By Charlton Stanley, Weekend Contributor
Jackson Attorney
Photo by Jackson, MS police department
As I write this, the news is still coming in, and the full story is far from being told. I will provide breaking news as I hear it, but our intrepid bloggers should consider the comments an Open Thread. If you have solid news to report, please do so, and source the information. Otherwise it is just gossip.
It should come as no surprise to anyone that conspiracy theorists are breaking out the tinfoil hats.
What do we know about the death of Mississippi attorney Mark Mayfield? He lived in Ridgeland, Mississippi, a bedroom suburb just north of the city of Jackson. He was 57 years old. About 9:00 Friday morning, he was found dead in his home of a single gunshot wound. There was a note, but authorities have not revealed the contents. That is not unusual. When I worked in the state that was general policy with investigators across the state. Sometimes suicide notes are poignant, sad, and express intense pain. Other notes have content so gross or inflammatory they could not be printed in a family newspaper. In cases of suicide notes, the families often are reluctant to permit release to the public. In other cases, the note may implicate other people in a crime, or include confidential information. If the latter is the case, release of the content of a suicide note risks compromising an ongoing investigation, especially if sealed indictments are involved. Nothing should be read into it if the note contents are not released and made public.
Mayfield was a major supporter of the Tea Party in Mississippi. They fielded a candidate to run against Senator Thad Cochran in the Republican primary, Chris McDaniel. During the run-up to the primary, several men gained illegal entry into the nursing home where Senator Cochran’s wife was staying. She has Alzheimer’s disease. The actual break-in was actually implemented by a Tea Party blogger named Clayton Kelley, who was arrested. A photo of Mrs. Cochran was posted on a website, presumably Kelley’s. It was taken down a short time later.
Kelley was arrested along with four men, including lawyer Mayfield. The others arrested in the incident were Richard Sager, a high school coach and John Beachman Mary of Hattiesburg. Mary was not taken into custody because of what were described as “extensive medical conditions.”
All the men face felony conspiracy charges. I have not found a complete list of all the charges, but I am sure some would have been added later. For one there is a major HIPAA violation.
My take on this as a professional who has worked in the field for more than forty years, is that Mayfield felt he had no options left. His career as a lawyer was over. He knew he would lose his license to practice and almost certainly was going to be sent to prison. Life as he knew it in the past was ended; that is, after he was released from prison.
There are many professions where one can recover and rebuild after a conviction. Martha Stewart is an example of reinventing oneself. On the other hand, actor Fatty Arbuckle never was able to reestablish a career. Having made a study of suicide over the years, and taught a doctoral level course on Thanatology, there is one overriding element almost all suicides have in common. The subject believes there is literally no way out of the bleak situation they are in. That leads to a feeling of hopelessness. This in turn causes a kind of tunnel vision in which they can envision only one way out.
Setting political issues aside for a moment, I believe this is a time for empathy for Mark Mayfield’s family and loved ones. His criminal defense attorney, Merrida “Buddy” Coxwell is a long time acquaintance of mine, and I believe he expressed it as well as I can, “…he was a client, but more importantly, he was a friend for almost 34 years. My heart is completely broken. This is beyond tragic and the people of this community and state have lost a good man…”
The recriminations can start later. I will say; however, that my contacts in Mississippi tell me the Tea Party regulars have tight sphincter syndrome regarding what Mayfield may have put in that note.
Sources:
—ooOoo–
The views expressed in this posting are the author’s alone and not necessarily those of the blog, the host, or other weekend bloggers. As an open forum, weekend bloggers post independently without pre-approval or review. Content and any displays or art is solely the author’s decision and responsibility.
If no one knows of my shame, it can’t be shame?
If no one reads my comment, it can’t make noise?
http://www.kimleatherdale.com/self-esteem/shame-versus-remorse-going-to-the-garden-to-eat-worms/
Shame vs. remorse. I have no idea if she is a psychologist, but it made sense.
TheSaucyMugwump (@TheSaucyMugwump)
Washington said that Americans should live the literal words of the Preamble, Constitution and Bill of Rights. You didn’t hear him. You hear what you want to hear.
“…you see what you want to see and you hear what you want to hear…”
Nilsson – The Point – 1971
If America lived the Preamble, Constitution and Bill of Rights; if the SCOTUS did its sole duty of objectively, and not as an act of corrupt bias, ideology and subjectivity in concert with and for political allies and benefactors, supporting and upholding the literal words therein, without usurping the power of the executive and legislative branches, elections void of parties would be, justifiably and de facto, the only constitutional form – people would live according to the Preamble, Constitution and Bill of Rights, not the unconstitutional collectivist, socialist and progressive perversion of the “dictatorship of the proletariat” they are enslaved by and struggle under now.
Washington gave us freedom through self-reliance, not governmental control of the economy and our personal lives, and redistribution of wealth.
