February 29, 2008

5 Year-old on 5 Psychiatric Drugs Dies

5 Year-old on 5 Psychiatric Drugs Dies

This psychiatrist said he was treating symptoms of a
five-year-old. But he was unable to attribute these to an illness with
a pathology. Mental illnesses can only be seen by psychiatrists. Why
should we trust their visions? Journalists regularly criticize and
question the President, governors and mayors. But they never question
psychiatrists. Are psychiatrists better deceivers than politicians?
Journalists hold the President accountable for the deaths of
soldiers in Iraq. Why aren't psychiatrists held accountable for the
deaths caused by their patients and their drugs?

Roy Bercaw - Editor ENOUGH ROOM

You may recall the extremely high profile case of Rebecca Riley, a 4
year old in Massachusetts, who died while on various psychiatric drugs
including the antipsychotic drug Seroquel. The Boston Globe, NY
Times, CNN and USA Today reported that story widely.

Now , a responsible psychologist from Tennessee contacted us this
morning to report the below tragedy. The mother of a 6 year old
girl named Cheyenne is on trial in Tennessee for her daughter's
murder.

Psychiatrist Saran Mudumbi should also be on trial. He prescribed a
combination of drugs for this little girl that included the
antipsychotics Risperdal and Seroquel. (More on antipsychotic drugs
here: http://tmap.wordpress.com/

You can write a letter to the editor here: editor@southernstandard.com
If you have any connectons to major national media, please forward
this to them.

http://www.southernstandard.net/news.php?viewStory=46251

Cheyenne was heavily medicated-Psychiatrist testifies he prescribed
three drugs at first session
Psychiatrist Dr. Saran Mudumbi testified that he put Cheyenne Delp,
then 5, on three
different types of medication to fight depression, anxiety and
paranoia after one office
visit with the child. That initial visit took place April 3, 2003

Southern Standard
Cheyenne was heavily medicated - Psychiatrist testifies he
prescribed three drugs at first session
By James Clark
Feb 27, 2008

[From article]
Prescriptions drugs Cheyenne was taking
Here's a list of the prescription medication Cheyenne Delp was taking
at the time of her death, according to her psychiatrist Dr. Saran
Mudumbi:
Imipramine
Risperdal
Guanfacine
Benadryl
Seroquel

February 26, 2008

Cambridge MA Triple A Bond Rating

Cambridge MA Triple A Bond Rating

The Cambridge City Manager takes full credit for a Triple A Bond rating for the City. (Victoria Cheng, "All's A-OK with finances, as city saves big on bonds," Boston Globe, City Weekly, February 17, 2008) The rating agencies state it is the ability of the taxpayers to pay their taxes that is the biggest factor. Is this Manager the only one who could merit this rating with these taxpayers?
It is possible to employ bond insurers in order to get a Triple A rating. But these insurers squandered their trust by insuring the "shaky" sub prime mortgage debt. (NICOLE GELINAS, "THE BOND MESS: ELIOT'S BAD FIX," New York Post, February 21, 2008)
As a result of the sub-prime mortgage scandal the Rating agencies (Moody's, Fitch, and Standard & Poors) themselves are being questioned by the New York State Attorney General. They gave "high ratings to sub prime debt that later plummeted." (Bloomberg, "RATING AGENCIES NOT OFF HOOK: AG," New York Post, February 8, 2008) Were these ratings more reliable than Cambridge's Triple A Bond Rating?
Of what real value are these ratings? As long as the bond investors believe in the quality of the taxpayer the cost of borrowing will remain low. But it is still borrowing. Future taxpayers will have to repay these loans. Why is the Manager being praised for increasing the debt burden of the city's taxpayers?
Is this one more example of fooling the people and bewildering the herd as Noam Chomsky calls it?

Roy Bercaw - Editor ENOUGH ROOM

CAMBRIDGE
All's A-OK with finances, as city saves big on bonds
By Victoria Cheng,
Boston Globe Correspondent
February 17, 2008

* * *

THE BOND MESS: ELIOT'S BAD FIX
By NICOLE GELINAS
New York Post
February 21, 2008 --
[From article]
THE Port Authority and other public borrowers are paying steeply higher interest on some debt because Wall Street screwed up. And Gov. Spitzer and state regulators can make the mess worse.

