title: Benedetta Carlini

texts:
<mask> (20 January 1590 – 7 August 1661) was a Catholic mystic and lesbian nun who lived in counter-reformation Italy. As abbess of the Convent of the Mother of God, at Pescia, she had a relationship with one of her nuns, Sister Bartolemea. These came to the attention of the counter-reformation Papacy, determined to subordinate potentially troublesome mystics if they showed any signs of independent or heretical spirituality. Although they paid three to four visits to the nunnery, it was not until they interrogated Sister Bartolemea that they found that <mask> and Bartolemea had engaged in sexual relations. Bartolomea gave testimony that Benedetta engaged in frottage with her while possessed by the spirit of a male demon known as Splenditello. Benedetta was stripped of her rank and imprisoned. Early life

<mask> was born on 20 January 1590 (St. Sebastian night), in a remote mountain village  which was located at the Apennines, 45 miles northwest from Florence.Her father was Giuliano, a rich and devout man who owned his house and several other properties in Vellano and a small farm nearby. Her mother was Midea <mask> (born Midea d'Antonio Pieri), a sister of the parish priest. Benedetta was an only child in her middle-class Italian family and Giuliano provided his will that after his own and his wife's death his house should be turned into an oratory dedicated to the Mother of God. Midea's labour was very difficult, painful and dangerous both for her and her daughter, both of whom survived. Giuliano had decided to name the girl Benedetta — blessed — and dedicate her to God's service. Soon after her birth, her family retired to her father's farm in the mountains where she was nursed by her mother and not a wet nurse. Benedetta's father educated her himself.That was unusual for Renaissance Italian society, in which most girls took lessons from their mothers and were not very literate. Her education and upbringing were religious. At the age of five, she knew the litany of the saints and other prayers by heart. Under her father's tutelage, Benedetta would take the Rosary and recite the litany several times a day. At the age of six, Benedetta learned to read and knew some Latin. Her mother instructed Benedetta to recite five Pater Nosters and eight Ave Marias every day. It seems that Midea was directing Benedetta toward supernatural female guides — the Virgin Mary, a statue of whom had been acquired especially for Benedetta, and St. Catherine of Siena, whose mystical marriage with Christ was celebrated as a feast day at their home.One day a black dog tried to drag Benedetta away, but her screams frightened him. By the time her mother came, the dog had disappeared. Benedetta and her parents intepreted this incident as the work of a devil disguised as an animal. On another day, when Benedetta was standing on a small porch of her house singing her Lauds to the Virgin Mary, she suddenly heard a nightingale imitating her song. She commanded the bird to stop singing as she did not wish to be accompanied. The nightingale stopped and only resumed when Benedetta allowed it. Over the next two years, this nightingale sang in any hour of day or night according to Benedetta wishes.In European folk culture and literature, the nightingale was a symbol of carnal love or the sensual side of life. One spring day of 1599, Giuliano decided to fulfill the vow made at the birth of his daughter and bring Benedetta to a group of religious women in Pescia. As father and daughter set off on the road, the nightingale once more appeared and began to follow them. About a mile from Vellano, <mask> turned to that bird and said: ″Goodbye nightingale, I am going to Pescia and leaving you.″ The nightingale flew off, and villagers never heard him again. Convent

Benedetta joined a group of unmarried women who wanted to lead an ascetic life; it was not a regularly enclosed convent and they were not even full-fledged nuns. Firstly it was a retreat in a private house where women led a communal life engaged in prayer, spiritual exercises and making raw silk. This community had been formed nine years earlier (i.e.in 1590) by Piera Pagni, the widow of a prominent Pesciatine. One of her kinsmen, Antonio Pagni, founded an independent religious congregation for men in 1588. He had obtained a degree in canon law at the University of Pisa; he was joined by Father Paolo Ricordati and several other priests and laymen. Because of their reputation for saintliness, local people soon began to call them Theatine fathers. But they called themselves Fathers of the Holy Annunciation, and they were not members of the Theatine Order of Clerics Regular founded in 1524 by St. Cajetan Thiene. Fathers of the Holy Annunciation agreed to back a female community founded by Piera Pagni and provide spiritual direction to the women in it. Paolo Ricordati was their father confessor.Thus, local people began to call Piera Pagni and her subordinates "Theatines" too although the Theatine Order of Clerics Regular was a male religious order. In 1599 in Pescia were three official monasteries: San Michele (founded in the 12th century), Santa Chiara (founded in the 1490s) and recently formed Santa Maria Nuova. However, due to the rapid growth of Pescia, the Valdinievole province and the religious revival, there was not enough space for all who wanted to become nuns or monks. Many girls were refused entrance to these institutions and had no place to go. Convents required novices to pay an expensive subscription. ″Brides of Christ″, like brides of laymen, were accepted only with dowries. Dowries of wellborn Prescia brides amounted to 1500 scudi, and place in a prestigious female convent like Santa Chiara cost around 400 scudi when a skilled worker earned not more than 55 or 60 scudi a year.A semi-monastic community founded by Piera Pagni required only about 160 scudi, which Benedetta's parents were able to pay. In the last half of the sixteenth century, many religious communities like this appeared, offering an alternative to many women who could not or did not want to join already established convents. Some of the most devout and successful female religious orders, the Ursulines among others, started from such modest origins. Women with strong religious vocations often preferred such groups to well-established convents. These convents were often considered to be corrupt because many nuns had not joined them by choice; they had been sent there by relatives or driven by a hopeless situation. Also, the life of discarded daughters of aristocratic families in the convents was in many ways indistinguishable from the life of the upper classes on the outside. A community that Benedetta joined had adopted the so-called Rule of Saint Augustine.Originally it was a letter that Augustine of Hippo addressed to a group of nuns, led by his sister, who were experiencing difficulties in the governance of their convent. This Rule does not regulate in detail all aspects of the monastic life. It provides a set of spiritual counsels within which more specific rules could be accommodated by individual communities. It touched on such topics as the need to lead a communal life with no private property, the observance of prayers, the mortification of the flesh through fasts, the need for modest dress, and so on. This was accepted by many female convents and quasi-monastic communities. For the members of these groups, the Fathers of the Holy Annunciation created a hierarchy of authority. "They have among themselves a female superior under whom they govern themselves, a teacher of the novices, and other customary offices as if they were full-fledged nuns".As soon as her father left her in a community house, nine-year-old <mask> kneeled in front of the statue of the Madonna and said ″My most sweet Mother, I have left my carnal mother for you, I beg you to take me as your daughter.″ Not long after this, Benedetta prayed there again, and this statue fell over. As young novice, she was frightened but thought this was a miracle, showing that the Mother of God wanted to kiss her. Whereas before Benedetta had accepted miracles as being in the nature of things, now she was astounded and awed by this action of the Virgin, which testified to the mighty power of God. Benedetta's first years in this Catholic retreat were unremarkable. Twenty years later, other community members remembered that she was always very obedient and exemplary in all her actions, took communion twice a week and never did anything worthy of rebuke. If anything supernatural was happening to her during that time, only Benedetta herself knew about it. In 1610, the community of Benedetta acquired a farm in the commune of Fucecchio for 1750 scudi and became quite economically successful and self-sufficient.It appears from the available sources that the group's annual revenues came to 300 scudi, of which half came from the silk work done by its members and the rest from their dowries and from this farm and others. Thus, the following year they received permission from Rome to organize a general chapter and accept new girls. After that, the community started constructing a new convent building, which was completed in October 1613. In April 1618, the nuns asked the secular authorities for permission to enlarge the convent enough to accommodate up to thirty sisters (at that moment, there were eighteen of them, but they were confident of continuing growth). The project they proposed would cost 4000 scudi, part of which was for dismantling a section of the city wall to make way for the building. Despite the difficulties, the construction was approved and began soon. Visions and Spiritual Experience
In 1614, just before the Pescia Theatines received permission to build their convent, Benedetta, now a young woman of twenty-three, reported to her mother superior and father confessor about her supernatural visions.The first had occurred one morning while she was praying. Suddenly she felt herself to be in a beautiful garden with many fruits and flowers. In the centre was a fountain with scented water, and next to it was an angel, holding a signboard with gold letters: ″Whosoever wants to take water from this fountain, let him purge his cup or not come nearer.″ Because she did not understand the meaning of this inscription, she asked the angel. He explained, ″If you want to know God, lift all earthly desires from your heart.″ On hearing these words, Benedetta felt a strong urge to take leave of the world, but, instead, the vision ceased, and with great inner wrenching, she returned to the normal world of the senses. Afterwards, she felt great happiness and a stronger desire than ever to be good. In the next visions, one time she saw a man dressed in great splendour who saved her from wild lions, scorpions and boars and said he was Jesus and the animals were demons. Another time a young boy appeared and told her to climb the Mount of Perfection, which was very difficult and, the boy said, would never be able without a true guide who is her father confessor.Some of <mask>'s visions had occurred in the presence of witnesses who had observed that during prayer she had gone into a trance-like state in which she gesticulated and made incomprehensible sounds. During these episodes, her altered state of consciousness had made it impossible for her companions to receive answers to their questions about what was happening to her. Particularly visual forms of mental prayer were widespread spiritual practice in pre-modern Europe. Visualization of people, places and events in the life of the Holy Family was recommended in prayers manuals by Luis de Granada, St. Charles Borromeo and others which Benedetta occasionally read. Benedetta's own reactions to her visions were mixed. At the time, there was less concern as to whether a "vision" was a product of imagination or mental illness; more concerning were whether these messages were diabolical or divine in origin. And father confessor Paolo Ricordati initially told her to disbelieve anything she saw as not to give the devil grounds on which to work his tricks, to try to repress the onset of visions and to ″pray to God that He send her travails instead of ecstasies and revelations, since it seemed to her that this would be safer against the deceits of the devil.″ Benedetta did as he said.She could keep herself from having visions, but she had great difficulty in receiving some sort of travail. Only in 1615, her prayers were answered, and she began to experience such intense pains over her entire body that she was paralyzed by them. The physicians could neither diagnose it nor determine what to do. None of the remedies eased Benedetta's pain. She thought that this mysterious illness was the sign of divine favour that Paolo Ricordati had asked for. She expected recognition of others for being the recipient of extraordinary grace and was to be sadly disappointed. Nothing had really changed, and for two years, Benedetta suffered quietly in the obscurity of monastic communal life consisted of prayer, fasts and manual work.In 1617 her visions resumed. But instead of encounters with Jesus and angels, Benedetta now was pursued at night by handsome young men who wanted to kill her and who beat her all over with iron chains, swords, sticks, and other weapons. And she experienced excruciating physical pain. Also, these men urged her to come with them and leave the Theatines, telling her by persevering in her monastic life she would only make herself ill without being certain of the salvation of her soul. One of them even asked Benedetta to be his bride, and when she refused, he tried to take her with brute force. The attacks took place several times a week and lasted for six to eight hours. One night she didn't endure and called other nuns for help.After that, her superiors assigned her a young companion, Bartolomea Crivelli, to help her in her battles with the devil. Bartolomea was to share Benedetta's cell and to keep an eye on her at all times. If at this point the confessor and the mother superior had any further concerns about the validity of Benedetta's claims, they did not voice them. Instead, the convent was now seen as being graced by the presence of a mystic whose body was the battleground between supernatural forces. The confessor and mother superior became extremely solicitous of her welfare and, because of her weakened condition, excused her from participation in many of the daily routines of the community. In 1618 construction of a new monastery building was coming to a close. The resettlement to new convent building was a solemn procession.<mask> walked in an ecstatic trance, seeing the angels of Pescia paying homage to her and scattering flowers along her path as if she were the image of St. Dorothy, the patron saint of Pescia, which being paraded in its annual procession through town. Once they arrived at the gates of the convent, the Madonna greeted her and gave her companion two guardian angels. No one other than <mask> could see the flowers and angels, but many citizens saw her in that unusual state. Abbess with Stigmata

