A Few Things
I have yet to post anything about the massive cyclone that has taken the lives of over 1,700 people in Bangladesh. Authorities in the country believe that, as rescue efforts continue, the death toll could climb. If you’re interested in helping, check out Oxfam Canada.
More On The Dziekanski Death
After last month’s fatal Tasering of Polish immigrant Robert Dziekanski, the RCMP has said that it plans to review its Taser policy, though RCMP Commissioner William Elliott has already defended the use of the device and said that it is a vital tool in the RCMP’s arsenal. That comes as no surprise, nor is it why I’ve broached the subject again.
While there are currently four separate investigations underway into what happened that day - the B.C. coroner, the RCMP, the public complaints commissioner for the RCMP, and the Vancouver Airport Authority – a public inquiry into the matter is not expected to begin until at least the spring or next summer.
One thing about Dziekanski should be cleared up. He did not suffer from a mental illness, as has been speculated. He had simply been stuck inside the airport’s international arrivals area for some 10 hours and, unable to communicate, had most likely simply become “confused and agitated while waiting for his mother”.
The Serbian State Mental Institution Holocaust
The International Herald Tribune recently ran a piece about a report issued by Mental Disability Rights International on the state of Serbia’s mental institutions. The details are so horrific that it’s almost impossible to fathom…
“A 21-year-old man with Down syndrome tied to a metal crib for 11 years. Children, naked from the waist down, left to eat and defecate in their beds. A 7-year-old girl with fluid in her brain left untreated “because she will die anyway.”
These are some of alleged abuses in Serbian state mental institutions and orphanages described in a report to be released Wednesday by Mental Disability Rights International, a Washington-based group that spent four years investigating the conditions and the treatment of some of the nearly 17,200 children and adults with disabilities in institutions in Serbia.
In the report, which is expected to be read closely by European Union officials who are assessing Serbia’s readiness to join the 27-member bloc, researchers concluded that “filthy conditions, contagious diseases, lack of medical care and rehabilitation and a failure to provide oversight renders placement in a Serbian institution life-threatening.”
The institutions investigated include the Institution for Children and Youth Kolevka in Subotica; the Institute for Mentally Ill People in Curug; the Kulina Institution for Children and Youth; the Special Institute for Children and Youth in Stamnica; and psychiatric hospitals in Vrsac and Kovin, east of Belgrade.
Eric Rosenthal, executive director of the rights group, said the use of physical restraints on children for years at a time was the most extreme he had seen in 14 years as a disability rights advocate. He said there were no enforceable laws in Serbia regulating the use of such restraints. “This is the most horrifying abuse I have seen on powerless children, who are tied to beds and unable to move,” he said. “This constitutes a clear case of torture.”
Words escape me.
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November 18th, 2007 at 12:33 pm
Wow… I am at a loss, as well. There’s really not much you can say.
November 18th, 2007 at 12:38 pm
You would figure that those 4 police officers would be suspended until all investigations were complete,but the sounds of rcmp commissioner is standing behind those men saying the followed proper procedure, & only re-assinging them to other duties.
It just disgust me to watch how the police officers did what they did to that poor man
November 18th, 2007 at 1:01 pm
I read that his friends in Poland said he was likely craving nicotine as well which seems quite likely. He definitely seems distraught in the video, but who wouldn’t be. Many hours on a plane having never flown before, arriving in a foreign airport and likely being grilled by customs for many hours (I was interrogated by US Homeland Security for a full day and a half once - not fun), tired, dehydrated, craving a cigarette, no one that speaks your language, obviously a hugely frustrating situation. I might start throwing things too were I not aware of the constant attitude of paranoia in airports.
I try to look at this with an open mind but I find it very hard to take the side of the RCMP. Sure, they had to control him quickly due to his behavior in an airport, and sure, he had picked up a stapler apparently. But his body language was not threatening in any way, surely 4 trained, armored officers can handcuff an exhausted man without tasering him MULTIPLE times and pinning his neck to the floor.
I read his last words were “police! police!” relieved that help had arrived. When they surround him he says “you will not charge me with anything”.
November 18th, 2007 at 1:03 pm
Wow… It’s hard to believe someone could do that to children. I think I might throw up.
