RELEASE MONTELL JOHNSON (UPDATE: PARDONED)

[codyandbecca]

I am all for whatever it takes to free Montell. I think we should copy all 24 pages of this thread and send them to Sen. Durbin so maybe he can send it to President Obama. Something needs to be done here to free this man.

[missbaldwin]

What is going on with Montell ?

[KSwife]

I don't have any information, but I have lost any hope after California denied Susan Atkins parole. California wonders why we are in crisis, this is part of it.

[missbaldwin]

You are so right KSwife.
Well we can pray for Montell and His mother and family.

[Dazzler]

COURT UPDATE: (From Ted Pearson)

"Attorneys for Montell Johnson will appear in U. S. District Court in Chicago next week to seek the consolidation of cases on his behalf against the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC), and California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and the California Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections (CDRC).  Johnson has chronic progressive multiple sclerosis and is almost completely paralyzed.  He is completely bedridden and dependent on others for care.

Johnson’s sentence was commuted by former Governor Rod R. Blagojevich last October.  Gloria Johnson-Ester, Johnson’s mother, began making arrangements to bring Johnson home. She is now prepared to bring him home and care for him. However, Johnson remains at Sheridan Correctional Center because Schwarzenegger and the CRDRC now demand his rendition to California pursuant to a long-abandoned executive agreement between the governors of Illinois and California in 1998.  

Johnson’s attorneys filed suit against Schwarzenegger and the CDRC on August 31 in the U. S. District Court for Northern Illinois.   The complaint seeks a preliminary and permanent injunction barring the “rendition” of Johnson to the CDRC “until the Defendants can demonstrate how they intend to provide constitutionally adequate health care” for Johnson.  

The motion arises because Schwarzenegger and the CDRC are trying to enforce a 1998 Executive Agreement between the Governors of the States of Illinois and California for the "rendition of Marcellus Bates, a/k/a Montell Johnson," to California.  They seek this “rendition,” the complaint alleges, “in spite of the fact that they have made no review of his medical condition, making any provision for his medical care, or showing that, in spite of California's unconstitutional inability to provide medical care to its prisoners, California has the means, the funds, the desire, the ability and the intention of actually caring for Mr. Johnson.”

The State of California is in a severe, ongoing budget crisis, and the California Prison Health System is under receivership for consistently failing to provide constitutionally adequate health care. (Plata v. Schwarzenegger, No. COl-1351 TEH, U.S.D.C. N.D. Cal. 26.)

In 2005, Judge Thelton Eugene Henderson, the presiding judge in that case, found that “By all accounts, the California Prison Medical System is broken beyond repair .... It is an uncontested fact that, on average, an inmate in one of California's prisons needlessly dies every six or seven days, due to constitutional deficiencies in the CDCR's medical delivery system. This statistic, as awful as it is, barely provides a window into the waste of human life occurring behind California's prison walls due to the gross failures of the medical delivery system (2005 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 43796, at **2-3 (N.D. Cal. Oct. 3,2005)).  

Regarding inmates such as Johnson, with chronic conditions, Judge Henderson wrote, "A sizeable portion of the CDCR prisoners suffer from chronic illness, yet defendants have failed to devise and implement a system to track and treat these patients, and such patients suffer from a lack of continuity of care" (Id. at *46). The medical staff is "incompetent and abusive" (Id. at *47).

On August 4,2009, a special three judge panel of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California found that the conditions described in 2005 had not substantially changed. "The medical and mental health care available to inmates in the California prison system is woefully and constitutionally inadequate, and has been so for more than a decade," they wrote (Coleman v. Schwarzenegger, No CIV 5-90-0520, 2009 U.S. Dist. Case 1:09-cv-05384 Document 1 Filed 08/31/2009 LEXIS 67943, at *38 (N.D. Cal. Aug. 4, 2009)).

