Sloppy police work, a hands-off justice system & blind prison system turned one man into another

[Are_grits_groceries]

Another long read about a man named Kerry Washington. He is mentally ill and when he was 27 he was arrested for a minor offense. He became mixed up by the authorities with a hardened criminal named Robert Sanders. Nobody checked and Kerry Washington's nightmare began.
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Nearly every day inside Green Haven prison in Stormville, N.Y., behind the 30-foot-high concrete walls and 12 watchtowers, within the endless gray corridors and tiers of windowless cells, the inmate Robert Sanders asked the same question: Why am I here?

He asked the guards in the main unit of the maximum-security prison, where he spent most of his time alone in Cell No. 22 on the third level, crying and praying and drinking too much coffee. He asked the doctors, social workers and nurses in the psychiatric unit, where he was often sent to deal with the voices in his head.

To the staff members, his questions were evidence of his psychosis. "He becomes delusional," they wrote in his chart. "He has bizarre behavior." The prisoner had a habit of picking cigarette butts up off the floor, but not of showering. Everyone complained that he gave off an unbearable smell, and the red-hooded sweatshirt he habitually wore was caked with food and dirt. They complained at night, too, when his chattering echoed down the narrow hall of A Block. The psychiatric team urged him to improve his hygiene and attend classes in "daily living skills." He was given 15 minutes of weekly therapy and heavy doses of Haldol, an antipsychotic drug that left his body rigid and his emotions flat. But his bewilderment grew. "Pt. said he has no idea why the plane took him to N.Y.," a nurse wrote in Sanders's chart. He also "does not know what crime he did and his name is not Robert."
<snip>
Remarks from a doctor who treated Kerry Sanders when he learned he was wrongly imprisoned:

Chung, only recently learning the details, said it was better for Kerry to be in prison than wandering the streets. "He got medication, free meal, food, everything," the doctor said in his deposition. "He should say, 'Thank you, for two years you guys treated me very nicely."'

The last paragraph:

Robert Sanders remains in federal prison in the Cleveland drug case, serving a 15-year sentence. New York still has the warrant out for his arrest.

http://partners.nytimes.com/library/magazine/home/20000806mag-wrongman.html

Kerry Washington was re-arrested after his release and held as Robert Sanders again.

Sigh.......WTF........sigh.......

[Dr Hobbitstein]

1. Where does it say he was re-arrested?

The last line refers to the actual Robert Sanders, NOT Kerry Washington.

-J

[Are_grits_groceries]

2. Did you read the entire article?

From the same article:

On the evening of Jan. 10, 1997, two officers spotted Kerry crossing against a "Don't Walk" sign on Florence Avenue, forcing cars to brake suddenly as they exited the freeway. They stopped him and asked him for his name and birth date. They radioed the information to the dispatcher and heard back about the felony warrant for Robert Sanders from New York. The police in Los Angeles apparently did not notice that Robert Sanders was in prison in the federal cocaine case. The officers pressed ahead.

According to their report, they asked Kerry whether he knew there was a warrant for him in New York and he responded: "Yes, I was there 10 months ago, and I used the name Robert Sanders. Here, in California, I use the name Kerry Sanders so no one will know I'm Robert Sanders."

Kerry Sanders was booked and jailed as Robert Sanders, with "Kerry" listed as an alias. Again, the police did not check fingerprints. They notified prison authorities in New York that they had Robert Sanders in custody. Three days later, New York said to let him go, and the case was dismissed. "Wrong suspect, exonerated," the police report says. When he saw his mother, Kerry told her what happened. "I been in jail for Robert Sanders again," he said. "Momma, they cannot keep Robert Sanders in jail. He got to do his own time by himself, Momma."

[Dr Hobbitstein]

3. Sorry,

I missed that. But it looks like he was released into a mental health facility in the end. Of course, this article is 13 years old, so who knows where he is now.

[Are_grits_groceries]

4. Does the age of the article have any

relevance to how he was treated?

[Dr Hobbitstein]

5. No, I just said it's unknown how he's currently doing

as the article was old. I wasn't meaning to downplay his treatment. Sorry if it came across that way.