Providentia

'Suicide Voyeur' Facing Criminal Charges

A US prosecutor is considering criminal charges against a 47-year old Minnesota man for his role in encouraging and assisting online suicides.  William Melchert-Dinkel, a registered nurse, has admitted to being "addicted" to suicide chatrooms and reportedly spent years persuading people to kill themselves while he watched.  Posing under various assumed names including "Li Dao", "Falcon Girl", and "Cami D", Melchert-Dinkel would recruit vulnerable people and enter into suicide pacts with them.  He has confessed to being involved in at least five deaths and is known to have attempted to encourage others.  After being arrested, Melchart-Dinkel was admitted to hospital and told nurses about his suicide fetish and offering advice for assisted suicide in several cases.  Available transcripts of his online chat sessions describe careful step-by-ste instructions for noose placement and asking potential suicides to watch them kill themselves online.

William Melchert-Dinkel was exposed following the diligent work of a UK grandmother, Celia Bray.  After persuading a teenage friend not to take her own life, Bray learned that the friend had entered into a suicide pact with someone online known only as "Li".  When police failed to act, she began investigating on her own despite her lack of computer knowledge.  After years of investigating, she was able to learn Melchert-Dinkel's home address in Fairbault, Minnesota where he lives with his wife and two daughters.  While he has been implicated in the deaths of Mark Drybrough of Coventry, England and Nadia Kajouji of Brampton, Ontario among others, prosecutors are reluctant to lay charges due to potential First Amendment concerns and the fact that he did not physically assist in the suicides. 

Although Melchert-Dinkel was stripped of his nursing license in February, he continues to live at home with his wife and children.  Neighbours are reportedly mystified by the accusations and describe him as being quiet and a "great dad".  The investigation is ongoing.

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The Twenty-Fifth Man (Part 1)

Ed Morrell was an unlikely crusader.

Born Edward Brennan in Pennsylvania in the late 19th century (the exact date isn't known), his father died when he was very young.  Due to his family's poverty, he was obliged to begin working in coal mines at the age of nine.  As a teenager, he stowed away on a ship bound for Europe and managed to talk his way into becoming one of the regular crew.  Traveling around the world, he found himself in Australia where he met a man named Morrell who promised to adopt him.  When that didn't work out, Ed eventually returned to San Francisco.

Under various aliases, he began racking up criminal convictions and served his first prison sentence in San Quentin.  After his release in 1893, he went to Fresno and began living under the name Ed Morrell.  While working as a waiter at a local restaurant, he first met notorious outlaw Chris Evans who was being held in a local jail.  Morrell was in charge of taking meals to the prisoners and, before long, Evans had managed to recruit the impressionable youngster to help him escape from jail.

After a spectacular jailbreak (Morrell had smuggled two guns to Evans and they had managed to take the mayor of Fresno as a hostage), the two of them fled to the mountains. In the weeks that followed, there was one of the most intense manhunts in California's history.  Whenever deputies closed in on the pair, Morrell would chase them off with his rifle (although he never actually shot anyone).  Although the manhunters seemed to stay one step behind, newspaper reporters never had any trouble finding and interviewing the two fugitives.  The favourable newspaper coverage, usually portraying Morrell and Evans as Robin Hood types fighting against greedy railroad barons, made law enforcement agencies and the railroads more determined than ever to catch them.

The outlaws were finally captured by a posse after Evans was tricked into believing that one of his children was gravely ill.  Police surrounded the Evans home while Evans and Morrell were inside and they surrendered without incident.  Although Morrell never actually took part in the train robberies along with Evans, the railroads were determined to make an example of both of them.  Morrell was dubbed the "25th man" in Evans' gang and sentenced to life imprisonment to be served at Folsom State prison in California.  While still having a grim reputation today, doing time there was even more of an ordeal at the turn of the 20th century. 

