Death Penalty Issue Examined

Malaquias Montoya's works at the Dougherty Arts Center (Austin, TX) regarding "Premeditated: Meditations on Capital Punishment"

When I arrived, there was a huge contemplative painting...I stood in awe...looked to my left, to my right, and back to my left.... there were paintings and sketches everywhere in this gallery. I signed in the guestbook then I looked for a person to authorize me to take digital photographs in order to include them with my paper I was writing for my criminal justice class; they approved.

It was difficult to decide which photos to take; and, I believe I ended up taking photos of nearly every picture/statement there. It certainly made a huge impact on me and made a difference when putting together my crimianal justice paper on whether or not the death penalty is really a deterrence on crime. (See www.bluebonnetfields.blogspot.com for a copy of this paper I wrote.)

This was a very thought provoking exhibit and, if the exhibit comes to a gallery near you soon, you certainly need to take some time out of your day to examine the visual protest by this artist and professor, Malaquias Montoya.

NAMI - Capitol Day 2005 - 012605

It is an anxious day as I anticipate what it is going to be like to be involved with the "Capitol Day" conference with Joel Roberts speaking, hosted by the Texas Society Psychiatry Physicians (or, "TSPP"). Never been to this sort of a conference before. It will certainly be an interesting experience, no matter the outcome.



NOTES FROM THE DAY

DAY TWO OF THE CONFERENCE BEGINS....
with announcements that the maps of the capitol grounds are available, instructions given that if we don't have an appointment to cold call on our legislators & ask for the health care aid if one is available, always be sure you sign the guest book, and give them a chance to talk and listen for their feedback.

One of the first statistics that they through at us in the morning is the fact, insofar as insurance coverages are concerned, if you tell the insurance company you, or a family member, has a brain disorder the coverage will be limited to $10,000 in coverage by the insurance company; however, if someone has a brain tumor, the insurance will pay $1,000,000 in insurance coverage. What is wrong with that picture????

It is a issue of parity....
and an issue of stigma (hidden from view).

The support isn't the same depending on the diagnosis of the illnesses.

RECOMMENDED READING:

The Tipping Point
by Malcolm Gladwell
regarding social change

Parity Bill - insuring mental illness. Insufficient insurance begats non-productive employees, taking away from the workplace to deal with mental illness issues.

It is interesting to note that State Employees have mental health insurance, which is not the norm for most busisnesses. Small businesses are drowing during underinsured insurance coverage and rising costs.

Managed care language -- fee for service plan doesn't exist.

DSM-4 -- language

Tx Association of Business - supported Joe Nixon's 2003 Tort Reform Bill

Parity ---
* excluding coverage disparities of insurance
* different caps
* no differences for women and minorities
* different levels of emotional support
* different numbers of visits
* different pay (50% psychiatrists - 80% other physicians)
* different mental health facilities available
* different formulas
* different capacity crisis
* different number paid days @ hospitals
* different definitions (lack of acknowledge diagnosis issue)
* proof of ongoing treatment is necessary
* must justify
* mental health not seen as a medical illness
* longer and more effective care in non-psychiatric hospital than in a psych hosp


Aaron states:: "Need to take the 'full monty' of a person with mental illness -- ie Meds often cause other illnesses, as a result of taking the psych meds."

"passing the buck" = "Cost shifting" (silo savings effect)
saving in one area to transfer costs somewhere else...
when costs are shifted, they expand....

Often people have to fail first on one or two other meds b/4 going to other meds....
psych med - have cost compliance rebellion b/c don't want to suffer side effects;
atypical med - often people do better on these

What causes you to listen to be influenced?
* what sounds logical or reasonable
* personal knowledge
* expert

Opposite of expertise is:
* Charisma
* Tug at heartstring
* Presentation style
* Tie-in/personal experience
* Emotions
-- all a part of the humanity aspects!

