If Ebony Wilkerson Does Have A Mental Illness, It’s A Wake-Up Call For All African Americans

Ebony Wilkerson is sitting inside a Florida jail cell, but should she be viewed as a cold-blooded criminal or a mentally-ill person in need of long-term mental health care?

Wilkerson, 32, has been charged with three counts of attempted murder and is being held on $1.2 million bail after she drove herself and her three children (two girls and a boy, ages 3, 9 and 10) into the Atlantic Ocean in Daytona Beach last week. While it has not been confirmed, reports suggest that Wilkerson may have been suffering from a mental disorder, thus renewing public conversations on how the mentally ill should be treated by the legal system and society in general.

Jessica Harrell, Wilkerson’s sister, called 911 hours before her older sibling drove her vehicle into the ocean March 4. “She’s talking about Jesus, that there are demons in my house, that I’m trying to control her, but I’m trying to keep them safe,” Harrell, 28, said during the 911 call.

An officer pulled over Wilkerson’s black Honda Odyssey after getting the 911 call. He said Wilkerson told him she and her children were escaping her abusive husband in South Carolina. Leonard Ross, the attorney who is representing Wilkerson’s husband, Lutfill Ronjon, said that the abuse allegations are “baseless.” But The Post and Courier reports that Ronjon was arrested in May of 2005 for domestic violence. While the police report redacts the wife’s name, it cites the wife’s sister as Jessica Harrell. This morning, a Volusia County judge ordered Ronjon to stay away from Harrell after she reported that he threatened to kill her since Wilkerson’s arrest.

In Florida, Wilkerson could have been taken into custody under the Baker Act, a state law that allows authorities to involuntarily take people into custody if they seem to be a threat to themselves and others. But the officer who pulled her over did not feel the need to do so, because the children were sitting in the back smiling and did not seem to be in danger. “It was clear during my conversation that Wilkerson was suffering from some form of mental illness, but she was lucid,” the Daytona Beach police officer said in his report, according to the Associated Press.

She would drive herself and her children into the ocean soon after the officer let her go.

SOURCE-NEWSONE