* * *

RATING AGENCIES NOT OFF HOOK: AG
Bloomberg
New York Post
February 8, 2008 --
[From article]
New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo said "supposed reforms" by Standard & Poor's and Moody's Investors Service, which gave high ratings to subprime debt that later plummeted, won't stop his investigation of the companies.

Harvard University Promotes Drug Treatment Ignoring Danger

Harvard University Promotes Drug Treatment Ignoring Danger

Harvard administrators promote psychiatric treatment for students. (ADITI BALAKRISHNA and RACHEL A. STARK, "Mental Health Week Kicks Off, Harvard Crimson, February 25, 2008) They do not address the pervasive animosity toward persons with "a history of mental illness." Nor do they address the repeated reports of persons who stop taking psychiatric drugs who are charged with violent crime. If taking the drugs causes a person who stops taking them to become violent why begin taking them? Psychiatry treats imaginary illnesses that only psychiatrists can see.
Fund raising for the Bazelon Center helps promote more drug treatment. They see treatment as a civil right. What other form of treatment employs the police powers to force treatment? Bazelon promotes the notion of parity between medical illness and psychiatric illness. But only psychiatric illness is blamed for violence. Only psychiatric medical records are deemed unworthy of privacy laws. Parity increases the client base.
Drug companies have all positions covered. The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI) is a lobbyist for and funded by the drug companies promoting drug treatment masquerading as a patient advocate. They advocate for drug treatment not for patients.They call this fighting stigma.
Psychiatry is a means of social control without due process. They do harm in the name of good. Cleverly the co-chair of Harvard's Human Rights Committee is a former psychiatric researcher, who conducted experiments on mental patients. This is how convoluted the notion of civil rights is at Harvard.

Roy Bercaw - Editor ENOUGH ROOM

http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=522113

Mental Health Week Kicks Off
Published On 2/25/2008 2:30:17 AM
By ADITI BALAKRISHNA and RACHEL A. STARK
Harvard Crimson Staff Writers

February 13, 2008

Beatrice Klemm Obituary

Beatrice Klemm Obituary

http://www.scanlanfuneralhome.com/?p=obituary_view&id=48190

Beatrice Klemm

Home:Pompton Plains, NJ
Date of Death:January 12, 2008
Age:78
Birthdate:August 25, 1929
Place of Birth:Queens, NY
Service Information:Thursday, January 17, 2008 11:00 AM
M. John Scanlan Funeral Home, Pompton Plains, NJ
Visitation:Wednesday, January 16, 2008 2-4 and 7-9 p.m. at M. John Scanlan Funeral Home, Pompton Plains, NJ
Interment:Mt. Rest Cemetery, Butler, NJ

Beatrice Klemm, 78, of Pompton Plains, formerly of Bloomingdale, died Saturday, January 12, 2008 at Care One Nursing Home in Morristown.

Born in Queens, New York, Beatrice was the daughter of the late Samuel and the late Faye (nee Schwitzer) Bercaw, and lived her childhood years in Passaic.

Marrying Gustav Klemm on March 10, 1952 in Wallington, the couple settled in Bloomingdale, raising four sons.

In 1972, Beatrice earned her Bachelor of Arts in Elementary Education from The William Paterson College of New Jersey. A lifelong learner, Mrs. Klemm also attended numerous continuing education courses until shortly before her death. She taught in the Bloomingdale Public School system for more than 20 years.

Beatrice was also an avid reader and served as a volunteer for many years at the Bloomingdale and Kinnelon Public Libraries.

She is survived by her sons, Dennis and his wife Lisa of Jefferson, Robert and his wife Louise of Butler, Richard of West Milford, and Kenneth and his wife Leslie of Metairie, Louisiana; her grandchildren, Allyson, Timothy and Olivia Klemm of Jefferson and Nicholas and Lauren Klemm of Metairie, Louisiana; her sister, Maxine Musick of Colfax, California; and her brother, Roy Bercaw of Cambridge, Massachusetts. She was preceded in death by her husband, Gustav.

A funeral service will be held 11 a.m. Thursday at the funeral home, followed by interment at Mount Rest Cemetery in Butler. Visiting hours will be Wednesday from 2-4 and 7-9 p.m. at the funeral home.

In lieu of flowers, donations to St. Judes Children Research Hospital, Memorial and Honor Program, 501 St. Jude Place, Memphis, Tennessee 38105 (http://www.stjude.org) would be greatly appreciated by the Klemm family.