An example is demonstrated in the Bush v. Gore campaign:
In June, Gore was ahead by 17%. Bush couldn't beat Gore on expertise, because Gore had been VP for past 8 years. Bush was surrounded by experts though, then the campaign shifted to humanity aspects and brought the 17% difference to zero -- like termites on "wooden" Gore.

TO BE CONTINUED WITH BREAKOUT OF THE FOUR BREAKOUT DISCUSSIONS INTO HUMANITY AND EXPERTISE ASPECTS.....

NAMI - Capitol Day 2005 - 012505 (continued)

AFTER BREAKOUT SESSIONS, JOEL HAS US RETURN AND GROUPS OF 3 FROM EACH BREAKOUT SESSION COMES FORWARD TO BE ANALYZED BY JOEL ROBERTS, THE COMMUNICATION EXPERT:

First Group Examined by Joel Roberts -- FOSTER CARE CHILDREN

J.R.
*have a sentence or 2 -- ie "The wrong fix for a wrong problem" "Misdiagnosis of a severe problem - if a misdiagnosis passes, it'll make you think"

Bill
*attempts to address - "A serious problem, unfortunately it is a misdiagnosis of a problem"

Joel suggests...
* lean in and ask "do you want to know how serious this problem is?" "Can I get a witness??" (when Joel stated this, it reverberrated just like Nicole C. Mullin's "Witness" song with the same strength, vocalization, and emphasis)
* get real - Ask a question like, "If you go to one doctor from another doctor, do they follow your medical care necessarily? It happens in foster care..." and a medical passport is needed (ie labwork, EEG, EKG, medical history, etc)
* exude quiet, seething, outpouring, outrage emotions

Bill
*attempts to address - discrimination against poor children


Joel suggests...
* good, but not responsive to the question
* always hit the ball thrown to you
* bad idea to block - instead blend with it, go with it
* issue belongs somewhere else - not in the courts
* extra layers of bureacacy
* ask the Q - "Where else do you know any area of field of medicine where that a doctor needs authorization from the court to authorize a medical care plan?"


Second Group Examined by Joel Roberts -- JAIL DIVERSIONS

Roy S.
* 1977 - worked at Bell Labs as Mechanical Engineer
* 1988 - out of work
* advocates saving money, saving lives, productive citizens


Joel suggests...
* very impressed by Roy
* stalemates the envisions of the images of "Santa Monica Bluff", a stretch of grass over looking the ocean where Los Angeles PD and Santa Monica PD encircle constantly arresting the homeless


Third Group Examined by Joel Roberts -- COUNSELING

Joel suggests...
* medicaid cut funding focus (counseling leading to recovery; recovery leads to fewer services required; fewer services required leads to saving money)
* personal stories need to be emphasized here
* emphasize - without counseling, there is a potential to subsequent relapsing
* gap exists - psychologist/psychiatrist vs. peer counseling
* private insurance pay for peer counseling
* professional's greatest advocates are the peer counselors
* compassionate - return on higher than the investment
* some of the most impactful help given from peers
* we are in the business from dislodging stereotypes
* the successful approach needs to be a 2-pronged process
* hip/knee replacement analogy is good (what if they never receive physical therapy?); other half of recovery process is the rehabilitation; therefore the prescriptions are only the halfway point to recovery (the other half is the therapy received)


Fourth Group Examined by Joel Roberts -- PSYCHOLOGISTS PRESCIBING PRESCRIPTIONS

Joel suggests...
* make sure you remove the monotone from your speech when talking to the legislators - must add emotion and voice influction
* Psychiatrists get a medical degree and can differentiate between dimensia and depression
* Psychologists - no medical degree
* Stories - must have a 30-sec punch line
* making a medical diagnosis is important to know how to prescribe the medicine
* statement "we refer to psychologists all the time"; important to be careful with such statements, after all one would wonder how do you refer to them???? :) A corrected statement might be that "we refer our patients to psychologists all the time"
* conflicts rise - we do more points and leave our stories on hold OR we make more points with our stories???? stories can do much to illustrate the problem
* emphasize that it isn't a war between the psychologists (who receive 300 hours of training) vs the psychiatrists
* it is important to not cut the quality of care

President of TSPP suggests a example...
* 62 yo patient arrives with 14 years non-insulin diabetes
* psychologist - primary degenerative diagnosis
* went to ER - disoriented, hallucinating, had no other physical complaints
* Cat scan ran - on head
* Chest XRay done
* Lab Work - no white cells, infections, blood sugar @ 120
* Final Diagnosis - patient had a raging asymptematic bladder infection!