"Inmates are forced to wait months or years for medically necessary appointments and examinations, and many receive inadequate medical care in substandard facilities that lack the medical equipment required to conduct routine examinations or afford essential medical treatment. .. A significant number of inmates have died as a result of the state's failure to provide constitutionally adequate medical care" (ld. At **38-39).

As a result, the three-judge panel ordered the release of over 40,000 inmates from the California prison system due to overcrowding. The State's current budget crisis also demands that the CDCR reduce its operating budget by $1.2 billion.

A lawsuit had been filed on Mr. Johnson's and Ms. Johnson-Ester's behalf in July 2007, complaining of Mr. Johnson's medical care by the IDOC at Dixon Correctional Center  (Johnson-Ester v. Elyea et al., No. 07-4190, U.S.D.C. N.D. Ill.).  As a result of that suit, from November 2007 to September 2008, Mr. Johnson remained in hospitals receiving specialized care, first at the University of Illinois Medical Center and then at Kindred North Hospital in Chicago. His mother, Ms. Johnson-Ester, was able to visit him regularly and assist with his care while he was in these facilities.

In September 2008, Mr. Johnson was transferred from Kindred to Sheridan Correctional Center, where he was to receive care pursuant to a treatment plan presented to the court in Johnson-Ester v. Elyea and developed by the Illinois Department of Corrections and its third-party health care provider, Wexford Health Sources, Inc., in consultation with the physicians who had cared for Mr. Johnson at Kindred.

Mr. Johnson has remained at Sheridan CC until the present, cared for pursuant to the treatment plan. His mother is able to visit him at Sheridan CC five days a week, and is critical to his care and continued survival.  

The 2007 suit is before Judge Robert M. Dow, who has asked for an independent medical evaluation of Montell's condition to help determine whether Johnson can be safely transported to California.  Subsequent hearings in both cases are awaiting fulfillment of this request by Judge Dow by the IDOC."

[JDsMom]

An all out phone assault on Sen Durbin's office .........anyone interested????  Illinois Citizens  For  the Release of Montell Johnson!!!!!!!!

[loretjord7]

have you posted a number yet?

[JDsMom]

WASHINGTON, D.C.
309 Hart Senate Bldg.
Washington, DC 20510
9 am to 6 pm
(202) 224-2152 - ph
(202) 228-0400 - fx

 CHICAGO
230 S Dearborn St.
Suite 3892
Chicago, IL 60604
8:30 am to 5 pm
(312) 353-4952 - ph
(312) 353-0150 - fx

 SPRINGFIELD
525 South 8th St.
Springfield, IL 62703
8:30 am to 5 pm
(217) 492-4062 - ph
(217) 492-4382 - fx

 MARION
701 N. Court St.
Marion, IL 62959
8:30 am to 5 pm
(618) 998-8812 - ph
(618) 997-0176 - fx
 
Let's set a day for all to call...........how about Sept. 14th  Monday morning 9 am ????????

[babybabybaby]

count me in

[Dazzler]

I received this information about Montell Johnson's struggle for freedom from our member Ted Pearson, of the NAARPR:     

 
FRIDAY, MARCH 5
U. S. District Judge Robert M. Dow said today that he expects to be able to rule on motions before him in the case of Montell Johnson by the end of this month.  He set another status hearing in his courtroom in the Federal Building in Chicago for March 24 at 3 pm.  He urged the parties and their attorneys to try to work out a resolution of the cases prior to that, and offered his assistance should they request it. 

 

The two fundamental issues before the judge are whether rendering Johnson to the California Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections (CDRC) to die in prison under a life sentence would violate the ban on “cruel and unusual punishment” of the Eighth Amendment of the U. S. Constitution, and whether the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) violated the same provision through deliberate indifference to his condition.  While incarcerated at Dixon Correctional Center in 2007 Johnson almost died as a result of blood infections via a series of stage IV decubitus ulcers (bed sores) that resulted from their failure to turn the paralyzed patient regularly.