Washington said that passion should be for the understood foundation, the context of America,
THE PREAMBLE,
the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
The Preamble has been ignored in its entirety.
The Constitution has been nullified.
The Bill of Rights has been controverted.
The Preamble, as the foundation, as the American context, was “understood” in the first American century and destroyed by Marxists in the second.
What, do you imagine, would Washington say about that?
Annie wrote “Reminds me of the question”
Or as quoted from a Playboy interview of the original SNL gang: if Helen Keller falls down alone in the forest, does she make a sound?
I won’t be killing myself anytime soon. I think remorse is different than shame, but you may be right. Reminds me of the question, if a tree falls in a forest does it make a noise if no one is there to hear it?
What you are describing is remorse. Shame, by definition, requires at least another person. One can be shamed in the eyes of God but I don’t think that would lead to suicide, unless your extremist religion tells you that you must kill yourself in order to make it to heaven. I’m sure there has been lots of that.
And Samantha, my tribe is human, as are you.
Samantha, I believe Kundera and your agreement with her is wrong. Her premise is wrong, my opinion only, I’m not a psychologist, but a human woman who has felt shame at an act that no one ever knew about. I believe I’m not alone in this feeling. It’s a part of having a conscience. It’s a part of being human.
If you think my premise is wrong, tell that to Milan Kundera who said: “The basis of shame is not some personal mistake of ours, but that this humiliation is seen by everyone.”
Of course, had I attributed Kundera in my comment, you might have saw value were you instead saw none, because your capacity to see truth or virtue is limited by the world view of your tribe.
I hired a retired homicide detective to work for me. His specialty was suspicious suicides. He taught me a lot.
Do you know that only a small % of people commit suicide w/o the benefit of booze or drugs. If there are none found in an autopsy, that is a red flag.
Samantha, do you think people are incapable of feeling ashamed of themselves, even if no one knows the shameful act? There are people who commit suicide and then their suicide note is found revealing some shameful act that drove them to suicide. I think your premise is off.
“HBO did a doc on Goldwater after he died”
So did his granddaughter C.C. Goldwater. (producer)
Mr. Conservative: Goldwater on Goldwater
The life and career of conservative icon Barry Goldwater is recounted from his days as an Arizona businessman to his five-term Senate career and his ill-fated run for president in 1964.
Lots of older family taken film from what i remember
my Introduction to the Joys of political humor
a Goldwater bumper sticker, on a friends, seldom flushed, basement toilet tank
One does not feel shame by committing a shameful act, alone. Rather, one can feel shame only after his act is exposed. It’s likely this guy would still be alive had he not been exposed. How many millions of people by now had led normal lives, only to commit suicide years later, after their shameful act was finely exposed? In this way, the internet, social media, and the ubiquitous surveillance society are actually worsening the suicide epidemic, which is not just shame-based, of course. Some psychopaths, I think, are immune from suicide, no matter how shameful their act. Some criminals kill their victims to remove all risk of exposure — and the shame that would lead to suicide.
Bob Esq.: Thanks for the clarification.
“Radical conspiracy theorist” Senator Bob Graham:
RTC: “For instance, I quite appreciated Bob Esq.’s comment regarding how the Heller decision changed the way the 2d Am was applied to the states.”
I appreciate the compliment, but that’s not what I said.
Heller held: “The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home.”
Since Heller took place in a federal district, i.e. Washington D.C., it was just a matter of time before the Court would be asked to apply it to the states via the incorporation doctrine.
That took place in McDonald v. Chicago, 561 U.S. 742 (2010)
Here’s J. Turley’s post regarding the decision.
http://jonathanturley.org/2010/06/28/supreme-court-strikes-down-chicago-gun-law/
samantha wrote, quoting James Gilligan “The mutilation of bodies, whatever drives it in each case, is a fairly common practice in war, although engaged in mostly by people who were not inclined to murderous violence prior to joining the military”
When you apply a little logic to this statement, the flaw stands out like a sore thumb. One of two things is true:
1) It is fairly trivial to convert peaceful humans into barbaric savages via military training.
2) Humans are born savages and generally keep their urges well-contained, but military service allows these urges to be satisfied.
However, if #1 is true, then all of us live on a knife edge between amity and atrocity. Violent video games, which mimic military training, are probably a contributor to mass shootings and must be banned.
And if #2 is true, then strict laws are necessary to prevent society from turning into a never-ending rerun of “Lord of the Flies.”
Saucy, Of course I don’t agree w/ that. There are freak shows in all politics. That was a freak show, an idiot! Do I need to name idiots in ALL segments of politics? I concede your point there are idiots in the Tea Party. That does not mean they are all idiots. Hell Saucy, up until a couple days ago your though all libertarians were Ayn Rand sycophants and no rules or regulations anarchists. Saucy, I think PETA is a horrible movement. But, I don’t think all PETA people are horrible.