FINAL WORDS ABOUT THE DAY --
I had a fabulous time. As a prior Toastmaster Member, I could certainly appreciate the pointers Joel Roberts was bringing out to our groups. They are certainly good pointers in good communication in any setting -- not just the Capitol Day event that we were readying ourselves for. I am certainly anxious to see what tomorrow brings!!!!

NAMI - Capitol Day 2005 - 012505

Wow! What an interesting day -- a day of overcoming fears of lobbying and getting involved with the legistlature of Texas. I had always had an itching to do this, but never did because I wasn't quite sure where to begin. Joel Roberts is a reknown speaker who offered the NAMI (National Alliance for Mental Illness) organization some tips and tricks towards effective communication with the legistlatures; he certainly knew how to console the soul!!

SOME NOTES TAKEN THROUGHOUT THE DAY --
"All politics are local" - quoted often by Joel throughout the day

We are all constituents - able to speakup and advocate for mental illness (or for any other subject matter for that matter; however, today's focus was on mental illness)

MH Coalition - active since 1995 regarding real medical illnesses; effectively treatable.

Steve Russell - a lobbyist for TSPP:
* advocating for every child having health care - including mental health
* appropriate role for various medical care providers in the Mental Health system
* committees will be appointed Thursday (rumor has it)

Dr. Sawyer, TSPP:
* psychologists - should be prescribing without medical education b/c they must know how to differentiate between the masking of other real medical conditions and label as psychiatric disorders
* foster child movement - need to look beyond the surface issues
* scientology - one of their goals is to do away with psychiatry

Cliff Gay, NAMI staff member (Consumer Network and Education Coordinator):
* HB2292 - mandated into law; targets population; wants to see this continued (as a disease management model); under this same bill, wants to see jail diversion incorporated into the disease management model (diverting the consumer from the jail door into getting treatment)
* Each company was mandated to have such a program running by February 1st of this year

Statistic Speaker (name not written in notes):
* he wasn't given Rx in jail until he finally arrived at the Kerrville State Hospital
* advocates for psych assessment to actually being done within 24hrs of the arrest

Jim Sweeny, Chairperson of legislation affairs committee of the Texas Depression & Support Alliance:
* medicaid funding - elimination of various options (ie, they cut therapy and adult counseling services from the funding)
* peer to peer support - helpful to treatment and continuation; trained specialists are instrumental

Representative, of Texas Mental Health Consumers Association:
* North STAR (Star of Texas Access Reform)Project in Dallas TX - provides consumers with a choice fee for service model
* HB470 - seperation of authority model (authority can't provide services)
* wanting legislation to adopt this model which provides for access as a one-stop eligibility center; regionalizes 42 MHMR locations into 11 Regions
* Houston StarStar+ Program - to manage medicaid; a con is that the management program is not paying people
* physician from audience spoke up - says that the model puts restrictions on services; not necessarily in the best interest of patients
* another issue advocating for - reinstatement of trauma counseling by medicaid as a medicaid billable service

JOEL WANTED US TO BREAK UP IN 4 DIFFERENT BREAKOUT GROUPS AND COME UP WITH SOME KEY MESSAGE POINTS (STORIES, STATISTICS, ILLUSTRATION) AND PICK 3 PEOPLE FOR BEING SPOKE PERSONS + 1 ON DECK JUST IN CASE)

NOTES FROM THE JAIL DIVERSION BREAKOUT GROUP:
* criminals can buck the system (con)
* worthless recovery (another con)
* 75% affected juveniles
* 20% affected adults
* 60% substance abuse/mental illness
* $31,000 - cost per year in jail vs. $6,500 - cost in halfway programs
* no mentally ill person should be left behind, based on direction to change
* Harris Co - non-lockdown facility - commissioners funded
* recovery - reintegration - 2-4 years mandated program
* Probation Officer follows psych assessment

AFTER BREAKOUT SESSIONS, JOEL HAS US RETURN AND GROUPS OF 3 FROM EACH BREAKOUT SESSION COMES FORWARD TO BE ANALYZED BY JOEL:

More on shelter funding...