The use of physical punishments, i.e., torture was commonly practiced in most American prisons of the time and Folsom was definitely no exception.  The prison administrators had access to a wide range of torture methods designed to break, cripple, or kill "problem" inmates.  As a member of the notorious Evans gang, Ed Morrell was a marked man from the moment he entered Folsom and making an example of him was a priority for the warden and guards.  Furnished with a sledge hammer, Morrell was placed on a high rock and ordered to dig a hole down through its center.  For four months, Morrell was obliged to dig in one spot in full view of the warden's office despite protests from the State Engineer on site.  Although he was later assigned to other work, Ed Morrell was later accused by a guard of stepping out of line (which he denied). As punishment for accusing the guard of lying, he was sentenced to fifty hours on one of Folsom's most notorious tortures:  the derrick. 

Located in the part of the prison known as the "Back Alley", Folsom's punishment chambers were boarded off from the rest of the prison.  As Morrell would later write: "The bright light of the corridor confused me for a moment and then I saw the horrifying spectacle of nine unfortunate human beings all dangling from the ends of ropes. They were suspended each one by a block and tackle, from a balcony above their heads. Two convict assistants helped the freeman perform his gruesome work. My arms were extended backward and then a pair of handcuffs were snapped upon my wrists. One of the convicts began pulling the rope which was attached to the handcuffs, drawing me slowly upward. When my heels were just off the floor the attendant made a move to tie the rope fast to a cleat on the side of the wall, but he was brushed aside by the dungeon warder who grasped it with both hands and with the full weight of his body gave it a savage jerk. It was cruel, unmerciful! The weight of my body caused the steel of the handcuffs to cut deeply into my wrists, as I swung limply at the end of the block and tackle. Now he released an inch or so of slack until I had again regained a steadying position, the tiptoes of my brogans resting on the stone flags of the dungeon corridor".  

Morrell's punishment involved being suspended in the derrick for five hours a day (two and a half hours in the morning and two and a half hours in the afternoon).  He had been given no food since the previous day and was given no water while suspended.  Even when his stretch was finished, the guard insisted that he be the last person taken down.  Morrell proudly noted that, "I was the first man who ever walked upright from the derrick after two and a half hours of torture".  After seven days of this daily regime, Morrell was taken down due to concerns about his dying on the derrick but the torture resumed three days later.  His fifty-hour punishment took thirteen days to complete.

Following years of punishments and several escape attempts, Morrell finally took part in another desperate plot to instigate a prison riot.  When another inmate gave away the plot details, Morrell and another twenty-four inmates were hastily transferred to San Quentin "for the safety of Folsom".    Whatever he had endured before, Morrell would find out that his torture was just beginning...

Continue to Part 2

Asking the Wrong Questions

A study published in the January 2010 issue of the Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science examined  the impact of the emotional content of visual scenes on memory accuracy and susceptibility to misinformation over time. Using a sample of 80 undergraduate students  researchers presented a series of photographic scenes selected as being either highly pleasant or unpleasant in nature.  When the subjects returned at a later date (either one week or one month after the initial session), they were then asked questions about the picture that were either factual or misleading in nature,  After 1 week or 1 month, participants returned and were asked (unexpectedly) about the images. Overall, memories of misled participants were substantially less accurate than nonmisled participants, a pattern persisting at 1-week and 1-month follow-up, although the passage of time decreased accuracy of all participants. Relative to positive images, negative images were associated with a greater susceptibility to false memories for a major misleading detail at both sessions. Thus, relative to positive emotion, negative emotion specifically heightens suggestibility in the presence of major misinformation.  The researchers discuss the results in terms of potential generalizability and the impact of improper questioning procedures in dealing with witnesses to traumatic events.

See the abstract.

The Perfect Gentleman

Happy Ada Lovelace Day!  As my contribution to this international effort, I submit the following story:

The Perfect Gentleman.

We'll likely never know the whole story behind the incredible life of Dr. James Miranda Barry.

