Tag: mental illness

REPORT: $236 Million Gavin Newsom Program to Help the Mentally Ill Has Helped Only 22 People in Four Years

A $236 million program heralded by California Governor Gavin Newsom that was intended to help get mentally ill people off the street has helped a whopping 22 people in four years, according to new reports.

That sounds about right for Newsom. Wouldn’t you like to know how much the people who ran this program were paid?

It’s fascinating how California keeps throwing massive amounts of cash at their homeless problem and the problem just keeps growing, while lots of people get wealthy by running these programs.

The New York Post reports:

Gavin Newsom shoots down claim $236M program for California’s mentally ill has helped just 22 people in four years

California Governor Gavin Newsom’s $236 million program to help those with severe mental illness who bounce between homelessness and jail has helped a measly 22 people since the its launch in 2022, a new report reveals.

Newsom’s CARE Court was billed as a “completely new paradigm” to get the mentally ill off the streets and into treatment, with up to 12,000 people expected to benefit, the Daily Mail reported.

But only 22 people have been sent to treatment over the past four years, after a state analysis found that up to 50,000 could be eligible for the program.

The 22 court-ordered cases were among roughly 3,000 petitions filed statewide as of October. Of those, only 706 were approved, including 684 voluntary agreements that never intended the meet program’s goal, according to the Daily Mail.

Newsom has denied the report.

Keep reading

A Man Bought Meta’s AI Glasses, And Ended Up Wandering The Desert Searching For Aliens To Abduct Him

At age 50, Daniel was “on top of the world.”

“I turned 50, and it was the best year of my life,” he told Futurism in an interview. “It was like I finally figured out so many things: my career, my marriage, my kids, everything.”

It was early 2023, and Daniel — who asked to be identified by only his first name to protect his family’s privacy — and his wife of over three decades were empty nesters, looking ahead to the next chapter of their lives. They were living in an affluent Midwestern suburb, where they’d raised their four children. Daniel was an experienced software architect who held a leadership role at a large financial services company, where he’d worked for more than 20 years. In 2022, he leveraged his family’s finances to realize a passion project: a rustic resort in rural Utah, his favorite place in the world.

“All the kids were out of the house, and it was like, ‘oh my gosh, we’re still young. We’ve got this resort. I’ve got a good job. The best years of our lives are in front of us,” Daniel recounted, sounding melancholy. “It was a wonderful time.”

That all changed after Daniel purchased a pair of AI chatbot-embedded Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses — the AI-infused eyeglasses that Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has made central to his vision for the future of AI and computing — which he says opened the door to a six-month delusional spiral that played out across Meta platforms through extensive interactions with the company’s AI, culminating in him making dangerous journeys into the desert to await alien visitors and believing he was tasked with ushering forth a “new dawn” for humanity.

And though his delusions have since faded, his journey into a Meta AI-powered reality left his life in shambles — deep in debt, reeling from job loss, isolated from his family, and struggling with depression and suicidal thoughts.

“I’ve lost everything,” Daniel, now 52, told Futurism, his voice dripping with fatigue. “Everything.”

In many ways, Daniel was Meta’s target customer. He was an experienced tech worker and AI enthusiast who had worked on machine learning projects in the past and had purchased the Meta glasses because he was intrigued by their AI features.

“I used Meta [AI] because they were integrated with these glasses,” said Daniel. “And I could wear glasses — which I wore all the time — and then I could speak to AI whenever I wanted to. I could talk to my ear.”

Today, however, as he continues to recover from his mental health breakdown, Daniel describes himself as a “shell” of who he “used to be.”

“My kids don’t talk to me because I got weird. They don’t know how to talk to me,” said the father of four. “I was a cook… I played the guitar. I love music. I love learning.”

But now, he says, he’s “just trying to survive day to day.”

According to Daniel and multiple family members, the 52-year-old had no history of mania or psychosis before encountering Meta AI. He’d struggled with alcoholism, but quit drinking in early 2023, months before he purchased the Meta smart glasses.

Keep reading

Is Court Hiding Outrageous Psychiatric Drug “Treatment” by Sealing Medical Records of Nick Reiner?

