There is a mental illness here and the mental illness is thinking that his suicide is unrelated to the massive witch hunt against him by the US Federal Government hellbent on his personal destruction at any cost.

Those who deny that that had anything to do with this, and it was only a "brain disorder" or other such claptrap are truly insane.

I've had students who for years were systematically abused and tortured by adults. This abuse caused them pain, distress, depression, and suicide ideation, not a chemical imbalance. Despite this, counselors they saw diagnosed them as having a chemical imbalance and pumped them full of pills that have psychosis and suicide as known and documented side effects.

Who is insane in this situation? Who is responsible for the damage it causes when a young person is targeted for destruction by sociopaths and it causes them to crack? A chemical imbalance? Not the things that are being done to them by others intentionally trying to harm them?

This attitude justifies the abuse of people. This attitude leads to suicide. This attitude needs to stop.

None of these strawmen remotely resemble anything I've said.

Seems like they do, though, because you only mentioned "depression" and how "it's treatable", in describing this particular case, and not one line about his prosecution.

Many a totally non-depressed people have committed suicide under prosecution. Heck, many non-depressed people even became depressed under prosecution.

did he have a history of depression? perhaps it was simply due to stress or pressure? The thought of spending the next 35 years in prison for downloading documents can be pretty painful... probably as bad as someone who was wrongfully tried for murder.

Depression is the leading cause of suicide. Almost all suicides are somehow connected to it.

It can have many causes. Sometimes it's innate to the person, sometimes it's brought on by circumstances; oftentimes multiple factors are involved.

But the bottom line is:

If you are thinking about suicide, get help. Right now.

Do you have experience recovering from depression?

Yes. I've been suicidally depressed.

I'm one of the fortunate people for whom first-line SSRIs (in my case, sertraline) are very effective. I no longer rely on the meds, but I have additional comfort knowing that they're there if I need them.

I still have bad patches. And it's weird, being inside yourself, intellectually cognisant that this emotion of pointlessness and worthlessness is an illusion, that it doesn't exist -- yet being, sometimes, unable to beat it.

I know that, left to build gravity, the black spiral is stronger than me because it is me.

But I also know that the treatment is stronger. And that is there, if I ever need it again. If I ever get too many of those days in a row, I won't hesitate to seek help.

And neither should anybody else. The suffering is entirely unnecessary.

Get help. You are not alone. It gets better.