EISENSTARK, RAYMOND Obituary

EISENSTARK, RAYMOND Obituary

December 22, 1999
The New York Times

EISENSTARK-Raymond Gerald, 53, on December 20, 1999, of acute leukemia. Beloved husband of Sarita Nemerow Eisenstark, brother of Keith and Sandra, stepfather of Raphael, Jordan, Libby and Lisa Copeland. Innovator in the computer software field since 1966, he worked on virtually every type of equipment, programming language and operating system in use during the last three decades, and provided training in software engineering and UNIX here and abroad. An expert in communications & middleware, he set up one of the first Internet service providers in New York City. A wise, bold thinker with an indomitable will, generous heart and irreverent sense of humor. A man with a rare talent for friendship and a great enthusiasm for life. Respected, loved and admired by family and colleagues everywhere. Services today, December 22, 11:45AM, at ''The Riverside'', 76th Street and Amsterdam Avenue. Charitable contributions may be made in his honor toward the relief of human suffering.

Walter Bowart Obituary

Walter Bowart Obituary

http://tinyurl.com/yvbmc6

FBI Can't Find Its Tail

FBI Can't Find Its Tail

The lack of prosecutions of organized crime in Massachusetts is
due more to the priorities of the FBI, than the lack of organized
crime operations . (Kevin Cullen, "Wiseguys, wannabes," Boston Globe,
February 11, 2008) Major crime operations moved into offices run by
corporations and public officials. As the Corleones said you can steal
more money with a law degree than with a gun. US Judge Mark Wolf
questioned why US Attorney Michael Sullivan does not focus on white
collar crime.
Taxpayers cover multi-billion-dollar thefts using government
agencies. See the Savings and Loan scandal, the subprime mortgage
scandal, HUD, etc. Best Buy employees discovered a terror plot not the
FBI. The corruption of the Boston FBI office was revealed by defense
attiorney Anthony Cardinale. US Attorney Donald Stern took credit when
credit was not due.
The Gambino arrests resulted from an informants who was arrested, in order to save his own behind, not from FBI diligence. The New York arrests excluded public officials, police and corporation executives that worked with the Gambino crew members. They will cooperate with any family. Business is business. In Boston after
Weeks (in print) and Bulger boasted of having local police and state
police on their payroll there has yet to be any investigation of any
police agencies including the FBI. It appears that crime families
moved out of the streets and now comfortably operate in public and
private offices. It is possible to fool most of the people most of the
time.

Roy Bercaw - Editor ENOUGH ROOM

Wiseguys, wannabes
By Kevin Cullen,
Boston Globe Columnist
February 11, 2008

Reading through that 170-page indictment aimed primarily at the
Gambino crime family in New York the other day, it was hard not to
feel a twinge of nostalgia.

Among the 62 wiseguys and wannabes named were such luminaries as John
"Johnny Red Rose" Pisano, Thomas "Tommy Sneakers" Cacciopoli, John
"Jackie the Nose" D'Amico, and the deliciously named Anthony
"Buckwheat" Giammarino.

Now, perhaps there is some loanshark in Cleveland called "Stymie," but
I'm guessing Giammarino is the only made guy in America named after a
black kid on "The Little Rascals."

Despite this talk of the Red Sox having exorcised the demon of
inferiority complex when it comes to all things New York, my first
reaction to the indictment was: Why we no have?

There hasn't been a roundup of mafiosi by the feds around here in
years - and don't hold your breath waiting for one.

The difference between New York and Boston is not simply one of scale:
that New York, as home to the five biggest crime families, is a
major-league wiseguy town while Boston is not. There are still more
than a few made guys around here extorting bookies, running drugs,
whatever. Still, federal prosecutors are loath to bring another
era-spanning racketeering case against the remnants of Boston's mob
not merely because there are so few wiseguys left but because doing so
would inevitably mean revisiting the legacy of corruption within law
enforcement, especially Boston's FBI office.

To suggest, as the Department of Justice does, that it began and ended
with a few rogue agents involved in the mishandling of James "Whitey"
Bulger is simplistic. So, while the good guys in New York are still
chasing real live wiseguys, we're chasing ghosts, namely Bulger, who
may or may not be alive and is most definitely not where the FBI has
been or has not been looking for him.

Taking advantage of the federal racketeering act, prosecutors were
able to charge the New York wiseguys with crimes that stretch to 1976.
Detailing in court the way people around here were getting framed,
used, and excused going back to 1986, let alone 1976, would be a
defense attorney's dream.