Contrary to what has been reported, Rob and Michele Reiner’s vicious murder was always about mental illness and prescription psychiatric drugs. What isn’t known is whether alleged killer Nick Reiner’s attorney will expose the fraud of psychiatric diagnosing and the dangers associated with psychiatric drugs to save his client from a life of prison hell. It’s a heavy lift but, in the long run, may save some lives besides that of the murderous Nick Reiner.

Prominent high powered attorney Allen Jackson has reportedly been hired by the Reiner family to represent alleged killer, Nick Reiner. In the only press conference about his client, Jackson said, “there are very, very complex and serious issues that are associated with this case,” and “things need to be thoroughly but carefully dealt with and examined and looked at and analyzed.”

With the acknowledgement that Nick Reiner lived a life of mental illness and psychiatric drug use, there certainly are “complex and serious issues.” But the issues aren’t what most people think, including the killer’s own family.

It’s been reported that Nick had been in rehab at least 18 times between the age of 15 and 22. That means that if Nick spent just three months at each of the rehab facilities, he would have spent 216 out of 364 weeks in rehab over that seven-year period. In short, it appears that Nick spent at least 60% of his life in rehab during that seven-year stretch. It could be less or more time, but clearly, Nick’s life revolved around psychiatric intervention. But it didn’t start at 15 years old.

Based on years of dealing with children diagnosed and drugged by the psycho/pharma industry one can imagine what happened to Nick Reiner. In fact, it has been reported that Rob Reiner suffered from depression and even his daughter Romy has taken antidepressants for years. So, we see that the Reiner family embraced psychiatric intervention and certainly utilized it for son and brother Nick.

If one were able to review Nick’s entire mental health file, one might expect to see the first psychiatric intervention at around four or five with an ADHD diagnosis and a Ritalin prescription. From there one might see that Nick’s drug prescription would be tweaked, either increased or changed to a different drug or another drug added for, perhaps, anxiety being observed.

By the time Nick was in middle school, he may have been moved to antianxiety drugs and antidepressants and, maybe, even antipsychotics to treat his erratic explosive behavior. In the end, what one can probably assume in Nick’s case is a history of constantly altered psychiatric drug cocktails to treat his ever-increasing psychiatric diagnoses.

The problem, of course, is that Rob and Michele believed in what the mental health “experts” were selling and like so many unsuspecting parents did not understand the fraud of psychiatric diagnosing and the harm associated with the mind-altering drug “treatments,” especially on a developing brain.

Let’s consider the facts about psychiatric diagnosing. Not one of the mental disorders listed in the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) is based in science or medicine. In other words, there is no abnormality in the brain that is ADHD, depression, anxiety, bipolar or any other mental disorders. These are behaviors, not abnormalities of the brain. In fact, if there were an objective, confirmable abnormality in the brain, one would seek assistance from a neurologist not a psychiatrist.

So, understanding that there is no abnormality that is any psychiatric diagnosis, one must ask what exactly are the psychiatric drugs “treating?” The answer, of course, is the drugs aren’t “treating” anything. The prescription, like illegal, drugs are mind-altering and will change behavior. Whether those changes are helpful depends on many things. In Nick Reiner’s case, one might suggest that the prescription drug “treatments” were definitely not helping.

It is no secret that the prescribing physician/psychiatrist have no idea how a cocktail of psychiatric drugs “work” in the brain, as cocktails of drugs have never been subjected to clinical trials. What the psychiatric elixirs do to the brain is anyone’s guess, including the pharmaceutical companies that openly admit that they have no clue how the drugs “work” in the brain as “treatment” for any alleged mental disorder.

Fully aware that Nick Reiner was being “treated” for schizophrenia let’s consider what is known about the possible “treatment.”  Normally, the go-to psychiatric drug is an antipsychotic. The newer antipsychotics, like Risperdal, Seroquel and Zyprexa (olanzapine), reportedly affect the serotonin in the brain. And how do these drugs “work?” According to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) “the mechanism of action of olanzapine, as with other drugs having efficacy in schizophrenia, is unknown.”  Clueless.

Were Rob and Michele informed by their $70,000 a month psychiatrist that the FDA has no clue about how the drugs used as “treatment” for their son “work?”  But it gets worse. Whether it’s antidepressants for depression, antianxiety drugs like benzodiazepines, or stimulants like Ritalin, the pharmaceutical companies cannot explain how the drugs work as “treatment.” The mode/mechanism of action is “unknown.”