This morning I am working at the shelter I work at on Sundays for 24hrs straight and I certainly have to admit that we are feeling the affects fo the closure of one of the SafePlace's shelter. Our shelter here is full to capacity and we have no available funding for hotel stays fro overflows from the shelter. Within a few hours of being here this morning, I had more than 4 hotlinge calls of people (families) looking for shelter from DVSA (dometic violence sexual abuse) situations; one though called on the hotline looking for a place to do a rapid detox. Of the families looking for shelter, one was a man with his four children. Normally, as in the past, we would have been, at least, able to put him up in the hotel and offer him outreach, counseling, and other community services. We didn't get FEM fundings for this 2005 year; therefore, our hands are tied.

I am thankful that we are able to house all the women and children that we have at this time -- 12 adult women and 12 children. I just wish I had more power to more people. If only I had a millions dollar budget to work with myself to get a shelter set up and running!! The thing that motivates the staff here is seeing the success stories moving forward and out of the cycle of abuse.

On another note, talked to Steve W., Kaplan University's Criminal Justice careeer advisor about revising my resume and offering a direction for my career. We agreed that, with my paralegal background and experience here at this crisis center, I may be a perfect fit for working in a victim services area at a police or sheriff's departments. It is a role that not everyone could handle.

Ironically, I have been accepted into the Cedar Park Citizen's Academy starting next Tuesday for the next eleven weeks with a graduation ceremony to be held on April 19th with dinner. The training will be great -- offering training in a variety of criminal justice topics:

Feb 1 - Orientation and Department Tour
Feb 8 - So you want to be a Cedar Park Police Officer
Feb 15 - Community Services Division
Feb 22 - Basic Patrol Procedures II
Mar 1 - Traffic Enforcement
Mar 8 - Criminal Investigations Overview
Mar 15 - Special Response Team/Negotiations Team
Mar 22 - Crisis Intervention/Communications
Mar 29 - Cedar Park Fire Department
Apr 5 - Police K-9 Patrol/Undercover and Narcotics Interdiction
Apr 12 - Firearms and Law Enforcement Weaponry
Apr 19 - Graduation Ceremony

These topics will pair nicely with my eJournal I am working on for this term. Note: This is training for a voluntee program -- not a paid position; however, it would be great if it did allow me to get a foot in the door -- even just a toe!

The Description of the DVSA Shelter...

The description about the DVSA shelter in Austin announces that they will be closing its doors in February 2005; whereas, in fact, it actually closed its doors to the smaller of the two shelter loactions it possessses yesterday, January 21st, as per the news broadcast last night. They all indicated that, as one door closes though another one opens, and mentions that, because the Texas Legislation is presenlty in session, they hope that consideration for additioanl funding is given to domestic violence shelters. It seems such a crime to not have more funding available for these shelters as they play a pivotal role in aiding to break the cycle of abuse by empowering the victims to move forward with their lives. I don't envy Governor Perry's role in working with the lawmakers to come up wiht a viable solution to devy out available funds to all the organizations reliant on grants and other funding resources; however, this area has suffered many cuts in funding in the past few years; there has to be a point where you have to look for other organizations' corners to be cut and give back a little more to an area that has been cut, admittingly, too drastically.

Crisis Service Crisis!

Safe Place Emergency Shelters

"SafePlace operates two emergency shelters, one for women unaccompanies by children and one for women with children. However, beginning in February 2005, SafePlace will operate only one emergency shelter to serve all the women and children who seek shelter."

