Well, the year is about over. I have won some of my cases, but lost the big one on the soy diet. Well, kinda lost. The Seventh Circuit court of Appeal denied my case. They stated that the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) dietary staff would not be held accountable for the soy diet being detrimental to my health. So there will be no compensation for the life-long disease of Hashimoto’s thyroiditis that I developed from eating the soy diet. The pacemaker in my chest due to the thyroid disease will not see compensation.
But although I lost my personal lawsuit, we have seen a big victory for all the men incarcerated in Illinois. For the soy-based diet is a thing of the past. It is being phased out. Once the stock of soy substitute meat products has run out, the soy diet is over.
So I wanted to post my thanks for the long road and cost supported by the Weston A. Price Foundation. Look, we may not have gotten the recognition in court, but we won the war in the shadows. The soy diet is gone and men are getting real meat again. Only by litigating the matter did we place a spotlight on the cruel and unusual treatment of serving a diet, that was detrimental to the male prisoners’ health. I went the distance myself and tried to get full compensation. The other plaintiffs took the five-hundred dollar-buy-out offered by the Wexford Doctors and Illinois Department of Corrections Staff lawyers.
The main problem was the high estrogen levels in the soy, and the adverse effects it has on the thyroid gland. I proved up these facts. I was given a no soy diet by the IDOC from December 8th, 2008, to April 20th, 2016—then they took that away from me and I had to buy my food at the commissary. Only with the help of the Weston A. Price Foundation (WAPF), Dr. Richard Pooley, and Karen Lyke did I prove up my disease and the daily pain and suffering I was being subjected too.
To the staff and directors at WAPF, you took on the good fight for the guys who had no one to help them. So we want to thank you for the roast beef we had for Christmas dinner. Been fourteen years since the prisoner was served real beef. Food for thought: If the soy diet was FDA-approved as healthy for those who consume it, why has the Illinois taxpayer paid for soy-free food for the IDOC staff all these years? If the soy is safe for the prisoners, why is it not served to the staff? Sometimes the simple, daily, facts speak volumes.
