An urgent plea for help

[Guest guest]

Greetings:

Sadly, there is a young man with severe autism in my home state of Oregon facing murder charges of killing his dad's girl friend. His story is @ http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2008873913_teenmurdercharge.html A few days later there was another story about folks coming FF claiming a violent past????

Many of U know Sondra as she use to be a member of ASPIRES and is a strong advocate for our community. ...

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My dear friend, Sondra has brought to my attention a tragic situation in Ohio. I rarely watch the news so this may already be common knowledge to many of you.

Please read these articles:

http://media-dis-n-dat.blogspot.com/2009/02/ohio-teen-with-autism-charged-with.html

http://www.ageofautism.com/2009/02/18-year-oid-with-autism-faces-murder-charges.html

Regardless of whether or not this young man, Sky , killed his mother he does not belong in a jail cell. He was diagnosed with Autism at about 3 years old and has severe challenges in life. With understanding of the sacrifices his mother made in life, there is no way that she would want her son even charged with such a crime. This is a most tragic accident, but not a murder.

I am concerned that unless there are enormous efforts made by advocates on Sky's behalf that he will spend the remainder of his life locked within a system of despair.

Also, we may once again face the barrage of assaults from the likes of Savage or other know it alls who may take advantage of stories such as this to incite hatred against our community.

I will be away from my office travelling tomorrow, but I am hopeful that some of the recipients of this message will have the ability to begin some action or to make contact with organizations that can intercede. If you are not able to directly assist in this call for help, then I would ask for your thoughts and/or prayers to be made on Sky 's behalf.

It is my wish that I could be more active in advocacy right now. Unfortunately the current economic morass has negatively effected my family. Most of my time is consumed in trying to keep the company I work for from going out of business. I apologize to any of you who I may have failed to follow up on contact or work efforts with. I intend to continue unfinished work when things settle down more.

If some of you can do something for Sky , then please do whatever you can.

Please note that Sky's father has not been involved in his life for quite some time. Will he have a change of heart now? I hope so!

Thank you,

-Derrick Jeffries-- Derrick Jeffries

derrick_jeffries@...