Knowing that prescribing extraordinarily expensive “experts” could not explain to the Reiner’s how the drugs being prescribed to their son “work” it gets worse when one considers the possible adverse effects of the “treatments.”

Keep reading

Four-Decade Study in Denmark Shows Higher Suicide Rates Among Transgender People

A study in Denmark that spanned 40 years and included 6.6 million people found that those who identified as transgender have significantly higher rates of suicide and attempted suicide than others in the population. These results are similar to what research has found here, though the U.S. doesn’t collect the same level of data as Denmark which makes large-scale population studies like this impossible.

The Danish study included 3,759 people who identified as transgender. Among them, there were 92 suicide attempts and 12 suicides between 1980 and 2021. While these numbers seem small, they suggest that the rate of suicide attempts among those who identify as trans is 7.7 times higher than the rate of suicide attempts in the broader Danish population and the rate of suicide deaths is 3.5 times higher.

In addition, the researchers believe these numbers are an undercount because the records they used don’t always capture a person’s gender identity. The authors note that they only had data on gender identity for those who sought gender affirming care at a hospital or applied for a legal change of gender. Such data suggest that 0.6% of Denmark’s population identifies as transgender, but researchers believe the true number is much higher, which would mean the suicide rate would also be much higher.

The study can’t explain why trans people are at higher risk of suicide, but it seems clear that living in a society that is often unaccepting is a contributing factor. Previous research has found that 60% of transgender individuals in Denmark have experienced harassment and bullying and that 30% have experienced violence. Trans people in that country have also said they face discrimination in the healthcare system.

Keep reading

Psychedelic treatments show promise for OCD while cannabis doesn’t, review finds

A recent review of alternative treatments for obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) indicates that psychedelic treatments show promise for the disorder while cannabis does not.

Dr Michael Van Ameringen, a psychiatry professor at McMaster University in Ontario, Canada and lead author of the review published in the Journal of Psychiatric Research, said that 40-60 % of OCD patients get either partial or no relief with available treatments, including SSRIs and exposure and response prevention therapy.

While psychedelics and cannabinoids have become part of the conversation surrounding OCD – a disorder characterized by intrusive, obsessive thoughts and/or compulsive behaviors – there is a much larger body of published evidence on the efficacy of these substances for more common conditions, like depression and anxiety.

“We wanted to hone down and really understand, is there evidence for these things that have been talked about to be used as the next step treatments?” Van Ameringen explained.

Given the paucity of existing literature, Van Ameringen said he didn’t know what to expect. To make up for the lack of published information, he included conference presentations and preliminary, unpublished findings in the review paper.

Upon compiling available evidence, Van Ameringen and his team found “stronger signals” for the efficacy of psychedelics, specifically psilocybin (the psychoactive component of “magic mushrooms,”) than for cannabinoids like THC and CBD.

Van Ameringen theorizes that the difference is related to how these substances interact with areas of the brain related to OCD. While cannabinoids activate the brain’s CB1 receptors, which regulate symptoms like compulsions and anxiety, available evidence shows they don’t offer lasting relief from OCD symptoms.

Psilocybin, on the other hand, can reduce connectivity in the brain’s default mode network, which “essentially is involved in self referential thinking and rumination. The default mode network is really activated in OCD”, he says.

A difference in the methodology of cannabis and psilocybin studies might also have contributed to the different results, says Dr Mohamed Sherif, a psychiatrist and computational neuroscientist at Brown University who will lead a future clinical trial on psilocybin for OCD. Psychedelic clinical trials, like the one Sherif is planning, tend to offer patients not only medication but also encouragement to frame their experience as a therapeutic “journey”.

“This was not done in cannabinoids [studies,]” Sherif explained.

Dr Terrence Ching, a clinical psychologist at the Yale School of Medicine, similarly wondered if the way people use cannabis versus psilocybin might explain the different outcomes. While people tend to use cannabis for temporary relief, psilocybin can help facilitate actual changes in the brain and in patients’ perception of their OCD.

“One could use cannabis for the same therapeutic reason, of confronting something deeper about their OCD or their obsessive fears. But conventionally, people tend to use cannabis for an avoidance function,” Ching explained.

