comment: >
  
  This is some years back but I was supposed to see my grandma in May but I was having a fever so I opted not to since I didn't want to infect her. Next time I visited the country was in early July and when I went to see her my dad told me she might not remember who we are anymore.   
  She died a year ago and I'm still crushed I missed her last lucid moments.   
  It can happen so quickly.
context: Due to severe dementia 
  
  Adult film legend Ron Jeremy is suffering from “severe dementia” and will be declared incompetent to stand trial on multiple charges of rape later this month, according to an e-mail obtained by The Times.
  Jeremy — whose legal name is Ronald Hyatt — was first charged in June 2020 with raping four women he met in West Hollywood bars and clubs. The case against Jeremy quickly ballooned, as dozens of women came forward claiming the one-time porn king had been abusing women for decades at parties, adult film conventions or on movie sets.
  
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  Jeremy, 69, was later indicted on more than 30 counts of sexual assault stemming from allegations made by 20 women, with some of his alleged crimes dating back to the 1990s. But weeks before Jeremy’s trial was slated to begin last year, his defense attorney, Stuart Goldfarb, walked into a Los Angeles courtroom and said his client did not recognize him.
  In an e-mail obtained by The Times this week, L.A. County Deputy Dist. Atty. Paul Thompson said mental health experts called on by both prosecutors and Jeremy’s defense team have determined he suffers from severe dementia and there is no evidence he is faking his symptoms.
  “As a result of the agreement of the experts, the defendant will be declared incompetent to stand trial ... his prognosis for improvement is not good,” Thompson wrote. “If he does not improve, we will not be able to try him for his crimes. Because criminal proceedings are suspended as long as he is incompetent, we also cannot get a guilty plea from him or discuss other measures to get justice for the victims in this case.”
  
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  Thompson and Goldfarb declined to comment Friday. Jeremy, who has denied all wrongdoing, is scheduled to appear in a Hollywood courtroom Jan. 17, when he will be formally declared incompetent to aid in his own defense, Thompson said in the e-mail.
  While competency to stand trial is fluid — meaning a mentally incompetent defendant can later be found capable of standing trial after receiving medication or therapy over time — dementia is a progressive and degenerative illness from which Jeremy is unlikely to recover.
  According to the e-mail, the experts reached their conclusion based on a review of medical documents and interviews with Jeremy, his relatives and several of the Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies who interacted with him while in custody. Some of Jeremy’s relatives apparently suspected he suffered from dementia before his 2020 arrest, “which was the catalyst that started the process that resulted in his driver’s license being taken away,” Thompson wrote in the e-mail.
  Once declared incompetent, Jeremy is likely to be placed in a state-run hospital.
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  Lianne Young, a former British adult film star who first publicly accused Jeremy of assaulting her in an interview with The Times in 2020, said she was frustrated to learn there were concerns Jeremy had dementia long before prosecutors brought charges against him.
  “My first reaction, I was kind of numb,” she said. “They were aware of his condition before getting us all involved. They were well aware he had dementia, so I’m very disappointed that they didn’t solve that bit before letting us go on that emotional journey for two and a half years.”
  Greg Risling, a spokesman for the district attorney’s office, said prosecutors were unaware of the severity of Jeremy’s illness at the time charges were brought.
  
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  “Although his attorney expressed some concern for his declining faculties, we believed him to be competent at the time of filing based upon interviews we conducted with him, among other reasons,” Risling said. “We had no records at time of filing indicating that he had a dementia diagnosis.”
  Young said she was wearing a bikini at an industry party at the former House of Blues on the Sunset Strip in 2000 when Jeremy came up behind her, shoved her against a table and forced himself inside her. The encounter only lasted seconds, according to Young, who said she fought him off quickly. After Young spoke with The Times, she said she was contacted by Sheriff’s Department investigators and later called to testify against Jeremy at a grand jury hearing.
  Young said she doesn’t regret coming forward, as she believes the wave of allegations against Jeremy sparked a conversation about sexual abuse in the adult film industry. But she’s also concerned that, without a conviction, Jeremy may be absolved in the eyes of many of his fans.
  
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  “It’s going to come down to public opinion now, and public opinion has looked at Ron like a god,” she said. “It could be an indication to other predators or viewers of pornography that they can get away with such crimes.” >
  
  There were reports about this delaying the trial as early as August of last year, honestly this should never have gone ahead. There’s nothing you can do when the guy’s brain is dying, he’s already getting the worst possible punishment for anything in dementia. I get the desire for justice to be done or at least to be seen to be done, but nature gets a say too. >
  
  This was the best scenario, if they never charged him he could be out there still doing this. At least now he will never be able to do this again because he will be in the state run hospital until he dies.
  This is the better outcome, barring an actual trial. >
  
  He was charged in August 2021, a year later the trial was in delay because he was so demented. Now the prosecution is agreeing to throw it in because he isn’t competent and never will be again. 
  I don’t think there was realistically much if any of a window for him to reoffend. He must be pretty advanced if he’s incompetent to stand trial, so he was always going to die in hospital one way or another, state-run or otherwise. He’s going to have one of the worst deaths possible, which also should soothe the sting of missing out on convicting him. >
  
  Think of this. It's likely Ron Jeremy will have lucid moments and realize he's in a state run institution. Imagine waking up in a prison and having no idea how you got there. >
  
  I had a relative I lost to Alzheimer’s, which was quite a bit slower in her case than whatever is going on with Ron Jeremy. We knew she had to be in some sort of facility when she attacked my grandfather, a man she was married to for more than fifty years, with a knife because she didn’t know where she was or who he was. 
  That’s the horror of dementia, it doesn’t matter if you’re in prison or your own home with a spouse you love, you wake up in hell. You’re scared and confused, agitated and depressed, sometimes psychotic, and it never gets better, it only gets worse. And then you die. 
  So for me, it doesn’t matter where he is, “comfortable” is a lie we tell ourselves because the truth is unbearable; I’d rather immolate myself than die from dementia. >
  
  After watching his grandmother and  later his mother (my grandma)  spiral into a murky world of memory due to dementia, my dad has a DNR and wants us to put him under should his mind start to go. 
  We had to put my grandmother in care because it was impossible to get her to do anything. I actually travelled 10 hrs to help assist getting her in the shower because all her rage disappeared when she saw me and she would just smile.
  Dementia is a horrible prison in of itself. To see a strong woman, who travelled the world as a nurse between the 50s and late 70s, who didn't stop for any "norm" just sit in a chair and refuse to go outside because it was scary.
  I hope they legalize euthanasia. I refuse to go down that path. >
  
  A DNR helps but people can often live for 10 years and even as long as 20 years with severe dementia if they are otherwise physically healthy. We need a better system for people to escape that. >
  
  It wasn't quite that long, but my family had to watch my grandpa suffer for 7 years after being diagnosed before he passed. Watching the love of her life decline made my grandma give up on living and die herself (she pretty much stopped eating and starved herself to death). Shortly after that it got even worse and he had a stroke, so he spent the last 5 years of his life bedridden and barely able to communicate. I wouldn't wish what he went through on my worst enemy. >
  
  Ron is declared not fit to stand trial, yet you can find interviews with him only months before all the litigation where he is entirely coherent. >
  
  Honestly, I’d be dubious too if the prosecution didn’t agree. It sounds like the guy has just crumbled really quickly. >
  
  Decline in mental faculties can be quicker than most would think, especially in the later stages of the disease. My grandmother went from being able to talk and eat on her own, to passing away within months.