California man fatally stabbed while dining with his daughter on his lap

[Jedi Guy]

Source: CNN

(CNN) Anthony Mele was dining at a steakhouse in Southern California with his daughter on his lap when a homeless man allegedly walked up to him Wednesday and stabbed him in the neck.

Jamal Jackson, 49, was arrested shortly after the attack in Ventura and has been charged with premeditated first -degree murder, the Ventura County District Attorney's Office said.

Mele died the next day, but his daughter was not injured. The two men did not know each other, the Ventura Police Department said.

Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/22/us/california-steakhouse-stabbing/index.html

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That poor little girl... the trauma of her father being murdered while she sat on his lap. She'll spend years in therapy to get over something like that, if she ever does.

And if our country had any kind of services for the mentally ill, this guy would've been either institutionalized or at least properly diagnosed and on medication to manage his condition, if possible.

It's also worth noting that the cops had been advised about this guy a few hours previously and, after monitoring him via security cameras, cancelled the call since they thought he wasn't a threat.

[Honeycombe8]

1. Horrible. Therapy or not, the girl will never get over that....

unless she happens to forget it totally, as sometimes happens with traumatic events.

[Honeycombe8]

2. The cops can't arrest anyone who hasn't done anything criminal.

But what was a homeless person doing in a steakhouse?

The perp was Af. American. If the steakhouse had kicked him out for not being a paying customer, well we just saw the reaction to that. Sure, it's different, but I'm not so sure some in the public would have viewed it that way, in the current environment. If the cops had arrested him as a threat, when he hadn't done anything violent, they would possibly have been sued, and the officers suspended or fired.

There really wasn't much that anyone could do, when the perp hasn't been a direct violent threat to anyone.

I guess we all have to be on guard all the time, and expect violence from anyone around us. Maybe best not to eat out at all.

[Jedi Guy]

3. Apparently...

It was a boardwalk restaurant with an open-air patio. Probably just had a railing to separate the patio from the sidewalk outside the restaurant. I'm guessing the attacker just walked up and stabbed the poor guy. Or at least that's my interpretation of the article.

Someone else saw the assailant earlier and called the police because he was shouting and acting erratically. The cops observed him via security cameras and then decided he wasn't a threat to anyone and cancelled the call. They may well get sued by the victim's next of kin. Damned if they do, damned if they don't.

[Honeycombe8]

4. Ah, I see.

Yeah, the cops are damned if they do, damned if they don't.

Arrest or not, if he's mentally wacko, he would have been back on the street in no time, anyway. There's nowhere for the insane to go, if he is insane.

[Princess Turandot]

5. The restaurant is alongside the beach...

It appears to have an outdoor eating section; they may have been sitting there.

[still_one]

6. While this may be unrelated, the legacy of the Reagans governorship and what he did when President

set back mental health in California and the country for decades:

As President:

President Reagan and the Republicans taking over, the Mental Health Systems Act was discarded before the ink had dried and the CMHC funds were simply block granted to the states. The CMHC program had not only died but been buried as well. An autopsy could have listed the cause of death as naiveté complicated by grandiosity.

and as Governor:

"By the time Ronald Reagan assumed the governorship in 1967, California had already deinstitutionalized more than half of its state hospital patients. That same year, California passed the landmark Lanterman-Petris-Short (LPS) Act, which virtually abolished involuntary hospitalization except in extreme cases. Thus, by the early 1970s California had moved most mentally ill patients out of its state hospitals and, by passing LPS, had made it very difficult to get them back into a hospital if they relapsed and needed additional care. California thus became a canary in the coal mine of deinstitutionalization."

https://www.salon.com/2013/09/29/ronald_reagans_shameful_legacy_violence_the_homeless_mental_illness/

Many are oblivious to the damage the republicans have done to our country, and continue to do.

The point being, things don’t usually happen in a vacuum

The overt emergence of racism and bigotry that has been effectively “blessed” by this administration will be following us in the years to come

[Rorey]

7. Thank you!!! +1,000,000

I was thinking this same thing.

[dalton99a]

8. +1

[Cold War Spook]

11. I will stick with the VA Healthcare.

I have been in their psych ward in Fayetteville NC so many times it's like a second home. My problem is, they change my meds and I am good for 6 months to a year. Why they stop working for me who knows. My wife catches it pretty fast so I don't mind going there.

[appalachiablue]

14. Post Rec. Reagan's policies on the US mental health system were disastrous.

We must remember.

[Raine]

15. Yes exactly, this is another one of Raygun's legacies

thanks Ronnie!

[notdarkyet]

9. In my small town, a couple gave a ride to someone they didnt know and when they got to

Where the guy was going, the stranger pulled out a knife and stabbed the driver in the heart killing him. Same week, at our small Taco Bell a couple in the drive through pulled the worker out the drive through window and beat him up. Badly. I think it’s. Obvious. Lack of mental heath services, cuts to food, and housing, and any kind of help for those who really need it have been chopped by trump and his. Cohorts in Congress. As desperation among the needy grows, so will desperate acts. What a country. Just my opinion, as I watch my country devolve.

[dhill926]

10. there has been a noticeable increase in the homeless population....

and their aggressiveness in the last year, in our fair city. Another stabbing just down the block from us 2 nights ago. We have to figure this out.

[oneshooter]

12. British style knife control? n/t

[christx30]

16. Knives aver a certain length are already illegal

to carry in public. Nothing really could have been done from a legislative standpoint to stop this. Except to be less afraid to get this obviously crazy guy out of public before he hurt someone. He had already been making a scene, and had the cops called on him. The cops didn’t want another Starbucks firestorm, so they watched him for violence, saw nothing, and left. That kind of thinking always gets people killed.
I would encourage cops in the future to point out this case. You can charge someone with disturbing the peace. It’s better than waiting for someone to die.

[Kotya]

17. Because it's worked so well in Britain.

Then again, it has encouraged people to switch to acid attacks as an alternative. The legal penalties for blinding someone with acid aren't as harsh as stabbing someone with a knife.

[dogknob]

13. Can't unsee this. Horrible.