Three months after the resettlement, on the second Friday of Lent, <mask> received the stigmata. By her own words, these appeared between two and three at night when she was in bed. She saw a crucifix and bright rays from wounds of Christ to her head, hands, feet and side of the chest. These rays caused tremendous pain, but then Benedetta felt such contentment in her heart that she had never experienced before.Bartolomea Crivelli was near, and she was the first to see the signs on <mask>'s body. Also, she saw that <mask> arranged herself in the form of the Cross and became as red as a glowing ember and heard that <mask> said, "My Lord, there are others who are better than me, I don't deserve this since I am a sinner." Then <mask> asked Bartolomea to lift her by the arm because she couldn't do it by herself. And Bartolomea saw red marks like small rosettes on Benedetta's hands, feet, and side, and also a deep red band around her head, but it was bloodless. The stigmata were the first material evidence of supernatural phenomena that happened with Benedetta. Her heavenly

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title: Benedetta Carlini

type: original

texts:
 grace had been quickly recognized, and sometime between February and May 1619, the nuns' community elected her to be their abbess. During the Lenten season of that year, Ricordati was regularly visiting the convent to hear Benedetta give sermons to the other nuns while they purified themselves with their whips as part of their penance.As she talked to them, she was always in a trance and spoke, not as herself, but as an angel who persuaded the nuns to lead a better life. This angel usually ended the sermons by praising <mask>, chosen above all others to receive the signs of God's grace. Had Benedetta not been in an altered state of consciousness, Paolo Ricordati would not have allowed her to give sermons because ″it is shameful for a woman″ to speak in a Christian church, even for an abbess. But if a woman had been favoured with the gift of prophecy of other divine gifts, she could be an exception. Heart Exchange and Splenditello Angel

On March 21, 1619, Paolo Ricordati summoned Benedetta and told her: ″Today is the day of St. Benedict, your saint's day, go in ecstasy at your pleasure, I give you permission.″

It was an experiment to examine if her visions would come on command. That evening, during compline, Benedetta fell into a trance. Then at night, Benedetta experienced a new miracle that she had never had before.She saw Christ looking like a handsome young man with long hair and a long red robe. He was accompanied by St. Catherine of Siena and other figures. <mask> turned to Bartolomea, saying: ″I don't know if it is the devil's work; pray to God for me. If it is the devil's work, I will make the sign of the cross on my heart, and he will disappear.″

The young man explained that he was Jesus and had come to Benedetta to take her heart. She laughed, ″What would you do, my Jesus! You have come to take my heart, but I don't want to do it without the permission of my Spiritual Father.″

The young man reminded her that the confessor had said she could do anything that was God's will without any reservations. Benedetta supported that Jesus had taken her heart and returned three days after to put another heart in her body.By his miraculous power, it was possible to live so long without a heart. Bartolomea later said that when she was helping Benedetta with her blankets, she came up to her and felt her chest around where her heart should be, and felt a void. To maintain Benedetta's physical purity, Jesus ordered her not to eat meat, eggs, and milk products and not to drink anything but water. To maintain her spiritual purity, he assigned her a guardian angel, Splenditello, to point out her falling when she did something wrong. This angel appeared as a beautiful boy dressed in a white robe crowned by a wreath of flowers. In his hand, he held a green wand, about two feet long, on one side of which were flowers, and on the other thorns. The flowers were for when she did things that were pleasing to Jesus, the thorns were to punish her when she did not.And she felt pain if she did something wrong, because Splenditello touched her with the thorny side of a wand. Receiving corporal punishment from an angel and such intensive purification of the body was very unusual for Catholic nuns and saints. Once settled in their new quarters, the Theatines began the final round of administrative procedures to become a regular convent. In 1619, they asked Pope Paul V to grant them complete enclosure. When the papal officials who handled such petitions received the request, they asked the provost of Pescia to send in a report about them. Marriage with Christ

