[Gods Ivy]

Originally posted by AKA_Monet
I am not a lawyer so you have to ask the "lawyer sorors". But if I was one of the folks for the prosecution, straight up premeditated murder? No. Involuntary manslaughter, possibly...

An accident? Did the personnel know the boy had the Sickle Cell Trait--like was it in his medical record. It sounds like it was... So to me, if I was on a jury, which I probably wouldn't be because of my expertise, then I would say it was NOT an accident because the boy had it in his chart. Because the personnel used excessive force on a known Sickle Cell Trait boy, that to mean would mean they killed that child. Because I am not a lawyer, I don't know the difference between the legal definitions of "accidental death", "involuntary manslaughter" or "negligent homicide". But I would definitely say it was malpractice like they do to physicians...

The issue from my perspective is that the legal community is behind the medical forensics biotech community in some aspects. It will take acts of Congress when new technologies arise to keep the legal community upto speed...

My stance, force was too excessive on an adolescent boy that has the sickle cell trait... Period... Too many unknowns occurred and one will NEVER know if it was due to insufficiency of fully functional hemaglobin or not.

As far as your friend, she will probably live a fairly decent life without many issues any different from other people. If she is part of the health disparity community, then her problems will be similar to others with the additive effect of the trait compounding the issue.

The key is to get informed and come in walking into the door while at the physician's office with monitored NOTES. 9 times out of 10 the physicians will write it off, but that is where we need the "political forces" to make our case known about the medical relevancy and advocacy of sickle cell anemia.

Sure, I can find some tidbits and caveats about the molecular mechanisms and basis of sickle cell disease. How sickle call haploinsufficiency causes whole organ failure, etc. And I probably can get some funding for it. But if the US President or Congress does not see the significance to studying this illness, then why should the public???

Why do so many African Americans still have hypertension (high blood pressure)? Does it have ANYTHING to do with sickle cell trait, Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms, etc.? I know NOBODY studies that right now... NADA... And guess what, NOBODY give a rat's ass about it...

Okey, like maybe 2 dozen researchers worldwide... Most of them in Africa who have zero funding opportunities.

I agree, but in my opinion the force would have been excessive to a healthy child. I have a friend who works in a youth correctional facility and they have never be able to touch the inmates and they are inmates. This was a boot camp. I just think the whole ordeal was criminal.