"As the FBI approaches its 100-year anniversary, we remember that our
very beginnings were rooted in fighting gangsterism," FBI Deputy
Director John Pistole said in New York. "We face other daunting
challenges today, but our commitment to battling organized crime has
never wavered."

Could Pistole come here and make that same speech? Actually, let me
rephrase the question: Could Pistole come here, make that same speech,
and be believed?

If federal prosecutors here were to prepare an indictment similar in
scope and historic reach to the one in New York, some of those
indicted would have been working for the FBI or enlisted as government
witnesses over the last decade to clean up the mess created by corrupt
agents. Some of them will be in Miami in June, ready to testify for
the government when Bulger's old FBI handler, John Connolly, goes on
trial for allegedly helping Bulger's guys murder people.

The greatest single act of government aggression against the Mafia
around here was the creation of the Massachusetts Lottery. It muscled
out the mob's bread and butter, the daily number, essentially leaving
the gangsters with sports betting. The federal prosecutions of the
1980s took out some big shots, but the chances of seeing another big
Mafia trial here are, unlike Carmen DiNunzio, the alleged local Mafia
leader, slim.

DiNunzio faces state charges for extortion and sports bookmaking,
which might land him maybe five years, instead of a federal rap that
would be effectively a life sentence. As for DiNunzio's supposed
nickname, "The Big Cheese," he insists nobody calls him that, that
it's an invention of the cops and the newspapers because he runs a
cheese shop in the North End.

We have been reduced to bookmaking cases and made-up wiseguy nicknames.

What would Buckwheat say?

Kevin Cullen is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at cullen@globe.com.

February 5, 2008

Bias for Thee but Not for Me?

Bias for Thee but Not for Me?

After many years white and Asian people are finally addressing
unlawful discrimination in the public schools. (CHUCK BENNETT,"IN 'WRONG'
MINORITY,"
New York Post, November 19, 2007) But why are there still no questions why
persons with disabilities are excluded from such programs? Discrimination based
upon disability is as illegal as racial discrimination. But journalists, lawyers
and public schools continue this activity. Let me guess, it never entered their
minds.

Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM

IN 'WRONG' MINORITY
New York Post
By CHUCK BENNETT

November 19, 2007 -- Three Chinese parents in Brooklyn are expected to file a
federal lawsuit today challenging a popular city-run tutoring program on the
grounds it discriminates against Asians, The Post has learned.

The Specialized High School Institute preps gifted but "underrepresented"
minorities to ace the competitive exam to get into top city high schools like
Stuyvesant or Brooklyn Tech.

But the parents say it is unfair - and illegal - for the Department of Education
to limit eligibility to blacks and Latinos.

"The program only selects certain kinds of minorities and unfortunately my
daughter didn't fall into that category," said Peggy Foo-Ching, 47, a mom from
Bensonhurst who said her 12-year-old daughter's application last year was
ignored.

The Specialized High School Institute was created to expand the population of
black and Latino students at the elite high schools, but the Department of
Education has always insisted anyone who qualifies for a free lunch could apply.

Foo-Ching's eldest daughter qualified for the institute in 2003 and is now a
student at Brooklyn Tech, but the mother believes guidelines were changed
barring her younger daughter from participating last March.

A Department of Education internal memo obtained by lawyers trying the case
indicated that eligibility criteria excludes whites and Asians.

"What this memo reveals is blatant and categorical discrimination by race. If
you are white or Asian, you're not supposed to get an application," said
Christopher Hajec, an attorney with the Center for Individual Rights, a
conservative advocacy group.

"It's not the business of the government of New York City to be counting up the
Asians or whites in, say, Stuyvesant High School and concluding there are too
many of them."

Andrew Jacob, a Department of Education spokesman, said the racial criteria has
been under review since summer, when a US Supreme Court ruling said ethnicity
could not be a factor in deciding which public schools students attend.

He could not comment on the suit, but said no policy will be changed before
March, when the next group of sixth-graders will be invited to apply to the
program.

The father who initiated the suit, Stanley Ng, said he understood how
controversial his challenge may be viewed.

