Excited Delirium

The term “excited delirium syndrome” is one medical examiner Charles Welti came up with in the 1980s to describe the death of Black people during interactions with police. It was believed that these Black individuals exhibited superhuman strength due to narcotics abuse and ultimately died from heart failure, rather than forceful police tactics. In Excited Delirium (Duke University Press) Beliso-De Jesús unpacks this history of this fabricated diagnosis and relates it to today’s ongoing systemic racism. Her analysis adds to the complex history of the impact of medical and police brutality against people of color.