Mikal Mahdi, On SC Death Row, Asserts Humanity Before Death

“Mikal Mahdi, on SC death row, asserts humanity before death”

Mahdi spent 6,000 hours, or roughly eight months, from ages 14 to 21 in solitary confinement throughout a number of stays in juvenile and grownup prisons. The state of Virginia didn’t cease utilizing the type of solitary confinement that it subjected Mahdi to whereas in juvenile detention till 2021.

Dr. Malcolm Woodland, Mahdi’s forensic psychological well being skilled, referred to as his case one of many worst he is seen. He famous that Mahdi first expressed suicidal ideas at age 9. His melancholy and publicity to violence at residence went untreated out and in of juvenile jail, he stated in Mahdi’s clemency video.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a child say, ‘I’m suicidal. I want to hurt myself,’ and he’s placed in isolation, in one case, for two weeks,” Woodland stated. “What does that do to a child? The immediate message is that no one cares about you; you can die in that cell for all we care.”

However the S.C. Supreme Courtroom wrote that a lot of what Woodland and Mahdi’s staff argued may have been collected earlier than his 2006 sentencing. The state’s justices defended Mahdi’s trial staff, ruling that making the case for his developmental impairment would have required the household’s cooperation at a time when the victims “were still outraged and Mahdi’s family was likely shocked, angry, embarrassed, disappointed in his actions, and unwilling to assist.”

The justices famous “extensive evidence” in 8,800 pages of courtroom report that a few of these relations believed Mahdi was manipulative and had lied about being abused by family members and that relations solely got here ahead to defend him after years had handed.

Gee, Mahdi’s aunt, stated many relations weren’t contacted. Some, like her, had her phrases twisted by the preliminary trial staff, she stated. Protection investigators didn’t ask her contact different sympathetic relations, she stated.