Based on the best available information, she was probably born Margaret Ann Bulkley although the actual year of her birth is still open to speculation (somewhere around 1791 seems to be the best guess).  Margaret's mother, Mary Ann Bulkley (nee Barry) was the sister of noted artist James Barry  and her father was likely the Venezuelan revolutionary Francisco de Miranda.  Despite her mother's illustrious family and friends, Margaret had some major disadvantages from the very beginning.  Not only was she illegitimate, raised in poverty, and Catholic, she was also a girl at a time when higher education for women was unthinkable.  

Posing as a boy was almost certainly her mother's idea originally.  After coming to London to seek her brother's financial help (her husband had gone bankrupt), Mary Ann persuaded David Stewart Erskine, the 11th earl of Buchan, to finance the education of her brilliant son.  As a professional gentleman, Margaret (now renamed James Barry after her uncle) would be in an excellent position to support his/her impoverished mother.  Whatever the original reason for the disguise, it worked incredibly well.  At the presumed age of ten (but likely a bit older), James/Miranda was entered as a medical student at the University of Edinburgh Medical School and graduated a scant two years later.  Although the University initially balked at granting a medical degree to someone so young,  Buchan's influence forced the Senate to reconsider.

By 1813, James Miranda Barry was a civilian doctor serving in London's hospital wards.  Unfortunately, she already had difficulty being taken seriously due to her youthful appearance and high-pitched voice.  Since she was apparently only fourteen (but likely much older), patients weren't reassured by a doctor who had yet to reach puberty.  Joining the army seemed a logical next step for her.  As an army physician, she would have an unprecedented opportunity to travel the world and still have the relative independence to practice medicine in a way that civilian doctors never could.  Buchan had to use his influence to persuade the Army Medical Board to accept James' credentials (minimum age at the time was twenty-one).

And it was quite a medical career.  By 1816, she was posted to the Cape of Good Hope colony in what is now South Africa.  By all accounts,James  Barry was often temperamental and easily offended.  While many of her military colleagues were put off by her attitude, her genuine compassion for her patients was clear enough.  She had no reservations about treating patients from all social classes, including prostitutes, syphilis cases, and slaves.  Her effeminate appearance often attracted attention though.  One contemporary report described her as "the most skilled of physicians and the most wayward of men.  In appearance a beardless lad, with an unmistakably Scottish type of countenance, reddish hair and high cheek-bones. There was a certain effeminacy in his manner which he was always striving to overcome".  She cultivated a reputation as a skilled marksman and a lady's man to play up her manliness.

It was also during her time stationed at the Cape colony that she entered into a deep, and apparently intimate relationship with the Cape's governor, Lord Charles Somerset.  An attractive aristocrat, Somerset made James Barry his personal physician and gave her an apartment in his large residence.  She saved his life after he contracted cholera although the full extent of what passed between them is still a matter of speculation.  There were certainly rumours that the two of them were having a homosexual affair and Lady Somerset was particularly outraged at how much time they spent together (not that the truth would have been any more reassuring).  Word got back to London and a royal commission was set up to look into the scandal.  Although James Barry was later exonerated, Somerset returned to England in 1826.

The rest of Barry's medical career was marked by numerous triumphs and setbacks.  She was a brilliant surgeon and introduced strict standards of cleanliness in dealing with patients that predated Lister and Semmelweiss by decades.  Her radical treatments for leprosy and other tropical diseases reformed all the hospitals in which she worked.  She also had a reputation for insubordination and frequent unauthorized absences.  By the time of the Crimean War, she had risen to the rank of Inspector-General.  Although she was stationed in Corfu, she took "French leave" (unauthorized absence from her post) to investigate the appalling death rates among patients in Florence Nightingale's hospital.  What she found there (and her famous clash with Nightingale herself) eventually led to the radical reform of battlefield medicine.

