duca, a
lawyer with two adult sons who are severely Autistic, described Latson’s
situation as a “never-ending downward spiral of completely avoidable charges of
criminal assault.” When one of her sons lived at the Florida facility that
agreed to take Latson, the young man’s violent actions — biting or attacking
staff members — were a routine behavior to be handled, not a criminal
infraction, she noted.
He “could easily be in
Reginald’s position . . . tragically entangled in a criminal justice system
that is not yet able to deal appropriately” with him, Del Duca wrote to the
judge hearing Latson’s case.
The differences
between the two men are as obvious as they are jarring: race, for one;
resources, for another.
Latson’s case is an
individual tragedy that cries out for remedy — Gov. McAuliffe, are you
listening? It is also sadly representative of a criminal justice system
poorly equipped to deal with issues of mental illness and developmental
disability.
It is maddening for
Latson to be trapped in solitary confinement when a safe, therapeutic
alternative is available; indeed, that neglect may violate Virginia’s
commitments in settling a Justice Department civil rights lawsuit on behalf of
those with developmental disabilities. McAuliffe should employ his authority to
ensure Latson’s transfer to the Florida facility, where the public would be
safe and he would receive treatment, not futile punishment.
“It verges on bizarre
to instead lock Neli in an isolation cell at substantial taxpayer expense with
the medical certainty that he will eventually emerge worse instead of better,”
his lawyers told McAuliffe.
Latson’s is a sad
case. Unfortunately, it is not an isolated one. The criminal justice system
must rethink how it deals with the mentally ill and developmentally disabled.
And it must do more than rethink — it must halt — the use of solitary
confinement in all but the most extreme circumstances.
#FREENELI!!