This is insane! DVSA (domestic violence/sexual assault) shelters are reaching a crisis of their own at epidemic proportions. This particular shelter services those victims in the Austin, Travis County, Texas area; other surrounding shelters in the the near proximity of the area (including surrounding counties) are filling the effect of their closure. Unfortunately, many of them are unable to help as well. Where FEMA grants were allowed to help with overflow of the shelters on occasion and/or male victims of DVSA and their families, they are no longer able to do so.

Where will those victims seek shelter when the shelters for the homeless are also reaching epidemic capacities as well? How much more cuts will be allowed in the social services before the social services aspect will not be able to be a viable resource in the communities? Something must give soon -- very soon!!

CJ BRIEFS - 010905

Austin American Statesman
Dated - January 9, 2005
By -- no by-line given
Page - oops, cut off page #

Entitled: "Criminal Justice"


Prior to class beginning this term, I was anticipating having to write a lot for the class and cut out some criminal justice articles of interest while reading the newspapers, etc., at my 24hr shift at the DVSA (domestic violence/sexual assault) shelter. This particular briefs indicate the relative issues up for review, discussion, and possible changes while the State legistlatures meet this session. It will be interesting to see how much it actually gets enacted upon -- or, if they are tabled once again for future sessions to decide upon. Hopefully, with the US Supreme Court having become involvd with the issues, it will step up the process of the State legislature to finally come to a final agreeable resolution to all the criminal justice issues at hand.

Death penalty protests???

Austin American Statesman
Dated - January 5, 2005
By -- no by-line included
Page - E2

Entitled: "Death penalty protest comes home to Austin"


Intersting article about a death penalty protest exhibit coming to the Austin area -- which, is very timely as lawmakers are convening in Austin discussing an array of issues including the crim lab issues -- which,in turn, can have a huge impact on the death row convictions.

It is certainly an exhibit that I plan to check out to gain yet another perspective on the death penalty.

Lawmakers fixing crime lab woes???

Austin American Statesman
Dated - January 5, 2005
By -- Juan A Lozano, Associated Press
Page - B7

Entitled: "Lawmakeers consider fixes to state's crime lab woes"

This is a very interesting article -- well, interesting to me in that it has become a huge issue simultaneously in Houston at the same time that my husband died in November 11, 2002, in the Houston area.

In 2002, Harris County began having a rash of DNA testing that proved the innocence of many people in jail, previously convicted for rape and murder crimes. This had proved prior testing erroneous and many crime lab workers cited poor working conditions and heavy work loads. It was the public's opinion that something should have been spoken out on this subject matter before it had become such a travesty.

Going on three years after the discovery of the flagrant mishaps, the lawmakers are going to get to the bottom of the issue and end these injustices. However, in the shadows of the discoveries, one begins to wonder how many more injustices will never be able to be reconciled because the convicted was eventually killed on death row -- forever being a mark of question in the death row conviction rates.

The accuracy of the investigators process is on a plate of scrutiny now and shall be forever more -- making it easier for cases going to courts to question the validity of the results on appeal, as will on initial impact of the courtroom.

A dominoeing effect, it is certainly going to make it harder for a crime lab to prove its results; however, as hard as that may be, it must be done. Hopefully, the lawmakers will be able to agree on some ground rultes to help make this happen!!

What is the Professional Development Journal?

READ ABOUT THE PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT JOURNAL:


The Professional Development Journal serves three functions. First, it is a place for you to record critical reflections on your education and to define its value in relation to your personal and professional growth. Second, it serves as a valuable tool in assessing your comprehensive knowledge of the field of criminal justice. Last, based on your critical reflections and learning assessment, it helps you outline a plan for lifelong learning and development that meets your goals with respect to academic, professional, and personal success.

Rather than waiting until the end, you should work on the journal throughout the course, adding and refining your thoughts as a part of a process of discovery.

The Professional Development Journal is due at the end of the Final Exam Reading Week.