A year and a half ago, I posted about an article in a local newspaper that caught my eye.
It involved the 48 year old man named Timothy, a wrong backpack, a lot of money, a 21 year old 'girlfriend', drugs and a robbery.
While checking my blog comments tonight, I saw this one:
Well Drafs is dead now committed suicide. I hope these other creeps who prey on the poor suffer in jail. The poor prey on the poor. The poor victimize the poor. I have no idea who Timothy Drafs is but a Google search shows a court memo from 1979, he must have been abused,molested or traumatized as a child and never got out of a cycle of destruction. His first court record goes back to 1987 where he was committed to a mental health facility.
Too many lives wasted on drugs, crime, childhood abuse from parents or even abuse from non-family. It is really sad.I would never excuse violence from a guy like this but have to wonder how many misfortunes and heartbreaks and traumas he went through before he committed suicide at age 50.
If the histories of people like this were being accurately documented it could help others not go through the same thing. The mental health industry has to do more to document the histories of people who had tragic pasts and do less to antagonize these people so that they will be willing to get a treatment that helps them.
From The Bellingham Herald:
Inmate kills himself with razor at Whatcom County Jail
A Whatcom County Jail inmate killed himself with a shaving razor this week in his jail cell, according to investigators.
Timothy Blair Drafs, 50, a homeless man from Bellingham, was being held earlier this week in a cell block on the second floor of the jail. He did not have a cellmate.
Around 11 or 11:30 p.m. each Wednesday, inmates are given Bic safety razors so they can shave before going in front of a judge on Thursday morning, said Chief of Corrections Wendy Jones. Only inmates who aren’t flagged as mentally unstable are given razors, she said.
Early Thursday, just a few minutes after midnight and around the time deputies would have been rounding up the razors from inmates, corrections deputies found Drafs in his cell with a serious wound to his neck. Aid responded but found he had died, according to the sheriff’s office. Bellingham police were called in as an outside agency to investigate.
According to a sheriff’s office press release, guards had checked on him “within the preceding hour,” though an exact timeline hasn’t been released.
An autopsy found Drafs cut himself with the razor. Medical Examiner Gary Goldfogel ruled the death a suicide.
A bit more:
A family friend, Abbey Nightingale, said Drafs suffered from post-traumatic stress, severe depression and an anti-social disorder. He struggled with alcoholism and drug addiction, the root of many of his run-ins with the law, Nightingale said.
“He has a horrible, horrible, horrible criminal history because he is an addict,” Nightingale said. “He was mentally ill.”
The way we "treat" the mentally ill is unconscionable. It is one of the biggest failures of the progressive mindset to dictate that we cannot confine and medicate people who are dangerous to themselves and to society because that would impose on their free will. As though they had a functioning free will to begin with.
We used to have state funded (and I do mean state - like Washington state - not Federal - the Tenth Amendment again) institutions where the mentally ill could live out their lives. Not the best of places by any means but they received custodial care, food and housing. Those that could work could do what they wanted to. There was art, education and structure in their lives so they could make the best of themselves.
Now, thanks to the politically correct, these facilities were closed and the burden of care was handed over to the hospitals and prisons. Not like they aren't busy with anything else and of course, this is a quiet, peaceful, stable and comforting environment (set sarcasm=off)
I never met Timothy Blair Drafs but I just came back from outside pouring one for my homie - a shot of nice whiskey.
Timothy Drafs - I stand here and honor your life - rest in peace brother!