"It's not something that I take lightly," he said. "There are many Asian and
white kids in this district who can't pay for tutoring. What is their recourse?"

cbennett@nypost.com

Promoting Fake Illnesses

Promoting Fake Illnesses

No evidence supports the statement, "Schizophrenia is a
biological illness caused by excessive stimulation in one part of the brain,
dismally balanced by deficits in another." (Elissa Ely, "Undefinable madness,"
Boston Globe, November 25, 2007)
What motivates this unsubstantiated claim? What financial ties does Ely
have with the drug industry? Two-thirds of medical school professors have such
ties.
The false notion of psychiatry as a biologically based illness is a fantasy
created by PR flacks for the drug companies. When a group of citizens challenged
the American Psychiatric Association to provide evidence they were unable to do
so. A well-funded continuing campaign promotes this boondoggle.
H.L. Mencken observed, "No one ever went broke underestimating the
intelligence of the American people. Abraham Lincoln noted "You can fool some of
the people all
of the time." If enough people believe this nonsense, the drug companies can
continue making profits selling bunkum.
Boston Globe headlines irrationally imply that mental illness causes crime.
Science proved that withdrawal from psychiatric drugs does cause crime. The
Globe
ignores that fact and promotes more drug treatment. The Globe omits any
references to the rights of persons with disabilities. Is there any connection?

Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM

Undefinable madness
By Elissa Ely
Boston Globe
November 25, 2007

"SO, WHAT is schizophrenia?" a 10-year-old I know asked on the way into the art
store to buy an easel for her clubhouse.

I took inventory. Schizophrenia is a biological illness caused by excessive
stimulation in one part of the brain, dismally balanced by deficits in another.
It is not due to angry mothering. A virus may or may not be involved. Being born
in certain months of the year seems to increase the risk. It is genetic and
ruinous. According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, that Blue Book of
psychiatry, a number of specific symptoms must be met - delusions and/or
hallucinations, and/or disorganized thought forms, and functional deterioration.
Over half of all patients also have substance abuse, and many die prematurely.
Most require numerous hospitalizations. Symptoms are fine-tuned by medications
that cause their own problems. There is little to like about the illness and
less about the treatment. Schizophrenia is a five-syllable diagnosis stamped on
a patient's chart for life.

None of that seemed like the right answer.

So, I told her some stories - stories to those who hear them, lives to those who
lead them. I told her about a man who ate only white foods, another man who
doused his face with a plant sprayer to ward off the devil, a third man who
spoke to visitors only in his language, which seemed to involve rhyming words
that began with "ch," and a fourth who thought his eyeglasses were watching him.
I told her about a woman who believed she was royalty from a different planet
and another woman who thought her parents were impersonators trying to replace
her true family.

Windows cracked, doors split open, and eyes peered out. I was remembering other
faces now. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual describes hallucinations and
delusions, but it doesn't begin to describe how personal and particular they
are. This is told best by those in their grip.

"There are people dead in the grave holding onto people still walking around," a
patient said to me. "I have a different style of life view," said another. He
was on his way from Pennsylvania to Colorado; over the years he had taken buses
through 42 states trying to stay one step ahead of his voices. "Sometimes I go
to a new place and they don't show up until the next day," he said. "But I know
one thing. They never show up at 2 a.m." Why's that? I asked. "Because," he
said, irritably, "they're sleeping."

But what is schizophrenia? The 10-year-old still wanted to know. She wasn't
satisfied.

From the halls of a state hospital that closed 15 years ago, a face like Father
Christmas looked out with an answer. He had lived there for a decade. He
believed he was powered by a race-car quality engine (how many of us believe we
are what we are not, only with lesser consequences?). He was undergoing an
examination by the chief psychiatrist on the unit, who was teaching us
youngsters how to diagnose.

"How are you?" the chief asked Father Christmas. (Open-ended inviting question.)

"Mediocre," he said.

"Tell me about yourself." (More of the same.)

"I'm 68 years old. I have 56 brothers in the Boer War."

"How old does that make you?" (Gently trying to point out absurdity.)

"I'm 200 years old."

"Is that crazy?" the doctor asked. (Humor.)

"No. I'm the Oracle at Delphi. "

"OK," said the doctor. (Never question delusion.) "OK, can you tell us who the
president is? "

"Absolutely not."

Father Christmas stood up and started walking. This was the question too
insulting to tolerate. He turned at the door.

"I'm not neurotic, you know," he said.

That is schizophrenia; someone living with psychotic symptoms, enduring assured
but unhelpful questions of experts who do not. It is easy to depersonalize on
the one hand and romanticize on the other. It is pain, sly humor, dignity, and a
world of insight on the head of a pin with no ability to control it.

