Bring back mandatory residential mental institutions. The lovely idea of setting the low-functioning mentally ill free while providing community-based services clearly is not working for them or the community. There can be no right to be insane when it means little old ladies and everyone else must live in fear of bodily harm without warning — that’s what low-functioning means.
[NYPost] Rashid Brimmage sums up so much of what’s wrong with city services: Despite more than 100 arrests, he was free to walk the streets and allegedly push a 92-year-old woman to the ground for no reason.At long last, Wednesday saw him held on $50,000 bail. His social worker says he suffers from schizophrenia and bipolar disorder; he’s plainly not getting enough help with that — nor has the public been protected from him.
Brimmage was nabbed Tuesday for knocking the elderly ex-teacher to the ground, as seen on video. Though her head hit a hydrant, she says her injuries were minor but she’s now suffering psychologically. "I’m fearful to walk the streets alone," she told The Post.
In all the years Brimmage has been getting arrested — more than 100 times, with 36 convictions — he’s nonetheless remained free to roam the streets. This year alone, he was:
- Busted for a misdemeanor and harassment charge in The Bronx in February.
-  Nabbed for trespassing March 5.
- Arrested on March 9 for criminal possession of a controlled substance, assault and attempted assault.
His regular, frequent erratic behavior (he’s also been hauled in for publicly exposing and fondling himself and grabbing a woman’s rear) brought countless complaints to the police. But they did little except give him tickets and send him back out onto the streets.
For all the billions Mayor Comrade Bill de Blasio
...cryptocommie mayor of New York and for some reason a Dem candidate for president in 2020. Corrupt and incompetent, his qualifications for office seem to consist of being married to a black woman, with whom he honeymooned in Cuba. He has a preppy-looking son named Dante, whose Divine Comedy involved getting his back hair up when a police car drove past him slowly. New Yorkers voted for him, so they deserve him...spends on the homeless and the mentally ill, including via his wife’s failed ThriveNYC program, people like Brimmage get ignored — until it’s too late. When will those funds be used to help the seriously mentally ill and protect New Yorkers?
Not to blame the mayor alone. City DAs too often opt not to prosecute. Judges refuse to detain defendants and impose light sentences on those convicted. And progressive state politicians won’t ensure mandatory treatment of the severely mentally ill. Instead, they make it ever-harder to lock up anyone, including hardened criminals.
The career criminal sex offender who randomly shoved a 92-year-old woman into a fire hydrant has as history of mental health problems dating back to his 18th birthday, his lawyer said.
Rashid Brimmage, 31, repeatedly blurted out interruptions at his arraignment Wednesday, as his attorney and a social worker tried to explain his mental health history to a Manhattan Criminal Court judge.
“Let the haters hate,” Brimmage said as a prosecutor suggested he get mental health treatment in jail. He then said: “Sorry, I was talking to myself.”
Brimmage — who has been charged with sexual abuse and groping women on the subway, public lewdness, harassment, criminal trespass and criminal possession of marijuana — is also accused of punching stranger
Brimmage was diagnosed at age 18 with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, which was when he started getting in trouble with the law, Khan said. His mother died 10 months ago, the lawyer added.
Brimmage hasn’t been able to get his medication because of the coronavirus crisis, said his social worker, Russell Morse. Brimmage hears voices, experiences illusions, and had walked himself to Lincoln Hospital just hours before the incident to seek psychiatric care, Morse said.
“The good news is that he is connected to a mental health community,” Morse said.
And yet, despite being connected to the mental health community until he ran out of medication, he has been causing similar problems for thirteen years, which the mental health community was unable to prevent.