Despite her long and brilliant medical career, James Barry's history of insubordination and unauthorized absences eventually caught up with her.  In 1864, she was forced into retirement and even denied the knighthood that a doctor of her reputation would traditionally have been given.  She spent the remaining years of her life as a bachelor doctor tended only by her long-time manservant, "Black John" (both pictured above).  Only after dying of dysentery on July 25, 1865, did the full truth about James Miranda Barry come out when the women who laid out the corpse discovered her secret.  Not even "Black John" had known although others would claim that they long suspected it (Lord Somerset was deceased by this time).  Even more remarkably, there was evidence of a caesarean scar on her body which suggested that one of her "French leaves" had been intended to hide a pregnancy.  Whether it was Somerset's child or part of another relationship is another mystery that will likely never be solved.  There was a certain irony in this revelation considering that James Barry had performed one of the first successful caesarean surgeries earlier in her career (both mother and child survived which was unprecedented at the time).  In typical fashion, the British Army sealed all records relating to James Barry until 100 years after her death.  Only in recent decades have many of the facts relating to her remarkable life become known.  She is buried in Kensal Green cemetery in London with full military honours under the name she held all her life. 

Despite her amazing career and medical accomplishments, James Barry's reputation as a medical pioneer has been largely eclipsed by her life-long disguise.  Although there have been other notable cases of gender impersonation before and since, James Barry has become a cultural icon.  She has been the subject of numerous books (fiction and non-fiction alike), plays, and television dramatizations.  After numerous delays, a full-length movie based on the love affair between James Barry and Charles Somerset appears to be underway.

I'm looking forward to it.

"It Was A Little Scary"

“I know that it wasn’t me, and I couldn’t control it,” she said quietly. “But it was ... it was a little scary.”

These words highlighted Kiera Echols' reaction on watching a YouTube video based on her case that her physician, Dr. Chris Kobet has entered in the 2010 Neuro Film Festival sponsored by the American Academy of Neurology Foundation.    Echols, a 22-year old former honour student training to be a medical technician, began developing headaches, body aches, and neck stiffness last November that were initially attributed to meningitis.  As her condition worsened, she went to stay with her parents in Springfield, Ohio since her husband, was away on basic training in the U.S. Air Force.  Kiera Echols began developing intense neurological symptoms including blackouts as well as bizarre delusions.  During one episode, she screamed for an hour that she was in labour.  On November 16, her parents took her to a local hospital where they were advised to have her committed to a psychiatric hospital.  They refused to accept this diagnosis.

After an odyssey of consultations, Kiera Echols came to the attention of University of Cincinnati neurologist, Dr. Chris Kobet who diagnosed her with anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis.  First identified in 2007 by Josef Dalmau at the University of Pennsylvania, this particular form of autoimmune disorder was apparently triggered by a benign tumour on her ovaries (a teratoma).  In producing antibodies to attack the tumour, her immune system also attacked her central nervous system resulting in the bizarre psychiatric symptoms that she experienced.  As only the third case of anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis reported to date, Kiera was fortunate in coming under the care of Dr. Kobet who had dealt with similar cases in the past.  Although a reliable test for the condition is not yet available, tissue samples were sent off to Dr. Dalmau for a definite diagnosis to be made.  Once the teratoma was located, it was removed in a surgical procedure on December 23.

Since that time, Kiera Echols has made a remarkable recovery, assisted by her parents and her husband who is caring for her full-time.  There have been no new psychotic episodes since January and she is hoping to resume her normal life in time.  In making her decision to go public with her story, Kiera Echols has expressed the hope that her case will generate greater awareness of the devastating impact that anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis can have and the possibility that some women may have been misdiagnosed and unintentionally institutionalized in the past.