On 20 May 1619, Jesus appeared to Benedetta in vision and announced that he wanted to marry her in a solemn ceremony a week later. He issued detailed instructions on the decoration for the chapel.The upper part of the altar should be covered with light blue cloth, the right side with red cloth and the other two sides in green. The floor also should be covered: images of Christ and Madonna, flowers of all sorts and colours, three chairs and 12 pillows must be there. All nuns in the house would be at the ceremony with lighted candles and then this Jesus will say them through Benedetta's lips what to do and where to go. Benedetta doubted was this genuine Jesus or some diabolic illusion and hesitated to tell Father Ricordati all the details of her vision, but three days later she revealed it. She wondered about the public nature of the event, and the work it required because Jesus didn't usually reveal himself in such a public fashion. But Ricordati unexpectedly let her proceed and other nuns had already started to decorate the convent because, in one of her recent ecstasies, Benedetta had spoken of the impending marriage and possibly couldn't remember this in the normal state of conscience. Because the community did not have a whole set of things needed for a solemn mystical marriage ceremony, they sent a servant off to borrow the altar cloth from several people outside the convent.They asked some of the religious institutions in the vicinity to contribute candles and solicited the pillows and flowers from various other quarters. The candles were sent by the Fathers of Holy Annunciation, by the convent of Santa Maria Nuova and by people of the mountain country. Baskets of flowers arrived from everywhere. The tree chairs came from the Prior of Pescia. Nuns had received so many gifts that they didn't know what to do with all of them. Word of what was happening spread and many people wanted to participate, but no one, not even Father Ricordati, was allowed by the provost to enter the convent during the preparation or the ceremony itself. On the morning of Holy Trinity (27 May 1619), Benedetta heard an inner voice telling her that she should dress the two novices as angels.She quickly wrote a note to Father Ricordati to obtain his permission. This done, she and the others went to Choir, where she picked up a basket of flowers, scattered its content throughout and then lit the candles, giving one to each. Benedetta instructed nuns to get on their knees and to do as she told. Taking up the crucifix, she began to intone Veni Creator Spiritus as she led a procession out of the choir, onto the garden, and then back around the choir where all of them sang various hymns and the litanies to the Virgin. After scattering incense and bowing several times in the direction of the altar, Benedetta knelt and resumed singing by herself. Her voice was scarcely audible and her words could not be made out. Then Benedetta had a new vision of Jesus, so bright and beautiful she could hardly look at him.And he said: ″Rejoice, today I will marry you.″ Next came the Madonna with a retinue of angels and saints. Benedetta replied that she did not want to consent, as she was not sure whether he was Jesus or the devil. ″I am not the devil, but your Jesus,″ he answered, ″give me your hand because I want to put the ring on you.″ Benedetta said: ″But Jesus, I am not worthy.″ The Madonna then took her right hand, and Jesus placed the ring on her finger. Benedetta kissed the ring. Jesus told her that no one else would see the ring but her. Then this supernatural man, invisible for all but Benedetta, made a whole sermon and represented her as his bride and servant, who is the greatest that he has in the world, and told all to obey her. Benedetta spoke in a tone that seemed to the other nuns more beautiful than her usual voice.After this sermon, <mask> had returned to her normal senses and began to leave the choir, almost as if nothing had happened. Along the way, she stopped to chat with the wife of the Vicar who, in defiance of provost's orders, had come to the convent to witness the wedding. Some other participants of the event were in doubt about this possible wonder. No one other than <mask> had seen Jesus, the Madonna, the saints or the ring. They knew that St. Catherine's marriage with Christ had left no visible evidence too, but the desire for publicity was unusual for a true mystic and seemed suspicious, especially if other people there didn't see any supernatural person or objects. <mask>'s contemporaries were well aware that because women were denied a place in the social and public discourse of their age, they thought to make their voices heard in other ways. Having religious visions was one way women could have their voices heard.For example, Maria de la Visitación, the nun from Lisbon, also had the stigmata and became one of the most influential European women of the 1580s, consulted by rulers and high church officials, before she was discovered to be a fraud.It’s been suggested that such could be the case with Benedetta. The First Investigation
Not only the nuns of the Congregation of the Mother of God were concerned about Benedetta's religious experience, but also the leading ecclesiastical official in the town - provost of Pescia Stefano Cecchi, and Pescian secular authorities. Speaking through Benedetta, Jesus had said extravagant words of praise for her and the threat for damnation for those who did not believe in her. And he said that the fate of the townspeople was in Benedetta's hands. Such behaviour was not characteristic of holy people, whose messages from the divine contained praises of the Lord rather than themselves and who gained followers by their character and deportment rather than by threats. As the wedding preparations had already demonstrated, despite the provost's feeble efforts to curb any publicity about the affair, many people had become interested in Benedetta's mystical powers. Citizens not well-informed about religion were very inclined to believe in the unproven miracles.And the situation might get out of control of ecclesiastical and secular authorities. So provost Stefano Cecchi ordered all those who had witnessed the mystical marriage of <mask> and Christ to talk no further about this with outsiders. On 28 May 1619, the day after this ceremony, he came to examine Benedetta himself. <mask> was relieved of her duties as abbess until further notice, and Felice di Giovanni Guerrini came to this duties. Firstly Stefano Cecchi had examined the stigmata of <mask> <mask> since they were the only visible signs of miraculous intervention. Christ had said during Benedetta's sermon of the previous day that the wounds on her body would be open and larger in appearance than before. The provost, therefore, looked at her hands, feet, and side, where he could see bits of dried blood about the size of a small coin.When they were washed with warm water, each revealed a small opening from which drops of fresh blood trickled out. When the blood was dried with a towel, more came out. On <mask>'s head were many bloody marks, which also bled into the towel when washed with warm water. The stigmata, which day ago had been nothing more than small red marks, had changed just as Christ predicted. Then the provost asked Benedetta to recount how wounds came to be on her body. She told about five rays from the crucifixion in her vision during Lent and about that she felt pain not all time: "On Sundays, they seem to be numb; on Mondays and Tuesdays I have almost no pain; and all the other days I have great pain, especially on Fridays." After the first visit of the provost, Benedetta went into the trance and wrote two letters: to Ricordati and Cecchi.But after the trance, she could remember only former, in which she asked her father confessor for permission to write directly to the provost or meet with him. Ricordati denied her request because if Christ wanted to communicate with the provost, he would find other means for doing so. But then Ricordati forwarded to Cecchi the letter that <mask> had written to himself. <mask> did not know about this, and when Cecchi came again on 7 June 1619 and asked her what she wanted to tell him, she seemed nonplussed and had nothing to say. The provost had examined Benedetta's stigmata again and saw a few changes. The wound on the right hand did not bleed when washed and dried with a towel. The puncture marks on the head were also dried and looked partly healed.The provost was perplexed, but there was nothing to be done, and the visit came to an end. Then he had been visited and examined <mask> fourteen times between late May and early September. On June 14, the observation of stigmata revealed that some of the wounds that had almost healed the week before were now bleeding again. The provost ordered <mask> to cut her hair and wash her head to make the wounds more visible. <mask> was allowed to leave the room briefly to rearrange and close her garments before returning for further questioning. Suddenly she run back in, holding her hands to her head. "Jesus, what is this?"she exclaimed as blood gushed down her face and onto the floor. The visitors managed to staunch the blood with towels. But the examination had to be cut because <mask> was in too much pain to continue. But this was not the end of the investigation, just a postponement. On June 1619, <mask> revealed to Father Ricordati that she had again seen Jesus in a vision. This time he was an angry and vengeful Christ with an unsheathed sword ready to strike. And he threatened to punish the people of Pescia with the plague for their grievous sins while no one was willing to ask for mercy.<mask> offered to pray for his mercy herself and to be the instrument of the town's salvation by spending her time in  Purgatory until the day of judgment. Christ's anger seemed to be appeased by her words. He told her to continue to love him always and to arrange for processions to placate him. Ricordati gave her permission to organize a procession with an image of Christ at the head. On July 23, Cecchi met with Felice di Giovanni Guerrini, Bartolomea Crivelli and with another nun, Margherita d'Iptolito  Ricordati, a relative to Paolo Ricordati. Their testimonies did not result in any major new revelations. The main obstacle to officially sanctioned public recognition was the absence of a ring on Benedetta's finger.Other nuns were unable to see it because she always covered up that hand. But Margherita Ricordati said that she saw a yellow band with a cross that didn't look like a ring. When <mask> was called to the examination room, she had an ordinary, inexpensive gold ring on the fourth finger of her right hand. On the top side of a ring, there were five points the size of ordinary pinheads. A point in the middle was dark red. The ecclesiastical examiners were eager to probe further, but Benedetta was feeling too ill to answer. Finally, the provost of Pescia Stefano Checchi and other investigators had concluded that Benedetta's visions were genuine visions and neither dreams nor fantasies, and their religious content conformed to church dogma and practice.So <mask> had been recognized as a true visionary. The provost must have written favourably since in July of 1620, he and the Vicar of Pescia made one last visit to the convent to conclude the enclosure. On July 28, Pope issued the bull that made this female religious community a fully enclosed convent. According to the nuns' wishes, it was called the Congregation of the Mother of God and would be under the protection of St. Catherine of Siena. No longer would they have to go outside their convent to hear Mass, but more importantly, as nuns, their vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience would become solemn vows. Any nun wishing to leave the convent could be constrained to stay by her superiors and by the secular authorities. Similarly, any laypersons trying to enter the convent without permission could also be punished.After a convent was granted full enclosure, <mask> was reinstated as abbess. Resurrection
There is little information available about the next several years of <mask>'s life. It seems that she managed successfully her abbess' duties. When the nuns were cloistered and could not leave the convent area even for a short time, a board of outside administrators had been established in the fall of 1620 to aid <mask> with some of her tasks. Members of the board helped to manage the convent's properties and to market its silk and agricultural products. Benedetta's father, Guiliano, died between November 1620 and March