 

Pending before Judge Dow are motions for summary judgment against Johnson in his suit against the IDOC and dismissal of the suit against the CDRC.  The position of the IDOC is that while Montell’s treatment at Dixon may have been terrible and endangered his life it was not “cruel and unusual.”   The IDOC also argues that it must render Johnson to California under terms of a 1998 Executive Agreement between the states’ governors, and that it has no responsibility for what may await him there, even if it would subject him to cruel and unusual punishment.  The CDRC has taken the position that Judge Dow’s court has no jurisdiction over them.   The IDOC was represented in court by James P. Doran, Asst. Illinois Attorney General.  The CDRC was represented via telephone by Lisa A. Tillman, California Deputy Attorney General.

 

Johnson has chronic progressive multiple sclerosis and is almost completely paralyzed.  He is completely bedridden and dependent on others for care.   Johnson’s 40 year sentence was commuted in November 2008 by then Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich on compassionate grounds.  He continues to be held at Sheridan Correctional Center, however, because of a request by California that the terminally ill man be rendered there to die in prison under the executive agreement between the governors of the two states.  Johnson’s attorneys argue that the agreement was effectively abandoned when California did nothing to have Johnson returned to them after Gov., Ryan commuted his death sentence. 

 

Johnson was sent to Illinois in 1998 by the CDRC to stand trial for the murder of Dorianne Warnesly.  At that time Illinois Governor Jim Edgar signed an Executive Agreement with California Governor Pete Wilson that should Johnson not be executed in Illinois he would be returned to the CDCR.   He was serving a life sentence there for another murder. He has consistently claimed he was wrongfully convicted in both cases.

 

Johnson was sentenced to death for the Warnesly murder in Illinois, but his sentence was commuted to 40 years by former Gov. George Ryan after the victim’s mother appealed to Ryan and submitted evidence that Johnson was wrongfully convicted.

 

Johnson was examined Tuesday this week by Demetrios Skias, M.D. , a neurologist specializing in multiple scleroses at the University of Illinois at Chicago Hospital.  After describing his condition, Dr. Skias reported to the IDOC that transporting Johnson via a private charter medivac plane to California would not, in itself, endanger his life.  Dr. Skias could not comment on whether the CDRC was able to care for Johnson.   

 

A lawsuit had been filed on behalf of Mr. Johnson's and his mother, Gloria Johnson-Ester, in July 2007.  In it they allege that the inadequacy of Mr. Johnson's medical care by the IDOC at Dixon Correctional Center (Johnson-Ester v. Elyea et al., No. 07-4190, U.S.D.C. N.D. Ill.) violated the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment. 

 

Johnson’s attorneys also filed suit against California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and the CDCR  on August 31 2009.  Their complaint seeks a preliminary and permanent injunction barring the “rendition” of Johnson to the CDCR “until the Defendants can demonstrate how they intend to provide constitutionally adequate health care” for Johnson.

 

The effort by Schwarzenegger and the CDCR to enforce the 1998 Executive Agreement for the "rendition” of Johnson to California is “in spite of the fact that they have made no review of his medical condition,” according to briefs filed by Johnson’s attorneys.  California has made no “provision for his medical care, or [shown] that, in spite of California's unconstitutional inability to provide medical care to its prisoners, California has the means, the funds, the desire, the ability and the intention of actually caring for Mr. Johnson.”

 

In seeking dismissal of Johnson’s suit California Deputy Atty. Gen. Tillman argues that since Johnson is not yet in California and has not yet suffered harm there, he has no standing to complain of cruel and unusual punishment.  Tillman also argues that because Schwarzenegger and the other defendants reside and work in Sacramento, the Illinois Court has no jurisdiction. 

 

The State of California is in a severe, ongoing budget crisis, and the California Prison Health System is under receivership for consistently failing to provide constitutionally adequate health care. (Plata v. Schwarzenegger, No. COl-1351 TEH, U.S.D.C. N.D. Cal. 26.)