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Alcohol Abuse and Aboriginal Suicide

While a disturbing rise in suicidal behaviour in aboriginal populations has been noted worldwide, there has been relatively little research emerging from Aboriginal settings.  In a recent paper published in Crisis: The Journal of Crisis Intervention and Suicide Prevention, a team of researchers examines the psychosocial and behavioral characteristics of 30 consecutive adult suicides from four First-Nations communities in Quebec, Canada. Psychological autopsies were carried out through face-to-face interviews with family members of the deceased to gather information on pre-suicide behaviours and other precipitating factors. The results reflected previous research with aboriginal suicides being overrepresented by young single men. Alcohol intoxication at the time of death was reported for 22 cases in association with rapid acting out after the precipitating event for 20. All but two cases had a history of alcohol abuse, and drug use was also present in 23 cases. In 16 cases there had been a previous suicide attempt, 14 of which occurred during the previous year. The main socio-demographic characteristics of the communities were overcrowded living arrangements and no job status (90%). Seven cases were incarcerated or locked up at the time of death. Clustering of suicide was observed within seven nuclear families including 16 suicides. The researchers conclude that Aboriginal suicide is the result of a complex interweaving of individual, familial, and socio-historical variables. The impact of contemporary social stressors on individual well-being must be addressed to prevent suicide in this community.

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Pennsylvania Town Rocked by Suicide Pact Deaths

According to their friends and families, sixteen-year old Gina Gentile and fifteen-year old Vanessa Dorwart were vivacious and popular high school sophomores who showed little indication of the depression that would later cause them to take their lives.  On February 25 of this year, Gentile, along with a friend cut class at their Norwood, PA high school.  They then went to the Norwood regional rail station where they met up with Vanessa Dorwart.  As the 10:28 train traveling from Boston to Washington approached the station, Gentile stood on the tracks where she was joined by Dorwart.  Although the third girl (who has not been named in the media) begged them to get off the tracks, both girls hugged one another as the train, traveling at 110 miles per hour, struck and killed them both.  A ticket reported seeing the girls arguing and one of them talking on a cell phone just minutes before the fatality occurred.  Police have ruled the deaths as suicides and suggested that they had been part of a deliberate suicide pact.

The apparently premeditated deaths of two teenagers has been devastating both for their families as well as the entire town.  There seemed few clues as to what the deceased  had been planning although Gina Gentle, whose father had several years previously, was reportedly distraught by the accidental death of her boyfriend, Bill Bradley, in January.  The night before their deaths, Gina Gentile had gathered with friends to commemorate Bradley's passing and had written that, "Life without you here is not going to be the same".  Vanessa Dorwart had also been feeling despondent and had written about her depression on her Facebook page.  A candlelight vigil for both girls has recently been held at the Norwood train station.

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Suicide and Traumatic Brain Injury in Veterans

The elevated incidence of suicide in returning US veterans and patients with traumatic brain injury (TBI) has been the focus of increased attention by clinical researchers.  There have been few studies examing suicide rates in veterans with TBI however. The November 2009 issue of Rehabilitation Psychology  provided a research study examining veterans with a history of TBI to assess precipitating and preventative factors of suicidal behavior and to highlight past experiences and recommendations regarding services aimed at suicide prevention in affected veterans.   The researchers examined a sample of 13 veterans (12 males and one females) with a history of TBI) and a history of clinically significant suicidal ideation or behavior. Using in-person interviews, data was  collected on mental health history, precipitating factors, and biographical information.  Shared precipitating factors that were noted included loss-of-self post-TBI (shifts in self-concepts and personal identity), cognitive sequelae (i.e., impaired memory and executive functioning), and psychiatric and emotional disturbances. Common protective factors noted included positive social supports, a sense of purpose regarding the future, religion and spirituality, and mental health care. Means of improving care were also identified e.g., increasing the availability of services and mental health professionals’ knowledge regarding TBI, providing more structured treatment . The researchers concluded that their findings highlight potential areas of importance in the assessment and treatment of suicidal Veterans with a history of TBI.   The need for more psychological services for TBI veterans was also highlighted.