Preliminary results from Ching’s clinical trial on a single dose of psilocybin for OCD were included in Van Ameringen’s review paper, and showed that psilocybin was effective for OCD symptoms compared to placebo. Ching is now preparing the results of the trial for publication, and planning a second clinical trial where OCD patients will receive two doses of psilocybin at different times.

Keep reading

‘Obvious Mental Disability’: FBI Insider Raises Doubts About Man Charged As J6 Pipe-Bomber

An FBI whistleblower has come forward with perspectives that raise concerns that the bureau has charged an innocent person with planting bombs at Democratic and Republican headquarters on Jan 5, 2021, according to Kentucky Republican Rep. Thomas Massie. 

“The FBI employee disclosing this information to me doesn’t believe the FBI has arrested a person who is capable or motivated, or even interested enough in affairs outside of his own small world, to execute the J6 pipe bomb plot on his own,” wrote Massie in a Friday afternoon thread on X, noting that this was Massie’s “personal conclusion” about the whistleblower. 

Nearly five years after two pipe bombs were found at RNC and DNC headquarters on Jan 6, 2001, the FBI earlier this month arrested Brian J. Cole Jr. of Woodbridge, Virginia. He was charged with transporting an explosive device across state lines with the intent to either kill, injure, or intimidate, or to unlawfully damage property. He was also charged with attempted malicious destruction by means of explosive materials. The arrest came after mounting doubts that the FBI and other authorities were earnestly investigating the crime. Many theorized that, even worse than slow-rolling the probe, the feds were actively covering something up.  

Keep reading

Hey, Why Was the DC National Guard Shooter Naked Except for a Pair of Socks?

The first photograph that circulated of Rahmanullah Lakanwal, who shot two National Guard members in Washington on Wednesday, murdering one of them, showed him lying on a gurney, naked except for a pair of socks. Initial reports took due notice of this odd fact, without making any attempt to explain it: the New York Post reported that “the suspect, who was reportedly shot four times, was hauled away nearly naked in an ambulance and acted alone.” 

All right, but why was he “nearly naked”? Did police take off his clothes, perhaps to make sure he didn’t have a bomb? Did they remove his clothes to determine the extent of his injuries from having been shot four times? Both of those explanations are possible, but plenty of people have been searched for bombs, or examined for injuries, without being stripped entirely naked (except for the socks). So it is entirely possible that Rahmanullah Lakanwal was apprehended while nearly naked for another reason: after he fired upon his victims, he took off his clothes.

Now, why would he do that? The answer lies in Lakanwal’s worldview and motive. The Post reported that “police have not revealed a motive for the attack,” but other reports say that Lakanwal screamed “Allahu akbar” as he fired upon the Guard members, and if politically motivated myopia and willful ignorance don’t get in the way, that’s ample indication of his motive. Lakanwal would then have been firing upon the National Guard members because he is an Islamic jihadi and viewed them as the forces of an enemy of Allah and Islam, the United States.

Those who think that Lakanwal could not possibly believe such a thing, because he worked for the CIA in Afghanistan and was therefore obviously a friend of the United States, are displaying a dangerous naivete. For many of those Afghans who aided American forces, it was just a job; others preferred the Americans to the Taliban, yet still hated the Americans. There is no reason why working for the Americans in Afghanistan would definitively rule out the possibility that Rahmanullah Lakanwal was a jihadi.

In fact, his being naked reinforces the likelihood that he was a jihadi. Islamic paradise is a physical place, where the blessed recline in “enclosed gardens and vineyards” (Qur’an 78:32), where there will be “fruit in plenty, neither out of reach nor forbidden, and raised couches” (Qur’an 56:32-4). On those couches, there will be “large-breasted women of equal age” (Qur’an 78:32-3). These are the famous virgins of paradise: “Indeed, we have created them a special creation and made them virgins, lovers, friends” (Qur’an 56:35-7).

These women are, according to Islamic tradition, waiting with tremendous enthusiasm for those who “kill and are killed” (Qur’an 9:111) for Allah, and are rewarded for doing so with an immediate trip to paradise. That is why 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta packed a fancy suit in his luggage (which was flagged, while he himself wasn’t) on that fateful day.

Atta was actually anticipating changing into this suit before he flew the plane he hijacked into one of the World Trade Center towers. He wanted to make this change so that he would turn up in paradise looking his very best for the heavenly virgins. According to a letter that was also in his luggage, Atta was looking forward to “marriage” with the “women of paradise,” whom he would encounter “dressed in their most beautiful clothing.”