 

In 2005, Judge Thelton Eugene Henderson, the presiding judge in that case, found that “y all accounts, the California Prison Medical System is broken beyond repair .... It is an uncontested fact that, on average, an inmate in one of California's prisons needlessly dies every six or seven days, due to constitutional deficiencies in the CDCR's medical delivery system. This statistic, as awful as it is, barely provides a window into the waste of human life occurring behind California's prison walls due to the gross failures of the medical delivery system (2005 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 43796, at **2-3 (N.D. Cal. Oct. 3,2005)). 

 

Regarding inmates such as Johnson, with chronic conditions, Judge Henderson wrote, "A sizeable portion of the CDCR prisoners suffer from chronic illness, yet defendants have failed to devise and implement a system to track and treat these patients, and such patients suffer from a lack of continuity of care" (Id. at *46). The medical staff is "incompetent and abusive" (Id. at *47).

 

On August 4,2009, a special three judge panel of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California found that the conditions described in 2005 had not substantially changed. "[T]he medical and mental health care available to inmates in the California prison system is woefully and constitutionally inadequate, and has been so for more than a decade," they wrote (Coleman v. Schwarzenegger, No CIV 5-90-0520, 2009 U.S. Dist. Case 1:09-cv-05384 Document 1 Filed 08/31/2009 LEXIS 67943, at *38 (N.D. Cal. Aug. 4, 2009)).

 

"Inmates are forced to wait months or years for medically necessary appointments and examinations, and many receive inadequate medical care in substandard facilities that lack the medical equipment required to conduct routine examinations or afford essential medical treatment. .. A significant number of inmates have died as a result of the state's failure to provide constitutionally adequate medical care" (ld. At **38-39).

 

As a result, the three-judge panel ordered the release of over 40,000 inmates from the California prison system due to overcrowding. The State's current budget crisis also demands that the CDCR reduce its operating budget by $1.2 billion.

 

As a result of his suit against the IDOC, from November 2007 to September 2008, Mr. Johnson remained in hospitals receiving specialized care, first at the University of Illinois Medical Center and then at Kindred North Hospital in Chicago.   Ms. Johnson-Ester, was able to visit him regularly and assist with his care while he was in these facilities.

 

In September 2008, Mr. Johnson was transferred from Kindred to Sheridan Correctional Center, where he was to receive care pursuant to a treatment plan presented to the court in Johnson-Ester v. Elyea and developed by the Illinois Department of Corrections and its third-party health care provider, Wexford Health Sources, Inc., in consultation with the physicians who had cared for Mr. Johnson at Kindred.

 

Mr. Johnson has remained at Sheridan CC until the present, cared for pursuant to the treatment plan. His mother is able to visit him at Sheridan CC five days a week, and is critical to his care and continued survival.
                 

[EMERALD]

Thanks for the update Daz, I often wonder how things are for Montell.  He must be receiving adequate care at last because I was sure he would'nt survive as long as he has.

God bless his mother for devoting her life to him.  We can only hope that California will realise how ridiculous it would be to extradite this very sick man.

[KSwife]

As a California resident this is more than just disturbing to me. California is in a serious budget mess and it will get worse once everything is finalized with state agencies winning the furlough lawsuits including backpay. I have not seen a lot of media attention surrounding Montell and believe California should have just let it go from the beginning. This is all political and I believe the real concern comes down to all those people who would be mad that a "convicted murderer" was let go. They would be the ones all of a sudden forgetting that the California prison system can not afford to take care of someone as sick as Montell.

I don't really get into politics anyway, but I believe had California said nothing the politicians would have been "safe" from scrutiny and Montell would already be at home with his Mom to care for him. Montell deserves compassion regardless of his convictions.

I hope I accurately expressed my feelings on this and didn't upset anyone. I'm sure you will let me know. 

[Dazzler]

Update on Montell Johnson status Hearing today.

 

Montell Johnson’s case against California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and the California Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (CDRC) will probably be transferred to a Federal Court in California.  Northern Illinois U. S. District Court Judge Robert M. Dow said at a status hearing on the case today that this was the direction toward which he was leaning.  Regarding Johnson’s suit against the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) about the treatment that almost resulted in his death three years ago, Judge Dow said he would rule on the State’s motion for summary judgment soon. 

