Hanging Survivor

[avery]

A different kind of post XD but please let it stay up, it is a hanged girl after all.

By the time a guard at Copper Lake School for Girls got to her cell, S. B. was hanging by a homemade noose slung over a door hinge.

Fluid was coming from the 16-year-old’s mouth. She wasn’t breathing and had no pulse.

Guards and a nurse performed CPR on her for at least 20 minutes while they waited for paramedics to arrive at the troubled juvenile prison in Wisconsin’s rural north.

B. survived but emerged from a months-long coma with serious brain damage.

Her suicide attempt came after a series of warning signs that prison staff failed to act on, according to records reviewed by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Three weeks before she tried to kill herself, B. told a prison psychiatrist she had suicidal thoughts and sometimes viewed life as not worth living. She began discussing for the first time a traumatic event that was haunting her. And at least twice during her four months at Copper Lake, she scratched her arms until they bled, according to the records provided by B.' attorney.

At 7:54 a.m. on Nov. 9, 2015, a guard found her hanging in her cell by pieces of a T-shirt tied in a noose.

"Who's got the 911 knife?" he yelled, referring to the fishhook-shaped knife staff use to cut nooses.

B.' lips and fingers had turned blue, according to a nurse's report. A plastic chair was tipped over next to the door where she hung.

A Rock County judge sent B. to Copper Lake in July 2015 after she broke into a Janesville liquor store with a friend and stole several bottles of vodka and gin. The judge initially put Briggs in an alcohol and drug treatment center, but moved her to Copper Lake after she ran away from the treatment facility and a group home.

Two months after she arrived, B.’ social worker noted she was having difficulty adjusting to Copper Lake. At least twice, she scratched her arms with her fingernails until they bled.

Around this time, B. first began telling officials about an event from her childhood that had traumatized her. B.' attorney shared medical records and other documents with the Journal Sentinel, but blacked out references to the childhood incident.

Struggling to cope with that memory, B. found she couldn't sleep and was often depressed, records show.

B. “has had brief suicidal thoughts although she says, ‘I know I would never do that,’ ” prison psychiatrist G. H. wrote in a report after seeing B. in October 2015. “S. denies global hopelessness but does report occasional passive thoughts that life is not worth living."

H. encouraged her to alert staff if she had thoughts about harming herself, the report shows.

On Oct. 26, 2015, B. bit the inside of her mouth so hard that it bled. She spat blood on a table and told a nurse she'd chewed up the inside of her cheek out of anxiety, records show.

“My anxiety is worse lately,” B. said that day, according to notes a nurse took. “Everything is making me upset.”

Guards sent her to a segregation unit for being "disruptive" and "unsanitary."

"Instead of getting her help and taking on additional precautions, they disciplined her, which is an antiquated way of dealing with self-harm," said her attorney, E. H..

Finally, S. B. abruptly woke up. The extent of the damage was immediately apparent.

Her mother read her lips for months while B. developed the ability to put enough breath behind her words to be heard.

Little by little, S. B. has worked on developing her brain and improving her motor skills. Her care is expected to cost millions of dollars over the course of her life because she will need constant care, according to her attorney.

Belted into a wheelchair, B. on a recent morning wore gray Air Jordan basketball shoes, a pink sparkly T-shirt and a constant smile.

Between occasional muscle spasms, she talked about country singer Luke Bryan, Uno, Candy Crush Saga and SpongeBob SquarePants. A sly smile on her lips, she teased her mom about how old she must be now that she has a grandson.

B. is staying at the Lakeview Specialty Hospital and Rehab center in Waterford and is working on standing and walking. Her muscles atrophied during the four months she was in a coma and so far she has been able to take only a few of steps using a walker.

Nurses held a surprise party for her 18th birthday last month, waking her at midnight so she could celebrate. Everyone had a great time, but S. B. doesn’t remember it.

Asked by a reporter if she knew what put her in the rehabilitation center, B. turned to her mother.

“Mom, do you know why I’m here?” she asked.

“You had an accident,” her mother said.

“How?”

"We'll talk about it later," she said, looking down at her daughter and touching her arm.

B. has some memories from before the suicide attempt, such as playing with her pugs, Dexter and Lucy, and riding her friend's horse, Shaq.

She said she remembered Copper Lake, too, but couldn’t provide any details about her time there.

“I don’t know,” she said when asked what she recalled. “Nothing good. It was all bad.”

[Awake47]

Amazing read. Thanks for posting

[CreepyDeathShrine]

Video all black. So sad. So fucked. My late girlfriend had severe childhood trauma. It's so sad when the victim punishes themselves. Justice is such a fleeting concept in this world.

[avery]

Antemortem shots

[bagpuss]

Wow amazing post, doesn't always have to be gory to be interesting

[K53]

Tragic

[Pyramid_Head]

Nah, I'd rather be dead than be like that. Poor girl.

[2beers]

Sad ! What for has she been at this juvenile prison ?
Apparently she was just another number there.
Teens do stupid stuff. I did it, my kids do it, but it should never end like that. At least she kept some sort of humor.

[Analdo]

It brings up a serious question: Would you rather be fully cognitive (i.e. "normal") and a miserable asshole/bitch (i.e. "disruptive"), or would you rather be a bit of a fucktard with mobility issues but constantly happy and smiling?

Tough call... interesting case.