Court Cases Of Mental Illnesses In Just Mercy By Bryan Stevenson

Just Mercy is an astonishing book in which Bryan Stevenson describes many court cases of mental illnesses and racial inequalities. Stevenson is a young defended attorney who shared his experiences about his client’s background and what is going on in the justice system. While meeting up with his client, he noticed many connection and similarities through most of his cases. He discovered that his clients had all gone through many hardships while they were in prison. While these clients were at risk from execution, they revealed that they were falsely accused of the crime they did not even commit. Even the client’s family and community were aware, but there is nothing that they can do. Furthermore, what shockingly is that some of his

McMillian, who was just an ordinary black male, was accused of kidnapping Ralph Myers and for the murder of Ronda Morrison. Ronda Morrison was murdered in a store, but no evidence was found of who could of have shot her. However, Ralph Myers reported to the police that he was kidnapped by McMillian and witness Morrison being murdered at the store. The police believed Myers and arrested McMillian on sodomy charges. However, McMillian did not commit these crimes and the entire community that knew him did their best to proves his innocence. They said that “Walter was at home when Ronda Morrison was killed” while they were on a fish fry (Stevenson, 66). Sadly, Sheriff Thomas Tates took no interest into going into further investigation. It was rather odd that the justice system was not doing anything to prevent McMillian from being a criminal. As analyzing further into this case, it is revealed that McMillian “would report for years that all he heard throughout his arrest, over and over again, was the word nigger. “Nigger this,” “nigger that,” followed by insults and threats of lynching” (Stevenson, 48). Even Sheriff Tate called out McMillian during his arrest. Stevenson was horrified by the racial slurs and threat from what his client was receiving. He tried everything he can do to help save his client’s life and bring everything to justice. Unfortunately, Walter McMillian was placed on death row and

Richardson, who was a Vietnam Veteran, was placed on death row for blowing up a bomb on the porch that killed an innocent child. However, Richardson did not mean to harm anybody and kill the child. His only interest was to win back the love of his life, Dothan. Richardson’s plan was to blow up the bomb on the porch and Dothan will come to him for protection. However, her niece saw the bomb on the porch and wanted to look at it. Unfortunately, this bomb cost the child’s death and left Richardson feeling devastated. Richardson was then arrested for murder and as a threat to the community. Thus, the justice system decided to sentence him to execution without any further investigation of Richardson’s life. As Stevenson learned more information about Richardson, it is revealed that Richardson is mentally ill from the Vietnam War. He discovered that the “defense lawyer presented no evidence about Herbert’s background, his military service, his trauma from the war, his relationship with the victim, his obsession with the girlfriend” (Stevenson, 77) to the court. This is the case that should of have been addressed to the justice system from the start, now the entire justice system is not aware of Richardson’s mental illness. But there are obvious signs that should of have been recognized from the start with Richardson’s post-traumatic stress disordered. Even Stevenson recognize his