Thursday, April 12, 2007

CIVIL LIBERTIES / BUSHWHACKS


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CANADIAN JAILED IN GEORGIA FOR TRAFFIC VIOLATION

ANDREW SEYMOUR, OTTAWA CITIZEN - Carelton student Cheryl Kuehn was
detained in Georgia for running a stop sign and speeding. A 23-year-old
Carleton University master's student is outraged and demanding an
apology from Georgia officials after spending more than 11 uncomfortable
hours in a detention centre for running a stop sign and speeding.

Cheryl Kuehn said she was fingerprinted and had her mug shot taken
before being forced to strip naked and shower, don a navy blue jail
outfit and sleep in a cell with two other women while other inmates
jeered and leered at her from adjoining cells. . .

Officials with the Georgia state police and Glynn County Detention
Center, where Mrs. Kuehn was being held, said they were just following
procedure when someone from another country is stopped for speeding or
other traffic violations -- no matter how minor they might seem. That
procedure, they said, includes holding Canadians, including those
carrying a valid passport like Mrs. Kuehn, or other "foreign nationals,"
in custody until the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency
confirms they are legally allowed to be in the country. . .

While the first few hours were spent sitting in a cold, common holding
room, Mrs. Kuehn said she was never read her rights and jail officials
offered little in the way of explanation about what was happening to
her. However, she was allowed to call collect to her parents in Ottawa
and speak with her husband over the phone, before being forced to shower
and move to a ward where other female inmates were held, she said.

"When they first put me in there, they all started banging on the
windows and cheering like I was fresh meat," said Mrs. Kuehn, who spent
a sleepless night in the cell before being released at about 5 a.m. and
continuing to Daytona Beach, Florida. "It freaked me out.". . .

http://autos.canada.com/news/story.html?id=aab758c0-96f4-4af0-adae-ba919b136dbe


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BUSHWHACKS
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VA HOSPITAL BANS VISITORS FOR PSYCHIATRIC PATIENTS

STEPHANIE HEINATZ, HAMPTON ROADS DAILY PRESS, VA - At the Hampton
[Veteran Affairs] hospital, psychiatric inpatients are not allowed
visitors. That policy, in effect at the hospital since 2004, appears to
violate the patient rights laid out by the U.S. Department of Veterans
Affairs. It also appears to violate generally accepted medical practice.

"I have never heard of a psychiatric unit that never permits visitors,"
said Margaret Walsh, director of the office of human rights for
Virginia's mental health department, "and I have been in this field
since 1967."

Dr. Priscilla Hankins, chief of the VA hospital's mental health
services, defended the policy. "I recognize that it's highly
restrictive," Hankins said, "but it's for patients' safety.". . .

Receiving visitors has a healing benefit for patients, psychiatry
experts said.

"It's widely believed that people with mental illness, as with physical
illness, benefit from a support system" and having access to that
support system, said Mary Cesare-Murphy, executive director for the
Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations'
behavioral health program. "I don't think that a lot of people have done
research on that because it's just kind of accepted."

http://www.dailypress.com/news/local/dp-99705sy0apr08,0,5703740.
story?coll=dp-news-local-final


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