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title: Benedetta Carlini

texts:
 1621. Soon after that, when Benedetta went into her trances, one of her guardian angels, Tesauriello Fiorito, began to prophesize her imminent death.He would urge the nuns to treat their abbess with greater tenderness than before because her days on earth were numbered. And only after her death would they realize her true value because there was no one else in the convent as fit to be their abbess as she. After this vision, Benedetta herself began to speak about her death and even had her grave opened and readied for the day when it would be needed. On the day of Annunciation (25 of March 1621), the nuns witnessed Benedetta's death and called Paolo Ricordati. He arrived immediately and commanded Benedetta in a loud voice to return to the living, which, to everyone's astonishment, had the desired effect. When Benedetta revived, she told the assembled that she had seen angels and demons, Purgatory and Paradise, her father and several other deceased people. The Second Investigation
Sometime between August 1622 and March 1623, Alfonso Giglioli, a newly appointed papal nuncio in Florence, decided to re-investigate Benedetta's case and sent several of his officials.These investigators were more sceptical than previous. Unlike the Theatine nuns, Paolo Ricordati, or Stefano Cecchi, they had nothing to gain from <mask>'s claims. The doubts of the investigators about the reported miracles and visions were strengthened by their interpretation of <mask>'s character. Her mystical experiences contained immodest and lascivious language. Her so-called angels bore peculiar names - Splenditello, Tesauriello Fiorito, Virtudioello, and Radicello. These sounded more like the names of evil spirits than of heavenly creatures. Investigators did not find in Carlini charity, humility, patience, obedience, modesty, and other virtues to the eminent and heroic degree which usually accompany the true spirit of God.She lacked the extraordinary personal virtues that would make her a role model for other good Christians. New investigators found contradictions in Benedetta's visions. For example, in one of them, the Virgin had asked her to obtain permission from Father Ricordati to have a guardian angel but, before this request, such an angel had already appeared in her early visions. It was obvious to all that God neither lied nor was ever contrary to himself. And even Benedetta's visible stigmata could be not the marks of Christ but of the devil because these appeared not during the fervor of prayer, in the harshness of the wilderness, or during a long period of solitude, but when she lying softly in bed where the enemy of God resides. Further doubts were cast on the divinity of Benedetta's mystical exchange of hearts with Christ and marriage with him, regarding Benedetta's need for help from Bartolomea to complete this wonder. And the solemn public ceremony of marriage with Christ seemed too suspicious.Investigators believed that Christ might need the publicity of it only for a demonstration of a miracle to the people. But none were seen until two months later, when a rather shabby looking ring, not nearly as beautiful and brilliant as one <mask> had described, appeared on her right hand. Also, investigators discovered that <mask> likely had a hereditary demonic obsession. Both her parents had allegedly been possessed for some time. Despite the seeming aversion to the meat and milk products, <mask> was secretly fetching salami and Cremonese style mortadella to where she could eat them undisturbed. But one time, another nun saw it. This was like Benedetta's father behavior when he "too was assailed by spirits".Testimonies of other nuns made it clear that some of Benedetta's supernatural phenomena were falsifications. Two nuns spied on Benedetta through the hole in her study door and more than twenty times saw her renewing her wounds with a large needle. Another nun had seen her put her blood on a statue of Christ, which Benedetta then claimed began to bleed in honour of her sanctity. Other witnesses saw that she had made the star herself with some gold foil and fixed it on her forehead with red wax. And Benedetta said that Christ kissed her forehead and left a gold star. When she spoke as an angel in one of her ecstasies, that the Theatines could learn from her how to flagellate themselves with true spiritual fervour. The nun, who had been standing nearby, noticed that Benedetta didn't strike herself even once, and that to make it seem as though she had she smeared the whip with blood from her wounds in her hand.Three nuns also reported that she sometimes ran barefoot through the convent as if her feet were healed, and one heard her exclaim as she jumped down from a small table, "Whoever saw me jump down would say that there's nothing wrong with my feet." Bartolomea gave more testimonies. She eventually found a small brass box containing dilutes saffron in <mask>'s desk. This saffron and Benedetta's blood probably had been used to paint the ring. But the most shocking confession was about the lesbian relationships between Bartolomea and Benedetta. As investigators reported, "This sister Benedetta, then, for two continuous years, at least three times a week, in the evening after disrobing and going to bed would wait for her companion to disrobe, and pretending to need her, would call. When Bartolomea would come over, Benedetta would grab her by the arm and throw her by force on the bed.Embracing her, she would put her under herself and kissing her as if she was a man, she would speak words of love to her. And she would stir on top of her so much that both of them corrupted themselves. And thus by force she held her sometimes one, sometimes two, and sometimes thee hours". And "<mask> would tell her that neither she nor <mask> were sinning because it was the Angel Splenditello and not she that did these things. And she spoke always with the voice which Splenditello always spoke through Benedetta. . . ." <mask> refused to admit that she had engaged in sexual acts and claimed she could not remember what she did when Splenditello spoke and acted through her. The investigators were not prepared for such things because in Italy and Europe in the 17th century were very few documented cases of sexual relationships between women, and much more cases of heterosexual fornication between a nun and her male lover and cases of male homosexuality. Yet that two women should seek sexual gratification with each other was virtually inconceivable despite such cases had been described in the legal commentaries of Antonio Gomez, Gregorio Lopez and Prospero Farinacci, which had been printed and widely circulated throughout Italy in the previous decades.The second investigation had been completed on November 5, 1623, when the clerics submitted their "Last Report" to the nuncio. Then they saw no traces of the stigmata and the ring on Benedetta's body. And when she was asked about angels, visions, apparitions, revelation and ecstasies, Benedetta answered that she no longer saw any of them. She was not an abbess anymore and lived the life of an obedient nun under the care of a new abbess. The investigators concluded that "all the things that were done in her or by her, not only those which are deemed sinful, but also the other deeds which were held to be supernatural and miraculous were done without her consent or her will, since they were done while she was out of her senses by the work of the devil." Also, they concluded that the ineptness of Paolo Ricordati was a crucial factor in allowing the situation to continue as long as it did. While the ecclesiastical investigators who wrote the last report on Benedetta seemed disposed toward leniency and emphasized her lack of consent and will, the final judgement need not necessarily absolve her from guilt.It would be up to the nuncio to determine in which direction the sentence and punishment would go. Later life and death
Judith C. Brown could not find any information about the nuncio's decision and further Benedetta's life, except a fragment of diary of a nun, whose name has not come down to us. On August 7, 1661, this nun wrote in her dairy: "<mask> <mask> died at age 71 of fever and colic pains after eighteen days of illness. She died in penitence, having spent thirty-five years in prison." The words in the diary suggest that Benedetta was not imprisoned until 1626, three years after the second investigation. Perhaps the bureaucracy was simply slow. Perhaps authorities had decided not to punish her if she repents and never repeats such claims and deeds, but Benedetta would not or could not live as an ordinary obedient nun.Perhaps secular or ecclesiastical authorities once had recognized <mask> <mask> as a threat to the established order because she remained popular among the laity and decided to shut her within the walls of the convent. The official decision about <mask>'s imprisonment has not survived. We can suppose that the conditions of Benedetta's imprisonment were harsh. Ecclesiastical authorities had adopted Constitution by St. Teresa, who stated that sins of the flesh are the gravest of nuns' faults. And the punishment for these sins must be solitary confinement for life. Guilty sister "shell in no case, even though she repent and implore mercy and pardon, be received back into the community, save if some reasonable cause supervene and on the recommendation and advice of the visitor". Other nuns, except wardens, must not speak with punished one or send her anything under pain of suffering the same penalty.A sister in prison should have her veil and scapular taken away. She should be let out only to hear mass and to follow the other nuns to the place where they disciplined themselves with their whips. On those days, she might be allowed to eat on the floor of the refectory, near the door so that the others might step over her as they left the room. Several times a week, she should receive only bread and water for sustenance. Word of the death of <mask> <mask> spread quickly outside the convent walls. People of Pescia did not forget her even forty years after the events that brought her notoriety and thirty-five years of strong social isolation. Perhaps the reason was that her prophetic warnings to those who refused to believe in her had finally come to pass and in 1631 the plague did indeed strike Pescia.And many people had never really believed in the officials' efforts to discredit her miracles. A crowd gathered near the convent's gate. People wanted to see and touch <mask>'s body or even take some of it with them like the relics of a saint. But the nuns barred the doors of the church to avoid any uproar and tumult until the burial. They brought dead <mask> into the church as they do with the other nuns and dressed her with the black veil and habit worn by the others. Very little information about the later life of Bartolomea Crivelli has come down to us. An unknown nun on 18 September 1660 wrote in the diary: "Sister Bartolomea [blank] died [today?]; when Sister <mask> <mask> was engaged in those deceits note in this book on page [blank], she was her companion and was always with her. And because of this she experienced many difficulties. . . . In temporal affairs she worked as hard as she could and in spiritual affairs she was very devoted and totally given over to holy prayer." Possibly, Bartolomea had been recognized as an innocent victim of deception and coercion and had not been punished by ecclesiastical or secular authorities. She may have been stigmatized for a time by the other nuns and may have had to endure occasional reminders of her misdeeds, but she appears to have spent her time as an ordinary nun. Alternative interpretations of Carlini
E. Ann Matter, a feminist religious scholar, has an alternative perspective on the case of <mask> <mask>, and wrote about it in the Journal of Homosexuality in 1990. She compared and contrasted two autobiographical accounts from <mask> <mask> and another 17th-century Italian Catholic mystic, Maria Domitilla Galluzzi of Pavia.<mask> and Galluzi were both self-designated visionaries and highly regarded by their religious and secular communities, but each was subject to suspicion and close scrutiny by church hierarchy. <mask> <mask>'s trial records related the aforementioned series of sexual contacts with Bartolomea, while Maria Domitilla Galluzzi seems to have had no sexual experiences within her own mystical framework. Matter's article questioned whether scholars might have succumbed to the temptation to simply transpose the sexual self-understanding of figures in their own historical context to past historical environments. "Lesbian nun" might be viewed as too simplistic a description, and alongside Maria Galluzzi, <mask> <mask>'s sexuality "might be viewed as organised around an elaborate organic connection between the spiritual and the sensual." However, it might be noted that Matter has written extensively on Galluzzi in other contexts, and Brown's study of <mask> occurs in greater depth than that of her counterpart. More recently, Brian Levack has analysed the <mask> case and others in the context of his work on demonic possession and exorcism in the Baroque era of 17th and 18th century Europe. He notes that the case in question was anomalous, as according to <mask>'s account, she was possessed by an angelic entity, Splenditello, when she made love to Sister Bartolomea.Levack departs from the above authors in placing the event in philosophical and historical context, noting the rise of nominalism within 17th and 18th century Catholic thought, which attributed greater scope for agency and supernatural activity from demonic entities than had previously been the case. Such signs were described as convulsions, pain, loss of bodily function (and other symptoms that one might describe as apparent epilepsy from this description), levitation, trance experiences, mystical visions, blasphemy, abuse of sacred objects and vomiting of particular objects as well as immoral actions and gestures and exhibitionism. Levack argues that this provided the female subjects of exorcist rituals with the chance to engage in relative social and sexual agency compared to gender role expectations of social passivity. Possession was a form of dramaturgy and religious theatre, Levack argues, as was demonology. According to Levack, then, <mask> and other recorded instances of Baroque possession were engaged as active participants within a social ritual and theatrical performance that reflected contemporary Baroque religious culture. Judith C. Brown chronicled her life in Immodest Acts (1986), which discussed the events that led to her significance for historians of women's spirituality and lesbianism, while Brian Levack has recently explained the events described as a form of religious theatre and dramaturgy which permitted women greater social and sexual agency than Baroque Catholic religious passivity usually permitted. Canadian playwright and director Rosemary Rowe has written a play about her affair with Sister Bartolomea, <mask> <mask>: Lesbian Nun of Renaissance Italy.In film
Paul Verhoeven has directed a biographical film about <mask> <mask> called Benedetta released in 2021. She is portrayed by Virginie Efira. Notes

References

Bibliography

 Brian Levack: The Devil Within: Exorcism and Possession in the Christian West: New Haven: Yale University Press: 2013:

E. Ann Matter: "Discourses of Desire: Sexuality and Christian Women's Visionary Narratives" in Journal of Homosexuality: 18/89(1989–1990): 119 - 132

Rosemary Rowe: <mask> <mask>: Lesbian Nun of Renaissance Italy. Independently published (English & Italian): 2019:

 Vanda (playwright): 'Vile Affections: Based on the True Story of Benedetta Carlini', 2006: (First produced at the New York International Fringe Festival, August, 2006. Recently translated into German.) see www.vandaplaywright.com

1590 births
1661 deaths
17th-century Christian mystics
17th-century Italian Roman Catholic religious sisters and nuns
Lesbians
LGBT Roman Catholics
LGBT people from Italy
LGBT history in Italy
People from Pescia
Roman Catholic mystics
17th-century LGBT people
Italian Christian

masks: Benedetta Benedetta Benedetta Benedetta Benedetta Benedetta Benedetta Benedetta Benedetta Benedetta Carlini Benedetta Carlini Benedetta Benedetta Carlini Benedetta Carlini Benedetta Carlini Benedetta Carlini Benedetta Carlini Carlini Benedetta Carlini Benedetta Carlini Carlini Carlini Carlini Carlini Benedetta Carlini Benedetta Carlini Benedetta Carlini


title: Jay Clayton (attorney)

texts:
Walter Joseph "<mask><mask> (born July 11, 1966) is an American attorney who served as the chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission from May 4, 2017 until December 23, 2020. He was nominated for the position by President Donald Trump. Early life and education
<mask> was born at Fort Eustis in Newport News, Virginia. He grew up near Hershey, Pennsylvania, where his father worked for the local chocolate company, and Wallingford, Pennsylvania. <mask> graduated from Strath Haven High School in 1984. After attending Lafayette College, where he was a member of the soccer team, <mask> transferred to the University of Pennsylvania where he graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Engineering degree in 1988, and received the Thouron Award for post-graduate study in the United Kingdom. He received a Bachelor of Arts (promoted to a Master of Arts, per tradition) in economics from King's College, Cambridge in 1990.He then attended the University of Pennsylvania Law School where he graduated cum laude and Order of the Coif in 1993 with a Juris Doctor degree. During college and graduate school, <mask> was a member of the Ocean City Beach Patrol and Penn Law rugby team, an intern with the U.S. Attorney's Office in Philadelphia and U.S. Representative Curt Weldon, and an employee of United Engineers and Constructors. Career
From 1993 to 1995, <mask> clerked for Judge Marvin Katz of the District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. After being a summer associate at the firm in the summer of 1992, <mask> joined Sullivan & Cromwell full-time in October 1995 and became a partner in January 2001. At Sullivan & Cromwell, <mask> was a member of the firm's management committee and co-managing partner of the firm's General Practice Group. He specialized in mergers and acquisitions transactions and capital markets offerings and represented prominent Wall Street firms, including Goldman Sachs. He served as an adviser to numerous companies regarding issues related to the SEC, Federal Reserve, Department of Justice, and other agencies.He has also helped multiple corporations raise money through initial public offerings, including Alibaba Group, Ally Financial, Och-Ziff Capital Management, Oaktree Capital Management, Blackhawk Network Holdings, and Moelis & Company. During the financial crisis of 2007–2008, <mask> advised Bear Stearns in its fire sale to JPMorgan Chase in 2007, Barclays Capital in the purchase of Lehman Brothers' assets following their bankruptcy, and Goldman Sachs in connection with the investment by Berkshire Hathaway. <mask> disclosed to the U.S. Office of Government Ethics that his other corporate clients had included TeliaSonera AB, Ally Financial, Deutsche Bank, UBS, Volkswagen, SoftBank Group, The Weinstein Company, Pershing Square Capital Management, and Valeant Pharmaceuticals. <mask>'s individual clients included Ocwen's former head William Erbey, Paul Tudor Jones, former Attorney General of Ireland Peter Southerland, CDW founder Michael Krasny and LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman. <mask> earned $7.6 million in 2016 from his firm and has a family wealth of at least $50 million. A substantial portion of his holdings were in mutual funds of the Vanguard Group. His investments also included private funds managed by Apollo Global Management, Bain Capital, J.C.Flowers & Co., and Richard C. Perry but he divested these investments upon confirmation. SEC chair

Nomination and confirmation
On January 4, 2017, President-elect Donald Trump announced his intention to nominate <mask> to be SEC Chairman, and he was nominated on Inauguration Day, January 20, 2017. <mask>'s nomination was endorsed by Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. U.S. Senator Catherine Cortez Masto, a Democrat representing Nevada, expressed concern that <mask> represented Swedish firm TeliaSonera in a proposed venture that would combine Russian telecommunications companies MegaFon and Altimo. <mask> is not thought to have any ties to the Russian companies. On April 4, 2017, the Senate Banking Committee voted 15–8 to take <mask>'s nomination to the full Senate, with three Democrats voting in favor of <mask>. On May 2, 2017, the U.S. Senate voted 61–37 to confirm <mask> as Chairman of the SEC.Votes cast in favor of <mask>'s confirmation included nine Democrats and one Independent alongside 51 Republican votes. On May 4, 2017, <mask> was sworn in, marking the official beginning of his role as Chairman. Tenure
In connection with the nomination of <mask> in January, President Trump said in a statement that "[w]e need to undo many regulations which have stifled investment in American businesses, and restore oversight of the financial industry in a way that does not harm American workers." Upon <mask>'s swearing-in, the SEC consisted of <mask>; Michael Piwowar, who was serving as acting Chairman; and Kara Stein. Subsequently, Hester Peirce and Robert J. Jackson Jr. joined the commission. In 2018, Piwowar and Stein stepped down, and Elad Roisman and Allison Lee joined the Commission in 2018 and 2019 respectively. <mask> has expressed concern about the decline in the number of U.S. public companies and also has been outspoken on securities law issues related to distributed ledger technology, cryptocurrencies and initial coin offerings.Some predicted that he will look to encourage initial public offerings (IPOs) of companies and streamline the capital formation process by reducing the regulatory framework that applies to public companies in the United States. Under <mask>'s tenure as chairman of the SEC, the SEC charged the fewest number of insider trading cases since the Reagan administration. In November 2020, <mask> stated his intention to resign at the end of the year, although his term would expire at the end of June 2021, <mask> resigned on December 23, 2020. One of his final actions before resigning was to sue Ripple Labs challenging the legality of trading cryptocurrency XRP as an unregistered security. Southern District of New York
On June 19, 2020, Attorney General Bill Barr announced that President Trump would nominate <mask> to replace Geoffrey Berman as United States attorney for the Southern District of New York. <mask> was criticized for his role in the removal of Geoffrey Berman at a U.S. House hearing. <mask> said it was entirely his idea to become the U.S. Attorney for SDNY.He said he wanted the position because he had a "strong desire to continue in public service," and return to his New York-based family. After SEC
In February 2021, Apollo Global Management appointed <mask> to the newly created role of lead independent director on its board. <mask> also rejoined Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, where he was a partner before entering government, to become senior policy adviser and counsel. Professional memberships and activities
<mask> is a member of the American Bar Association, served as an Adjunct Professor at University of Pennsylvania Law School beginning in 2009, and was Chairman of the New York City Bar Committee on International Business Transactions beginning in 2010. Prior to his confirmation, <mask> served on the Executive Committee of the Metropolitan Golf Association. Personal life
<mask>'s wife Gretchen, whom he started dating while they attended the same Pennsylvania high school, worked at Goldman Sachs. At one point a small amount of her retirement assets (less than $1,001) was invested in an account managed by Omega Advisors.<mask>'s wife resigned from her job prior to his confirmation. References

External links

Alumni of King's College, Cambridge
American lawyers
Law clerks
Living people
Members of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission
Securities (finance)
University of Pennsylvania Law School alumni
Place of birth missing (living people)
Sullivan & Cromwell partners
1966 births
Finance law scholars
Scholars of securities law
University of Pennsylvania Law School faculty
Trump administration personnel

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title: Thomas Löfkvist

texts:
<mask> (born 4 April 1984) is a Swedish former professional road bicycle racer who last rode for the UCI Professional Continental team . Since 2015 <mask> is general manager of Swedish professional cycling team Team Tre Berg–PostNord. He became the youngest Swedish professional road bicycle racer when he started his professional bicycling career in  at the age of 19 in 2004. <mask> was a good time trialist with solid climbing abilities, winning the Monte Paschi Eroica in 2009 with a powerful attack during the steep final kilometer ascent. He has previously used, both within and outside of the cycling world, the surname spelling 'Lövkvist'. Beginning with the cycling season of 2010 he is using his legal surname Löfkvist throughout. Career