This was conversation to have with the young artist at a future time, though,
because for now her arms were filled with clubhouse supplies and she had
probably heard about as much as she wanted to know.

Elissa Ely is a psychiatrist.

No Snitching for Me but Not for Thee?

No Snitching for Me but not for Thee?

Two factors never heard regarding the snitching issues is the role modeling
of public officials and professionals. (Maria Cramer, "Judge targets
no-snitching culture," Boston Globe, November 23, 2007) Why are youths expected
to snitch on their colleagues? How many police snitch on other police officers?
How many lawyers? How many doctors? How many politicians? This suggests that
young people will experience no retaliation.
It is very difficult to fool young people these days with easy access to
the internet and TV. They know how the world works at a much younger age. If you
want to change the way the courts work you need to begin with the folks who run
the courts and then the folks who write the laws.

Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM

Judge targets no-snitching culture
Invites city teens to court for video and straight talk
By Maria Cramer
Boston Globe Staff
November 23, 2007

The 12 middle school students had just finished watching an instructional video
produced to help break down the "no snitching" culture in Boston when a court
volunteer asked them a series of questions.
more stories like this

How many have heard shootings at night?

Every hand went up.

How many knew someone who had been shot?

At least seven raised their hands.

Finally, how many have ever reported gunfire to police?

This time, no one raised an arm.

The children's response is why court officials have been showing the video "You
Be the Judge" to hundreds of fifth- and sixth-graders since January. The video,
filmed by the Huntington Theatre Company, tells the fictional story of a Boston
teenager named Bobby Wilson who is left holding a gun his friend used to shoot
another teenager after a drug deal gone wrong. Bobby is arrested when his
girlfriend, who had urged him to go to the police, refuses to hide the gun for
him. His fear of "snitching" leads to a first-degree murder charge and he is
left sitting morosely in a courtroom, filled with regret, as a jury decides his
fate.

On Monday, the 12 students - sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders from the
McCormack Middle School in Dorchester - gathered in West Roxbury District Court
for a viewing.

The children were older than most of the students who have watched the video,
and some had already had brushes with the law. Court officials were worried they
would react cynically to the video.

As it played, the children did snicker occasionally, mocking the sometimes stiff
acting and melodramatic courtroom scenes. But they paid attention and stayed
quiet for most of the film.

"It was good," said Shawn Rowe, a serious, hazel-eyed 15-year-old, afterward.
"It seemed like something that could happen."

For others, the video lacked credibility.

"That video wasn't real. It was made by adults," said one 14-year-old
eighth-grader who declined to give his name. "If it had been done by kids, it
would have been way different."

Asked what he meant, he said that for one thing, most girls he knows would have
hidden their boyfriend's gun.

"My girl would take that hammy," he said, referring to the slang word for gun.

"I wouldn't," retorted Myiesha, a 14-year-old girl who asked that her last name
be withheld.

The video unleashed a torrent of discussion inside the judges lobby, where
Kathleen Coffey, the first justice of the West Roxbury court, had invited them
to view the film with probation and police officers.

The children debated whether Wilson should be found guilty and if his girlfriend
did the right thing - most of them believed she did. They then peppered Coffey
and the officers with questions about mandatory gun sentences, why juveniles are
sometimes charged as adults, and why police shoot to kill. In turn, the
officials asked the children why they do not turn to authority figures when they
witness an assault or are the victims of one.

"If you go to the principal, that's going to make things worse," Rowe said.
"Because they're going to come after you even more."

The video, which features police officers, court officials, and teenagers from
across the city, is part of Reinventing Justice, a volunteer program of police
officers, lawyers, and others run by Coffey and designed to make the courts more
accessible to the community.

Coffey said they decided to show the film to middle school students because they
are more likely influenced by its message than high school students, who have
formed firmer opinions about cooperating with police.

Middle school students are at "the turning point," she said. "You still have
their attention."

As the students prepared to leave her conference room for a tour of the
courthouse, Coffey told them she hoped they would reflect on what they discussed
that morning. They would be heading into her courtroom to watch defendants plead
their cases. Many of them, Coffey told them, are good people who made "bad
decisions."

"What we're talking about is serious," she said. "I pray every night and I'm
sure your parents pray every night that you will make good decisions."

Maria Cramer can be reached at mcramer@globe.com.
© Copyright 2007 Globe Newspaper Company.