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Bipolar Man Avoids Life Sentence For Cheese Theft

A 50-year old chronic offender has been given an eight-year sentence for offenses including stealing a pack of shredded cheese worth $3.99 in US dollars.  On January 6, Robert Ferguson snatched a woman's wallet from a 7-11 counter and then stuffed the package of cheese into his pants before leaving the store.  Although prosecutors had initially pushed for a life sentence under California's harsh "three strikes law", Robert Ferguson was given a lighter sentence after a psychiatric evaluation determined that he was suffering from bipolar disorder and had a compulsion to steal.  Ferguson, who has a nearly 30-year record for burglary and other offenses, has spent nearly 22 of the past 27 years behind bars and narrowly avoided a life sentence in 1994 for a similar offense.  His defense attorney, Monica Brushia, successfully argued that many of his offenses occurred decades previously and his only assault conviction was actually a misdemeanor stemming from an incident in which he threw a soda can at one of his siblings as a teen.  She also stressed the petty nature of his latest offense and the lack of violence on his record.  He will be eligible for parole in three years.

Passed in 1994, California's three strikes law is the harshest of its kind and calls for 25 years to life for all offenders convicted of a third felony, regardless of the crime.  More than 41,000 offenders have been convicted under the law as of March, 2008 despite the massive overcrowding prevalent in California's prison system. The extent of the overcrowding (including prisoners being packed into hallways and classrooms in prisons) has been ruled as cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the US constitution.  Although a federal judge has recently order the state to reduce overcrowding by 55,000 inmates, "three-strikes" convictions continue.  A 2005 legislate report has reported that enforcing the "three-strikes" law for even non-violent offenses costs the government $0.5 billion US each year.  Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has recently called for a twelve-percent cut in California's prison budget as part of his austerity program.

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Making a Prophet (Part 3)

Continued from Part 2

Throughout the 19th and early 20th century, Jamaica was a stunning contrast of natural beauty and stark poverty.  The twin legacies of slavery and colonialism left the island with a population consisting primarily of former slaves, people of mixed race ("coloured"), and white colonists who, despite beinga small minority, owned most of the land and resources.  While formal independence from the U.K. would come in the 20th century, life in 19th century Jamaica was often harsh for the freed slaves and their descendants. 

It hardly seems surprising that religion would be a major influence among the island's inhabitants.  Not only with the various branches of Christianity, but also more exotic religions based on traditions imported from Africa.  Obeah and Myalism were widely practiced despite attempts at suppression by the  authorities.  These traditions were often incorporated into more mainstream religions and helped fuel the Christian revivalist movement.  The 19th century was marked by religious clashes and spiritual missions that quickly attracted believers.

Which brings us to Alexander Bedward.

He was born in southeastern Jamaica in 1848 into extreme poverty.  While his father is unknown, his mother had a local reputation as a healer.  Alexander Bedward never learned to write and had minimal reading.  Given his family's poverty, he had little choice but to work on one of the big sugar plantations in Colon, Panama.  Whatever future he may have planned changed after a massive fire swept through Kingston, Jamaica in 1882.  Following the fire, Bedward began to have disturbing dreams and erratic behaviour that so frightened his family that they tried to have him put away for lunacy.  He insisted that the dreams meant that God had chosen him for a divine mission.  By 1889, Bedward was formally installed as one of the 24 elders of August Town's Native Baptist church and his religious crusade began.

And what a crusade it was!  By October 1891, Bedward had resigned from his plantation job to launch his healing mission.  Using water from a spring on his property near Jamaica's Hope River, he conducted healing ceremonies based on a divine vision that told him that "the water of the Hope River would be miraculously converted into medicine for soul and body".  Along with his healing, Bedward delivered sermons on a large rock overlooking the river and thousands of people gathered every Wednesday to hear him. 