Early years
As a junior, Löfkvist was the European mountain bike champion.Aged 19 he won the Individual Time Trial and the Overall Classification of the prestigious Circuit des Ardennes. Löfkvist also finished sixth and wore the leader's jersey in the 2003 Tour de l'Avenir. Following these results he turned professional for the French team  in 2004. Française des Jeux
Löfkvist's first professional season turned out to be a very successful one. The week after turning 20 he won the last stage of Circuit de la Sarthe with a 171 km breakaway, covering 150 alone after getting rid of Christophe Moreau. The stage win also gave him the Overall Classification, drawing comparisons with Tour de France winners Bernard Hinault and Greg LeMond, who also won the race at the age of 20. Löfkvist finished 10 seconds ahead of Franck Bouyer, who four days later earned his revenge by beating Löfkvist in the French semi-classic Paris–Camembert.Later in the season he also won the Swedish National time trial championships and participated in the 2004 Summer Olympics. In the 2004 Tour de l'Avenir he won the last stage and finished second overall on the same time of the winner, Sylvain Calzati. <mask> began the 2005 season with a 12th place in the Paris–Nice. He made his debut in the Tour de France as the youngest rider at the age of 21. He also finished 4th in the Tour de Pologne and 14th in the Deutschland Tour. He was later named the Swedish Cyclist of the Year. In 2006 he became the Swedish National Road Race champion and was once again the youngest rider of the Tour de France.In 2007 he finished second in the Critérium International after winning the concluding Time Trial. He also competed in the Tour de France and later finished second in the 14th stage of the Vuelta a España, the best stage result for a Swede in Vuelta a España since 1982. At the age of 23 he had finished his second Grand Tour of the season and the fourth of his career. <mask> was the UCI ProTour rider with most competition days (84) in 2007 and he only abandoned in the last stage of Paris–Nice. He covered the third most competition kilometers in the ProTour. Team Columbia
<mask> joined the  for the 2008 season, later known as Team Columbia. Löfkvist won the best young rider classification and finished third in the Tirreno–Adriatico.His improvement in stage races became clear after he finished fifth in the Tour de Suisse, ahead of his team leader Kim Kirchen. <mask> also took the white jersey from Romain Feillu in the first time trial of the 2008 Tour de France. Löfkvist then finished impressively 12th at the World Championships. In 2009 he finished 5th at the Tour of California behind Levi Leipheimer and then won the Monte Paschi Eroica, his first win in two years. He also finished fourth in the Tirreno–Adriatico and later wore the pink jersey as leader of the general classification at the 2009 Giro d'Italia. Team Sky

On 10 September 2009, Löfkvist was presented as a rider for the newly established British , where he has chosen to spell his name 'Löfkvist'. Team Sky officials have said that the name appears as 'Löfkvist' on the rider's passport, and he previously has used that spelling in the Olympic games.In July 2010, <mask> finished 17th in the Tour de France (20 minutes, 46 seconds behind winner Alberto Contador), the highest placed Team Sky rider. <mask> led Team Sky at the 2010 Vuelta a España, but the team withdrew from after Stage 7 following the death of soigneur Txema González. In the absence of Bradley Wiggins, <mask> led Team Sky at the 2011 Giro d'Italia, where he finished 21st overall. <mask> left  at the end of the 2012 season, and joined the new  team for the 2013 season. In August 2014, <mask> announced his retirement at the end of the 2014 season, as he was diagnosed with chronic fatigue. In November 2014 <mask> was announced as general manager of the new Swedish squad Team Tre Berg-Bianchi ahead of the 2015 cycling season.

masks:
Thomas Löfkvist
Thomas Löfkvist
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title: Wesley Bell

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<mask> is a St. Louis area attorney, former public defender, former municipal prosecutor and judge, former municipal prosecutor and former city council member for Ferguson, Missouri. Currently <mask> holds the office of Prosecuting Attorney for St. Louis County, Missouri. In a major upset, he soundly defeated long-time yet controversial county prosecutor Bob McCulloch in the August 2018 Democratic primary election. <mask> became the first black county prosecuting attorney in St. Louis County history when he took office in January 2019. Early life
<mask> was raised in North St. Louis County, Missouri. He is the son of a police officer father and civil servant mother. <mask> is a graduate of Hazelwood East High School, Lindenwood University, and University of Missouri School of Law.Career
After graduating from law school <mask> worked as a St. Louis County public defender. He later joined the faculty of Florissant Valley Community College as a professor in the criminology department. Additionally, he also was appointed to be a municipal court judge in Velda City and municipal prosecutor in Riverview. While working as a municipal judge in Velda City, <mask> was sued by Arch City Defenders, a local nonprofit, for running an illegal bail system. In 2015 during the Ferguson Protests he was elected to the city council with strong support from some activists. During his time on the council he helped to implement the consent decree to reform the city’s criminal justice system through both police and court reform. Running for the county prosecutor race on a platform of community based policing, assigning special prosecutors in homicides by police, pledging to never seek the death penalty, reforming cash bail/bond and never using it for low-level offenses, expanding diversion programs and the county’s drug courts, and promoting equitable due process, he received significant support from local and national activists and advocacy groups.Prosecutor-Elect

In December 2018, a month before <mask> took office, the St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Office attorneys and investigators voted to join the St. Louis Police Officers Association (SLPOA) a chapter of the Fraternal Order of Police which represents police officers in a neighboring jurisdiction. This decision elicited immediate criticism, including accusations of a conflict of interest. Concerns were raised both locally and nationally, and by the Ethical Society of Police (ESOP), which is composed of, predominantly black, active and retired law enforcement officers. However, at least some of the employees’ concerns seemed to be justified after <mask> terminated three veteran prosecutors within hours of beginning his term. These terminated employees were later paid $170,000 by St. Louis County to settle their wrongful termination claims. County Prosecutor

<mask> Plan

On January 8, 2019 <mask> released details of his “Bell Plan.” This plan prioritized working to reduce the St. Louis County jail population to give more resources to combating violent crime. Marijuana Decriminalization

In his first hours in office, <mask> ordered his assistant prosecutors not to prosecute marijuana cases under 100 grams without evidence of distribution of the drug.However, he will still prosecute marijuana cases where the person possessing the marijuana is armed with a weapon. They will also not seek warrants on cases which solely involve the possession of marijuana. Child Support

Additionally, during his first days in office <mask> elected to stop prosecuting criminal child support cases. This led to concerns that he was allowing non-supporting parents to evade their financial obligations to their children. <mask> responded that he was trying to ensure that people would not face criminal charges for being unable to pay and that such charges made it harder for debtors to pay their child support. <mask> also stated that he was bringing St. Louis County into line with the rest of the State of Missouri. At the same time it emerged that Tim Swope, Bell’s Director of Operations, owed nearly $19,000.00 in back child support himself.Death Penalty

Bell campaigned on a platform of opposition to the death penalty. In November 2018, prior to <mask> taking office, Thomas Bruce, a resident of Jefferson County, Missouri, allegedly entered Catholic Supply, a religious goods store in west St. Louis County and ordered three women there to perform deviant sexual acts on him. According to the charges, when one of the women refused to do so he shot her in the head, killing her. There was a major public outcry for <mask> seek the death penalty for Bruce, but <mask> refused, keeping his campaign promise. Former St. Louis police chief Tim Fitch has urged <mask> to turn the case over to federal prosecutors so that they can seek the death penalty. However, the family of the victim supported <mask>’s decision not to seek the death penalty. Officer-Involved Shootings

In April 2019, police with the city of Ladue, a St. Louis municipality, were called to a disturbance at a local grocery store.The disturbance allegedly involved a woman shoplifting and fighting with store employees. The Ladue police officer, a white female, confronted the alleged shoplifter, a black female, and the woman fought with the officer and ran from her. The police officer then shot her, claiming she intended to use her taser instead. <mask>, reversing the trend over the past several years, charged the police officer with felony assault in the second degree. However, in another case in August 2019, at the St. Louis Galleria Mall, a man named Terry Tillman was shot and killed after being chased by a police officer. According to police, Tillman was carrying a pistol with an extended magazine inside the mall, a no gun zone. Police also said that a shopper alerted a police officer who went to stop Tillman.When approached, Tillman took off and the officer chased him. During this chase several other police officers joined the pursuit which took Tillman and officers onto an adjacent parking lot. At some point Tillman was shot after police said he allegedly made a threatening movement in their direction. However, activists in St. Louis later claimed the police planted the gun on Tillman after shooting him and that shooting Tillman was an extreme overreaction on the part of police. <mask> was one of the first people at the scene and promised a transparent investigation. However, after nearly a year and a half, in December 2020, <mask> announced he would not charge the officer. <mask> blamed the delay on being unable to obtain video due to the COVID-19 pandemic.However, a police report released by <mask>’s office indicated that <mask>’s office had the video on November 29, 2019. Controversies

Reopening the Michael Brown Shooting Case

After his win against incumbent Bob McCulloch, many of his supporters, including Howard University law professor Justin Hansford, called on <mask> to reopen the investigation into the death of Michael Brown. While <mask> initially promised to address the issue before his inauguration, it took him nearly 18 months to do so. <mask> ultimately found, like his predecessor Bob McCulloch and the Obama DOJ, that there was no probable cause to charge Darren Wilson with murder or manslaughter. This decision was met with anger from his supporters and Michael Brown's family who accused <mask> of conducting an incomplete investigation. The St. Louis Post Dispatch, a local paper of record, was also critical of <mask> for his apparent disappointment expressed at a press conference, in not being able to indict Wilson. Sex Discrimination Lawsuit

On October 29, 2020 one of Bell's assistant prosecutors filed a lawsuit under Missouri's Human Rights Act claiming that <mask> had fired her and forced out five other female attorneys in favor of male employees.The lawsuit further alleged that <mask> had created a hostile work environment for female attorneys at the office. <mask> responded by claiming that the prosecutor's attorney was irresponsibly and unethically attempting to litigate his case in the media. Allegations of Politically-Motivated Prosecutions

In October 2019, <mask> charged Dawan Ferguson with two counts of statutory rape and two counts of statutory sodomy and child molestation. The allegations stem from the disappearance of Ferguson’s son Christian in 2003. Ferguson’s public defender filed a motion to dismiss the case, arguing that the case was politically-motivated. She cited Ferguson’s ex-wife working for <mask>’s campaign for prosecutor and donating money to <mask> as proof of this assertion. Use of Government Resources

