Dear @NewYorkStateAG @TishJames: why are you keeping an HIV+ Black man in prison 13 years after he completed a 12-year sentence for crimes committed in his teens? Remember how Rudy Giuliani branded NuShawn Williams back then? #FreeNuShawn
Most everyone alive in 1997 will remember NuShawn's story. Branded an "AIDS Monster" by the tabloids, he was arrested in upstate NY, alleged to have infected 13 women with HIV, including some after his diagnosis the year before (he thought the health officials were lying to him).
It's the most notorious HIV criminalization case in U.S. history. His teenage story is the kind that makes sympathy hard. The NYT described his "sprint into trouble — from a broken home to childhood thievery, from gangs to crack dens, from girl to girl."
nytimes.com/1997/10/30/nyr…
One was 13 years old (when he was 19). Many were white, as the tabloids always made clear. The tough on crime politicians took it from there.
Giuliani said, "There's no question he should be prosecuted for attempted murder, or worse."
Gov. Goerge Pataki said that Williams should "never see the light of day again." He pushed for a new law that could keep sex offenders locked up forever, beyond their criminal sentences. Gov. Eliot Spitzer got it passed.
AG James @NewYorkStateAG, your predecessor, Andrew Cuomo, used that law to keep NuShawn in a horrible psych prison after he finished serving his original 12-year sentence in 2010. I first visited the Marcy / Mid-State Correctional Facility last July.
The Pataki/Spitzer/Cuomo law (Article 10 of the Mental Hygiene Law) requires the state to offer an annual review of an offender's mental health status, to appeal further detention. NuShawn has only been offered one review in the 13 years he's been at the psych prison.
That review, in 2021, before a single judge, denied NuShawn's release. The judge only needed two diagnoses from the state's shrink to do so. The shrink included substance use disorder (mostly for his prior weed use as a teenager!). No evidence of current drug use was presented.
From the judge: "Given the circumstances under which NuShawn W. has described his sex offending behavior to include the use of drugs to attract and placate his partners, the Court finds consideration of these disorders to be appropriate in this proceeding."
I find it fascinating that most of the gay, HIV+ meth dealers I've known haven't been locked up forever under this same standard. They've certainly spread HIV to some of their clients. But, ah yes, these dealers are white.
Thankfully, that judge's ruling is currently under appeal.
NuShawn has been incarcerated since September 1997.
He is now 46 years old.
A hero of mine, @housingworks CEO/Founder @HWCharlesKing, has been visiting NuShawn upstate for many years now. After I joined the Free NuShawn Coalition freenushawn.com in 2021, Charles invited me to join him on some of his visits (3 so far). Pic is from 2 weeks ago.
Addendum: ~30% of Americans strongly and proudly believed they had the right to rip-off their masks in crowded spaces before COVID vaccines became available, even if someone else's grandma died (and thousands did) ...
For these Americans, freedom equals the right to spread a virus.
To this date, none of them have been charged with reckless endangerment. That's what they charged NuShawn with (even though no one has died).
/end
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