 

Meanwhile, a settlement conference with the State is scheduled for April 29, and Judge Dow granted a motion by Johnson’s attorneys to depose Dr. Demetrios Skias, the University of Illinois at Chicago Hospital neurologist who examined Johnson earlier this month regarding his condition. 

 

Observers said that a settlement that allowed Johnson to be paroled to the home of his mother, Mrs.  Gloria Johnson-Ester pending resolution of the case against California in that state might be acceptable to Johnson and his family. 

 

Johnson is currently incarcerated in the Sheridan Illinois Correctional Center.  He has chronic progressive multiple sclerosis and is almost completely paralyzed.  He is completely bedridden and dependent on others for care.   

 

Johnson was sent to Illinois in 1998 by the CDRC to stand trial for the murder of Dorianne Warnesly.  At that time Illinois Governor Jim Edgar and California Governor Pete Wilson signed an Executive Agreement that should Johnson not be executed in Illinois he would be returned to the CDCR.   He was serving a life sentence there for another murder. He has consistently claimed he was wrongfully convicted in both cases.

 

Johnson was sentenced to death for the Warnesly murder in Illinois, but his sentence was commuted to 40 years by former Gov. George Ryan after the victim’s mother appealed to Ryan and submitted evidence that Johnson was wrongfully convicted.

 

Johnson’s 40 year sentence was commuted in November 2008 by then Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich on compassionate grounds.  He continues to be held at Sheridan, however, because of a request by California that the terminally ill man be rendered there to die in prison under a 1998 executive agreement between the governors of the two states. 

 

Johnson’s attorneys argue that the agreement was effectively abandoned when California did nothing to have Johnson returned to them after Gov., Ryan commuted his death sentence in 2003. 

 

The lawsuit against the IDOC was filed in July 2007.  They allege that the inadequacy of Mr. Johnson's medical care by the IDOC at Dixon Correctional Center (Johnson-Ester v. Elyea et al., No. 07-4190, U.S.D.C. N.D. Ill.) violated the U.S. Constitution’s Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment. 

 

Johnson’s attorneys also filed suit against California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and the CDCR  on August 31 2009.  They are asking for a preliminary and permanent injunction barring the “rendition” of Johnson to the CDCR “until the Defendants can demonstrate how they intend to provide constitutionally adequate health care” for Johnson.

 

The State of California is in a severe, ongoing budget crisis, and the California Prison Health System is under receivership for consistently failing to provide constitutionally adequate health care. (Plata v. Schwarzenegger, No. COl-1351 TEH, U.S.D.C. N.D. Cal. 26.)   In spite of this, the CDCR has made no provision for Johnson’s medical care, or shown that it has the means, the funds, the desire, the ability and the intention of actually caring for Mr. Johnson.

 

Regarding inmates with chronic conditions, such as Johnson, Judge Thelton Eugene Henderson, the presiding judge in the California case wrote, "A sizeable portion of the CDCR prisoners suffer from chronic illness, yet defendants have failed to devise and implement a system to track and treat these patients, and such patients suffer from a lack of continuity of care" (2005 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 43796, at **2-3 (N.D. Cal. Oct. 3,2005) at *46). The medical staff is "incompetent and abusive" (Id. at *47).

 

As a result of his suit against the IDOC, from November 2007 to September 2008, Mr. Johnson remained in hospitals receiving specialized care, first at the University of Illinois Medical Center and then at Kindred North Hospital in Chicago.   His mother was able to visit him regularly and assist with his care while he was in these facilities.  In September 2008, Johnson was transferred to Sheridan Correctional Center.  Johnson remains at Sheridan.  His mother is able to visit him there five days a week, and is critical to his care and continued survival.

[EMERALD]

This sounds hopeful for Montell.  Gosh, i'm so surprised that he's still with us, he must have a strong spirit.