<mask> has also been criticized for his use of government resources while in office.In June 2019, KSDK, a local news outlet, reported that <mask> had amassed nearly $800 in parking tickets for parking in no-parking zones and in front of fire hydrants outside of his office, despite the fact that he was provided with a parking space. <mask>’s chief of staff, Sam Alton, responded that it was "too tedious" to cross the street to the parking garage. <mask> later paid off the parking tickets using his own money. In August 2019, it emerged that <mask> had hired a former campaign worker as a paid intern with the office. In that position she earned more than many of the career staff employees and legal interns. While <mask> refused to be interviewed about the subject, his office responded that she was responsible for community engagement projects. The intern was also observed accompanying <mask> to many social and community events.In October 2019, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch conducted an investigation into <mask>’s expenditures during the first ten months in office. The investigation uncovered that <mask> had spent over $30,000 in government funds on travel and food during his first ten months in office. This included an $816 dinner at an expensive Miami steakhouse and a $300 meal at a Lake of the Ozarks steakhouse. In addition to food and travel, the Post-Dispatch determined that <mask> had spent over $8,000 of taxpayer dollars on new office furniture, blinds, and an espresso machine for his office. Furthermore, the Post-Dispatch also reported on <mask>’s efforts to hide details of his spending, such as omitting thousands of dollars of charges from requested records, charging the Post to provide requested documents, reimbursing expenditures only after records requests for those expenditures were made, and being nonresponsive to sunshine requests. This was criticized as inconsistent with <mask>’s campaign promises to be a transparent administration. Under pressure from his supporters, <mask> ultimately apologized for this scandal and vowed to spend taxpayer money more appropriately in the future.See also
 Larry Krasner
 Kimberly Gardner

References

Living people
Year of birth missing (living people)
Lindenwood University alumni
University of Missouri School of Law alumni
Lawyers from St. Louis
Missouri Democrats
Missouri lawyers
Politicians from St. Louis
Public defenders
Shooting of Michael Brown
Politicians from St. Louis County, Missouri
American prosecutors

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Wesley Bell
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title: Frank Moulaert

texts:
<mask> is Professor of Spatial Planning at the Department of Architecture, Urban Design and Regional Planning at Catholic University of Leuven. He is Director of the Urban and Regional Planning Research Group and chairs the Leuven Space and Society Research Centre at the University. He is also a Visiting Professor at the School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape, Newcastle University. <mask> has initiated a number of research and development projects on social innovation in territorial development. He has extensively published on the subjects related to globalisation, Institutionalism, territorial innovation, social economy, social polarisation, social exclusion, integrated area development, regional development, European governance, and socioeconomic networking. Other areas of his interest include evolutionary theory and the ecology of nature parks. He is fluent in 6 European languages and have published a number of works in Dutch, English, French, German, Italian and Spanish language.Most of his recent works reflect a growing focus on urban development as well as the institutional dynamics  of social innovation and social exclusion implying the need to include the cultural dynamics, artistic activities, and social economy organizations and associations into the social policy and planning arena. Recent activities
 Coordinates European Spatial Development Planning Network
 Coordinates European Module in Spatial Development Planning (EMSDP)
 Coordinator for SOCIALPOLIS – Social Platform on Cities and Social Cohesion (2008-2010) in the area of urban development and cohesion, under FP7 (SOCIAL POLIS)
 Coordinator for Research Area [O] Economy, Society and Territory, European Association for Evolutionary and Political Economy (EAEPE)

Biography
<mask> graduated in Business Administration from the Universitaire Faculteiten Sint-Ignatius, Antwerp, Belgium in 1971. Subsequently, he studied for Masters in Economics at the Katholieke Universiteit, Leuven, Belgium (in 1974) and then in 1977 in Regional Science from University of Pennsylvania, Department of Regional Science. In 1979, he received PhD in Regional Science at University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, U.S. He is married to Greet Debucquoy and has three children Pieter, Stijn, and Elke. When he is not travelling, he settles in his house in the small West Flanders' town of Kortrijk. Academic career
From time to time, between 1974 until 1983, <mask> was engaged as Research and teaching assistant in regional economics, Centrum voor Economische Studiën at Katholieke Universiteit Leuven.In between, he also worked as Research and teaching assistant for Regional Science Department at University of Pennsylvania, and Peace Science Department. He was Associate Professor at Limburgse Economische Hogeschool, Diepenbeek. At University of Lille I (USTL)
In 1987 he moved to Faculty of Economics and Sociology, Université des Sciences et Technologies de Lille, Lille, France as Associate Professor in Economics and remained Professor of Economics between 1994-2002. His other capacities at University of Lille I include:

 Prime d'encadrement et de recherché;
 Habilitation à diriger les recherches;
 Coordinator for ERASMUS Intensive Programmes "Lille-Roubaix-Tourcoing: a Metropolitan Region in the Central Periphery of the European Community"; Faculty coordinator for the ERASMUS networks "Spatial Development" and "Social-scientific Study of Technical Change and Innovation in a European Context";
 Head of International Ph.D programme in Regional Development Planning;
 Vice-dean for International Relations;
 Head of the Bachelor's Programme in Industrial Economics;
 Head of the Master's Programme in Industrial and Labour Economics, and Regional Development Planning. Positions held
 Associate Director of Johns Hopkins University Center for Urban and Regional Development, at Universite of Lille I (1984–87). Scientific advisor of the Ministry of Science in Belgium in 1989-90. Coordinated the international conference "Cities, Enterprises and Society on the Eve of the 21st Century" in Lille, March 1994.Curator, Bruges European Capital of Culture 2002, "Poverty, Culture and Urban Renaissance." Held three Marie Curie fellowships (1996, 1998, 2002). At Newcastle University (2002–2007)
Between 2002 and 2007, he remained Professor of European Planning and Development at the School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. He also led the research themes on Regeneration, Social Innovation and Inclusion at Global Urban Research Unit. Additionally, he held the positions of:

 Chair in European Planning and Development;
 Coordinator of Postgraduate Certificate in European Spatial Development Planning;
 Coordinator of Departmental ERASMUS exchanges;

At K.U.Leuven
Since 2007, he has been working at the Faculty of Engineering, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven in Belgium. He chairs the Leuven Space and Society Research Centre and is head of the Research Group on Urban and Regional Planning at the Department of Architecture, Urban Design and Regional Planning. He also coordinates the European Spatial Development Planning network.European social science research
<mask> is an active figure in European Research Networking in social sciences. He is credited for having conducted 15% of all research projects in Social-science and Humanities for three European Commission Framework Projects (FP4, FP5, and FP6) combined. Among the many successful social science projects coordinated and steered by <mask>, some include:
 Urban regeneration and social Polarisation in the City – URSPIC (1997–1999). Valorising Linkages between Private Consulting and Public Research and the Role of Universities – VALICORES (2001–2004)
 Social Innovation, Governance and Community Building – SINGOCOM (2001-2004)
 Development Models and Logics for Socioeconomic Organization in Space, an FP6 STReP with a consortium of 9 international institutions, DEMOLOGOS, (2004–07). Growing Inequality and Social Innovation: Alternative Knowledge and Practice in Overcoming Social Exclusion in Europe. A Coordination Action under European Commission Framework-6 (FP6), KATARSIS (2006–09). Leverhulme Trust Fellowship 2006–07 in Social Innovation strategy for scientific research and human development.Social Platform on Cities and Social Cohesion in the area of urban development and cohesion, under FP7, SOCIALPOLIS (2008-2010). Selected publications

Edited books
 <mask>, F., Swyngedouw, E. and A. Rodriguez The Globalized City: Economic Restructing and Social Polarization in European Cities. Oxford University Press, 2003,
 Globalization and Integrated Area Development in European Cities. Oxford University Press, 2000,  (Hardcover), 2002  (Paperback). MacCallum, D., <mask>, F., Hillier, J. and S. Vicari Social Innovation and Territorial Development, Ashgate Publishing, 2009. <mask>, F. and Vicari, S. (in Italian), Rigenerare la Città. Pratiche di innovazione sociale nelle città europee, Il Mulino, 2009.<mask>, F., Swyngedouw, E., Martinelli, F. and S. Gonzalez, Can Neighbourhoods Save the City? : Community Development and Social Innovation, Routledge, 2010,
 Oosterlynck, S., van den Broek, J., Albrechts, L., <mask>, F. and A. Verhetsel, Bridging the Gap between Planning and Implementation: Turning Transformative Visions into Strategic Projects, Routledge. 2010,

Special edited issues of journals
 (with Flavia Martinelli and Erik Swyngedouw) Social Innovation and Local Development. Special issue of Urban Studies, vol. 42, issue 11, October 2005. (with Flavia Martinelli and Erik Swyngedouw) Social innovation and Governance in European Cities: between path dependency and radical innovation. Special issue of European Urban and Research Studies, 2006.(with Abdel Hamdouch and Jacques Nussbaumer) Valorizing Linkages between Research Institutes in Europe. Special issue of The European Journal of Social Science Research, 2006. (with Serena Vicari) Ri-Generare la Citta. Pratiche di innovazione sociale nelle citta europee. Milano: Il Mulino. 2006. (in Italian)
 (with Jacques Nussbaumer) La logique sociale du developpement territorial.Projet soumis aux Presses de l'Universite du Quebec. 2006. (in French)