The descriptions of Bedward's crusade were closely followed by reporters from Jamaica's Daily Gleaner.  Although the newspaper dismissed Bedward as "an ignorant black man living somewhere in the Long Mountain", his movement certainly made news.  In one less-than-complimentary account, Bedward's crusade was described as "one of the most painful and saddening [phenomena] that could possibly be witnessed by anyone of ordinary intelligence, who has his country's good at heart …. [T]he seething mass of ignorance … congregates in the vicinity without a blush of shame at the credulity and infatuation which is [sic] on every side exhibited".  Not only did Bedward's followers gather to hear him speak, they also brought bottles, jugs, and anything else capable of holding the precious spring water to bring back to their homes.  There were also the invalids who came hoping for divine healing including "lepers, people with running sores, the crippled and deformed, blind, consumptive, asthmatic and in fact every complaint known in the medical world".

The local authorities and clergy were especially outraged by the healing sessions featuring nude men and women bathing together by the thousands. Medical doctors denounced Bedward for his outlandish claims and the false hope he gave patients.  Stung by his numerous critics, Bedward continued his Wednesday sessions and people still gathered at the river for healing.  The Daily Gleaner gave regular editorials denouncing the "Bedward craze" and unsavory hints at his family's previous attempts at having him committed began to surface.  Meanwhile, the "Bedwardites" (as they were being called) were making arrangements to build a temple to honour their prophet.  Colonial authorities were increasingly worried by Bedward's sermons directed against the upper-class Jamaicans who "grabbed the substance of the poor". 

On January 16, 1895, Alexander Bedward gave a sermon denouncing the white minority and predicted the end of the world in which the wicked would be punished and the faithful rewarded.  He railed against the government and the Clergy as "vagabonds, thieves, robbers and liars" and called on his followers to drive out the white population.  That was enough for the government to lay a charge of seditious language against him and Bedward was quickly arrested. His subsequent trial in April of that same year (with an all-white jury) returned a verdict of Not Guilty By Reason of Insanity.  Although Bedward was sent to a local asylum, he was released a few weeks later after a successful appeal.  Bedward returned to his mission and the healing sessions went on as before (though he eventually insisted that his followers be fully clothed when they bathed in the river).

Although skeptics claimed that Bedwardism would eventually "run its course", the movement continued into the early years of the 20th century.  By 1910, Bedward and his followers had built an impressive compound in August Town complete with a chapel.  While Alexander Bedward was still seen as a threat by the colonial authorities, he had enough support to prevent any attempt at arresting him again.  It's hard to say how  far the movement might have gone if Bedward hadn't had one final vision...

In 1920, believing that the millennium was at hand, Alexander Bedward announced to this followers that he would ascend into heaven on December 31, 1920. As you might expect, the Gleaner scoffed at this revelation but thousands of his followers gathered at the compound in hope of being "saved".  Many of these followers sold all their possessions and the tailor shop on site provided simple white gowns for them to wear for the big event.  Due to fear of rioting (and a possible black uprising), a military regiment was sent in to maintain order.  Throughout the day, Bedward's followers were repeatedly told that his ascension was postponed (he had originally promised that it would happen at ten in the morning).  By late afternoon, the followers were told that the ascension would be "spiritual" rather than physical and, by evening, most of the followers went home disappointed.

Although this event broke up much of Bedward's support, he was still able to rally six hundred followers for a "manifestation" in Kingston that following year.  Police took no chances and promptly arrested him and many of his followers.  Once again, he was declared Not Guilty By Reason of Insanity but there was no release this time.  Up until his death in 1930, Alexander Bedward was held in Jamaica's Bellevue Asylum. 

Much like Richard Brothers and Joanna Southcott before him, Bedward's supporters slowly drifted away following his imprisonment and death.  Many of these followers later became part of Marcus Garvey's Pan-African movement as well as the growing Rastafarian religion.  In some circles, Bedward is still considered a martyr and an early leader in Jamaican nationalism.  Leaving aside questions surrrounding whether he was mentally ill, his religious crusade inspired tens of thousands of people at the peak of his popularity.  

Although I have focused on three very different prophets in this series, the similarities among their movements and the people who believed in them seem apparent enough.  So why do some religious leaders launch major movements that continue after their death while others sink into obscurity?  Heaven only knows.