Although I suppose it’s not necessarily that the people looking after them are sadistic and twisted, but that they just didn’t have the resources, or know where to find them. Of course, that’s no excuse.
November 18th, 2007 at 1:07 pm
Wow…. Words escape me also
November 18th, 2007 at 3:17 pm
About Dziekanski: Isn’t it easy to say that he didn’t have a mental illness when really he could have? Untreated or underlying? I suppose that’s sort of ambiguous. There’s a million things that could have happened to him that day - in his life - that lead up to that point. I know what it’s like to get scared traveling. I cant fathom what that would feel like… getting killed for feeling distraught.
I don’t have words for the rest of this entry. I feel ill.
November 18th, 2007 at 3:46 pm
Way to go Serbia, another way to embarrass yourself… ugh.
November 18th, 2007 at 4:10 pm
This picture made me cry and I will never forget seeing it. Why is there such imbalance in the worlds wealth? Why at the end of the day, does wealth diictate who suffers? Children suffering in any manner is the worst failure of mankind.
November 18th, 2007 at 4:24 pm
:’(
November 18th, 2007 at 5:29 pm
I think they have to figure out why he was in customs for so long. What went on there?
November 18th, 2007 at 5:39 pm
Regarding the Taser policy… it would be nice to know what exactly the RCMP taser policy is. I keep hearing about the policy but have never had a chance to read up on it.
November 18th, 2007 at 5:53 pm
Totally horrific.This should be front page news, no question.
November 18th, 2007 at 7:23 pm
Jesus Fuck.
November 18th, 2007 at 9:14 pm
Just read about another reported death due to the use of a taser.
November 18th, 2007 at 9:27 pm
And people think their lives are over here in Canada because they dont have enough money for a coffee from Tim Hortons…..so sad
November 18th, 2007 at 9:57 pm
I never even heard or read about the mental institute story in the news.
thanks for bringing it to my attention.
It’s appalling and should be on the front pages worldwide.
November 19th, 2007 at 10:48 am
Absolutely sickening that they would treat people like that. While they may not have the correct resources to treat these human beings, it’s still unacceptable for them to be treated that way.
November 19th, 2007 at 1:43 pm
A story was published not long ago about a Russian orphange taping up babies’ mouths so they couldn’t cry. Former Communist nations have a long way to go in learning how to properly run their social services and institutions. Instead of bringing McDonald’s to them, how about we help them establish better services and facilites for their people. This is disgusting, but unfortunately a common result of the way these nations were run for so many years.
November 19th, 2007 at 8:44 pm
In this day and age, in all that we have learned, a disgrace like that should not have ever happened. They should go to prison.
November 20th, 2007 at 12:42 pm
Not only does this happen in Serbia, but in other places of the world as well. I recently had a friend travel to South America and live there for part of the year, and she came back with unimaginable horror stories about the psychiatric institutions in Argentina. You can find information on human rights violations against those with mental illnesses on the http://www.mdri.org website as well as information on how you can help or make donations.
“Argentina is among countries with the most psychiatrists per capita in the world-yet people detained in the country’s public psychiatric institutions are subject to serious human rights violations. Ruined Lives, MDRI’s joint report with the Center for Legal and Social Studies (CELS), exposes serious human rights abuses against nearly 25,000 people locked away in Argentina’s psychiatric institutions, where the average length of institutionalization is 9 years. Seventy-five percent of the people detained in state-run institutions are warehoused in asylums of 1,000 beds or more.
Ruined Lives exposes widespread abuse and neglect in these institutions, including people burning to death in isolation cells, complete sensory deprivation in long-term isolation, forced sterilization and sexual and physical abuse. In one psychiatric penal ward in Buenos Aires, men were locked naked in tiny, barren isolation cells with no light or ventilation for months at a time. At another institution, four people died while locked in isolation cells. Toilets overflowed with excrement and floors were flooded with urine.
Investigators found a 16 year-old boy in a crib, his arms and legs tied to his body with strips of cloth, completely immobilized. Staff said he had been tied up since being admitted to the institution more than a year before.” - from an MDRI report on the psychiatric institutions in Argentina.