Articles in refereed journals
 Institutional Economics and Planning Theory: A Partnership between Ostriches? Planning Theory, 4(1): 21–32, 2005. see the abstract/article
 (with Farid Sekia) Territorial Innovation Models: a Critical Survey. Regional Studies, 37(3):289–302, 2003. see the abstract/article
 (with Jean Hillier and Jacques Nussbaumer) Three essays on the nature of social innovation in territorial development, Geographie, Economie, Societes, 6(2): 129–152, 2004. (in French). see the abstract/article
 (with Jacques Nussbaumer) The Social region.Beyond the learning economy. European Urban and Regional Studies, 12(1): 45–64, 2005. see the abstract/article
 (with Oana Ailenei) Social economy, Third Sector and Solidarity Relations: A Conceptual Synthesis from History to Present. Urban Studies, 42(11): 2037–2053, 2005. see the abstract/article
 (with Jacques Nussbaumer) Defining the Social Economy and its Governance at the Neighbourhood Level: a Methodological Reflection. Urban Studies, 42 (11): 2071–2088, 2005. see the abstract/article
 (with Flavia Martinelli, Erik Swyngedouw and Sara Gonzalez) Towards Alternative Model(s) of Local Innovation. Urban Studies, 42 (11): 1969–1990, 2005. see the abstract/article
 (with Kathy Cabaret), Planning, Networks and Power Relations: is Democratic Planning Under Capitalism Possible? Planning Theory, 5(1), 51–70, 2006. see the abstract/article

Chapters in books
 (with J. Nussbaumer), « Die Ökonomie der europäischen Großstadt », The economy of the large European city. The social nature of articulated productivity, in Siebel W.(ed.) Die Europaïsche Stadt. Berlin, Suhrkamp (in German), 2003. (with J. Nussbaumer), Regional Production and Reproduction : The social region, in S. Kesting, (ed.) Tagungsband der 10. Iiso-Fachtagung, Série « Institutionelle und Sozial-Ökonomie », Peter Lang Verlag, 2005
 (with J. Nussbaumer) Beyond the learning region: the dialectics of innovation and culture in territorial development" in: R. Kloosterman and R. Boschma eds. Learning from Clusters.A Critical Assessment from an Economic-Geographical Perspective. Dordrecht, Springer, 2005. See also
 EAEPE
 ESDP-Network
 Social exclusion
 Social innovation

External links
 Address at European Journalism Centre
 <mask>, Personal Website
 Profile at KU Leuven website
 Expert details at ESPRID

Regional economists
Academics of Newcastle University
Flemish academics
KU Leuven alumni
University of Pennsylvania alumni
University of Lille Nord de France faculty
Living people
1951 births

masks:
Frank Moulaert
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title: Bauyrjan Baibek

texts:
<mask> (born 19 March 1974) is a Kazakh politician who served as the äkim of Almaty from 9 August 2015 to 28 June 2019. Along party lines. <mask> was the First Deputy Chairman of Nur Otan from 29 June 2019 to 2 February 2022 and previously from 17 January 2013 to 8 August 2015. Early life and education
<mask> was born in the city of Alma-Ata (present-day Almaty) in 1974. After graduating from the Kulyash Bayseitova Musical School in Almaty with honors in piano, he entered the Kurmangazy Conservatory in 1992. From 1994 to 1998, he studied in Germany under the Bolashak Scholarship. In 1995, <mask> earned a degree in German Language from the Goethe-Institut’s annual program in Bremen.He then graduated from the Lübeck Academy of Music with a specialty as a teacher in 1998. In 2002, <mask> graduated in absentee from the University of Central Asia in Almaty with a degree in international economics. In 2010, he defended his thesis on "The institutionalization of the state protocol of the Republic of Kazakhstan", earning doctoral degree in political science. Early career
From 1999 to 2002, <mask> worked as a referent, attaché of the Consulate General of Kazakhstan in Frankfurt and the third secretary of Economic missions of Kazakhstan in Germany in the city of Berlin. From 2002 to 2003, he served as an expert in the Central Systems Research of the Presidential Administration of Kazakhstan. From 2004 to 2006, <mask> was the chief inspector of the Protocol of the President of Kazakhstan. In 2006, he became the chief of the Protocol of the President and worked in this position until August 2009, when he became the deputy head of the Presidential Administration.First Deputy Chairman of Nur Otan (2013–2015, 2019–2022)

On 17 January 2013, <mask> was appointed as the First Deputy Chairman of Nur Otan. In 2014, under <mask>, an anti-corruption program of the Nur Otan was developed and adopted for 2015 to 2025. In March 2015, the party initiated a number of projects dedicated to the 70th anniversary of Victory Day. In the framework of the project “Ардагерлерді ардақтайық” (“Taking Care of the Older Generation”), a complete data was restored on 531 Heroes of the Soviet Union and more than 124 full cavaliers of the Order of Glory. With the assistance of the Nur Otan, the cycle “Қазақстандық қаһармандар” (“Heroic annals of Kazakhstanis”) started. Hundred videos in Kazakh and Russian languages about Kazakh World War II veterans were shown on the Astana channel. On 28 June 2019, <mask> was reappointed again as the First Deputy Chairman.He served the post until 2 February 2022 when he stepped down shortly after President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev became the new party leader. In his Facebook page, <mask> cited the reason for his resignation was due to the Nur Otan requiring "new tasks that require fresh approaches and views." In his statement, he gave remarks about his work in the party which were contributing to strengthening Kazakhstan's independence, thanking former President and party leader Nazarbayev and incumbent President Tokayev for trust and support, as well as the party's apparatus staff and members. Following <mask>'s dismissal, the post of the First Deputy Chairman was abolished and replaced by the executive secretary for the party, who became Ashat Oralov. Äkim of Almaty (2015–2019)

Transportation

Tram closure
On 31 October 2015, tram traffic was closed in Almaty due to the results of the inspection, which revealed numerous irregularities and inconsistencies: there were gaps of up to 50 mm at all assembly joints, rail wear was up to 2–2.5 cm, wooden sleepers were rotten. Due to the condition of the tram tracks, wheel sets of wagons were heavily worn out. In 2014, there were 20 facts of the derailment of cars.Up until September 2015, there were 43 derailments. In 2017, the dismantling of tram tracks began. Onai System
On 11 January 2016, the public transport system "Onai" was introduced, which was non-cash fare system. The system deduced unaccounted cash from the shadow turnover. In September 2016, the cash payment of Almaty residents for a month amounted to 256 million tenge, with cards to only 0.8 billion tenge. In September 2017, the monthly cash income was 91 million tenge, and through the Onai card, 1.5 billion tenge. 800 million tenge were withdrawn from the shadow turnover in one month.Upgrades
Under the leadership of <mask>, public transport was updated by 80%, almost 1300 new buses were purchased. In January 2016, 70% of the state-owned company “Almatyelektrotrans” was transferred to a private investor Green Bus Company LLP for 5 years in trust without the right to subsequent redemption. Bus rapid transit
In September 2018, the first BRT line in the country was launched on Timiryazev Street, at peak hours, the speed of buses along the line was 3 times higher than cars. Already in the first 10 days of operation, passenger flow increased by 40% from 100,000 to 140,000 people. Speed limit
After speed reduction on Al-Farabi Avenue from 80 to 60 km, the number of accidents decreased by 2.7 times. On the one-sided Kurmangazy street, the number of accidents decreased by 41%, and on Shevchenko street was 4 times. Urban policies
For several years, work was underway to reconstruct the central streets of the city for pedestrians.One of the main objects of change was Panfilov Street, which became a pedestrian street from Zhibek Zholy Street to Qabanbai Batyr Street. Under Baibek, more than 600 streets and almost 1,600 courtyards of Almaty were repaired, where modern children's and sports grounds, surveillance cameras, and courtyard lighting appeared. 30% of street lighting was converted to energy-saving LED lighting. 300 km of irrigation ditches and 2000 km of engineering networks were also repaired and built. Almost 3000 illegal kiosks were demolished in the city. Baubek announced the City Without Fences program, in which 150 km of fences were dismantled. Many organizations planted bushes and trees as a replacement.In October 2015, the building of the former General Plan on Jeltoqsan Street was demolished. Members of the Defend Almaty initiative group gathered near the building, claiming that work was being carried out illegally, but the city planning council issued all the necessary permits. In October 2015, with the approval of the Town Planning Council, the Alatau Cinema building, built in 1960, was demolished for the construction of McDonald's. Social media users organized a flash mob against the demolition of the building. In response to the controversies, <mask> stated that for 20 years the cinema was empty, and it did not represent historical value, since it was made of alucobond. A project for preventive monitoring of mudflow hazard was developed. Seismic amplification of 65% of educational facilities and 53% of healthcare was carried out.To protect against mudflows, the Mynjylky Dam was reconstructed, 9 of the most breakthrough moraine lakes were emptied. 9 rivers canals were reconstructed. Protective structures strengthened the slopes at HES-1 - BAO and Medeu - Shymbulak. For the first time in the city, the “Participation Budget” project was implemented where a part of the city budget is distributed by the citizens themselves. Social objects
In a few years, 11 schools and more than 540 public and private kindergartens were opened, and 12 hospitals and clinics were commissioned. Within the framework of the project “Baityt Obybasy”, the payment for kindergartens was halved, and a large number of private kindergartens were opened. As a result of this work, more than 20 thousand children were enrolled in kindergartens.From 2015, Almaty schools, colleges, hospitals and KSK began to publish their reports on financial activities. In February 2019, a simplified mortgage lending program was launched for large families. While Baibek was akim, many medical centers were sold into private ownership. The privatization plan of these and other facilities in the country was previously approved by the Decree of the Government of Kazakhstan from 30 December 2015 No. 1141 “On some issues of privatization for 2016-2020”. Criticism
In May 2017, environmental activists of the “Defend Almaty” and “Defend Kokkailau” groups gave the Akim a gift-installation “Death of Almaty”, which, according to the authors of the present, symbolizes the concern of the townspeople about the activities of the city akim. That same month, the appeal of a public figure Denis Krivosheev to Baibek was published.References

Living people
1974 births
Mayors of Almaty

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Bauyrjan Qydyrgaliuly Baibek
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