In Boulder, Colo. back in March 2021, a Muslim named Ahmad Al Issa (which was how he himself spelled his name, although the establishment media, perhaps to obscure his Islamic identity, has consistently referred to him ever since as “Alissa”) was more direct. He walked fully clothed into a King Soopers supermarket in Boulder and murdered ten people; then he stripped to his shorts, which is all he was wearing when he was arrested.

Keep reading

‘Slender Man’ stabber Morgan Geyser captured following nationwide manhunt

The nationwide manhunt for Morgan Geyser, the Wisconsin woman convicted in the 2014 “Slender Man” stabbing, has come to an end, authorities announced Sunday night.

The Madison Police Department confirmed Geyser was taken into custody in Illinois at approximately 10:34 p.m., ending the intense search.

Geyser escaped after she cut off her Department of Corrections monitoring bracelet and fled a Madison group home Saturday night, police said.

Madison police announced her escape in a social media post on Sunday.

“Morgan Geyser was last seen in the area of Kroncke Dr. around 8 p.m. with an adult acquaintance. Her whereabouts are unknown as of Sunday morning,” the department wrote.

“The Madison Police Department was notified of her disappearance Sunday morning.”

“A recent image of Geyser, captured on security video from this past month, is attached below. If you see her, please call 911,” police added.

In 2017, Geyser pleaded guilty to attempted first-degree intentional homicide in the violent stabbing of Payton Leutner, but claimed she was not responsible due to her mental illness.

She told investigators she tried to kill Leutner to please the horror character Slender Man and was ultimately found not guilty by reason of mental defect. 

Keep reading

‘Slender Man’ stabber Morgan Geyser escapes group home, cuts off ankle monitor – 11 years after horrifying attack

One of the “Slender Man stabbers” — who viciously ambushed and hacked a classmate when she was 12 years old in an effort to please a made-up internet boogeyman — has vanished, and cops are hunting her.

Morgan Geyser, 23, cut off her ankle monitor and escaped from the group home where she was living — and she’s on the run, according to cops in Madison, Wisconsin.

“Her whereabouts are unknown as of Sunday morning,” police said.

Geyser, along with her friend Anissa Weier, lured a fellow sixth-grade girl into a Waukesha, Wisconsin, park in 2014 and stabbed her 19 times.

The attack was an effort to impress “Slender Man,” a supernatural character that rose to viral prominence on internet forums and was later the subject of a 2018 horror movie.

Miraculously, the victim survived the horrifying assault, crawling her way to safety until she was found by a passing bicyclist.

Keep reading

UK woman said she wanted to be tortured and killed on fetish site — her body was found in shallow grave in the US

The boyfriend of a woman who allegedly paid someone to torture and kill her said that she had been suffering from mental illness before the shocking events, according to Florida authorities.

Sonia Exelby was reported missing in October before police were able to trace her to an Airbnb in Reddick and found her remains nearby.

Exelby boarded a flight to Florida and arrived on Oct. 10, according to an investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. The FDLE said that Exelby posted on a fetish website that she was willing to pay someone to torture and kill her.

A week after she arrived in Florida, her remains were found in a shallow grave.

Investigators linked her to a man named Dwain Hall, who had used her bank card and tried to use her credit cards.

When they interviewed him, he gave conflicting accounts of how they met.

Police said they gathered evidence pointing to Hall as Exelby’s alleged killer.

Authorities said Hall purchased rope and gun cleaner among other items at a Walmart in Gainesville on Oct. 10. After that purchase, he made a second purchase of a shovel. He then allegedly went to pick up Exelby at the airport, and they both went to an Airbnb that he had rented.

The next day, he charged $1,200 to Exelby’s bank card.

Authorities said he recorded a video of Exelby showing her with cuts and bruises, and asking her to say that she consented to being stabbed.

Exelby sent a message to a friend via the Discord app expressing regret.

“I’m so, so scared. I’m so broken and in so much pain. … I thought he’d do it quick and not give my mind time to stew,” she wrote.

On Oct. 14, Hall allegedly sent a package to a friend that authorities said contained a knife that had traces of Exelby’s blood. It also had a bracelet with DNA from both Exelby and Hall.

Keep reading