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Mass shootings and drugs

Scoot Magee

But I didn't want to dash
• Eric Harris age 17 (first on Zoloft then Luvox) and Dylan Klebold aged 18 (Columbine school shooting in Littleton, Colorado), killed 12 students and 1 teacher, and wounded 23 others, before killing themselves. Klebold's medical records have never been made available to the public.

• Jeff Weise, age 16, had been prescribed 60 mg/day of Prozac (three times the average starting dose for adults!) when he shot his grandfather, his grandfather's girlfriend and many fellow students at Red Lake, Minnesota. He then shot himself. 10 dead, 12 wounded.

• Cory Baadsgaard, age 16, Wahluke (Washington state) High School, was on Paxil (which caused him to have hallucinations) when he took a rifle to his high school and held 23 classmates hostage. He has no memory of the event.

• Chris Fetters, age 13, killed his favorite aunt while taking Prozac.

• Christopher Pittman, age 12, murdered both his grandparents while taking Zoloft.

• Mathew Miller, age 13, hung himself in his bedroom closet after taking Zoloft for 6 days.

• Kip Kinkel, age 15, (on Prozac and Ritalin) shot his parents while they slept then went to school and opened fire killing 2 classmates and injuring 22 shortly after beginning Prozac treatment.

• Luke Woodham, age 16 (Prozac) killed his mother and then killed two students, wounding six others.

• A boy in Pocatello, ID (Zoloft) in 1998 had a Zoloft-induced seizure that caused an armed stand off at his school.

• Michael Carneal (Ritalin), age 14, opened fire on students at a high school prayer meeting in West Paducah, Kentucky. Three teenagers were killed, five others were wounded..

• A young man in Huntsville, Alabama (Ritalin) went psychotic chopping up his parents with an ax and also killing one sibling and almost murdering another.

• Andrew Golden, age 11, (Ritalin) and Mitchell Johnson, aged 14, (Ritalin) shot 15 people, killing four students, one teacher, and wounding 10 others.

• TJ Solomon, age 15, (Ritalin) high school student in Conyers, Georgia opened fire on and wounded six of his class mates.

• Rod Mathews, age 14, (Ritalin) beat a classmate to death with a bat.

• James Wilson, age 19, (various psychiatric drugs) from Breenwood, South Carolina, took a .22 caliber revolver into an elementary school killing two young girls, and wounding seven other children and two teachers.

• Elizabeth Bush, age 13, (Paxil) was responsible for a school shooting in Pennsylvania

• Jason Hoffman (Effexor and Celexa) – school shooting in El Cajon, California

• Jarred Viktor, age 15, (Paxil), after five days on Paxil he stabbed his grandmother 61 times.

• Chris Shanahan, age 15 (Paxil) in Rigby, ID who out of the blue killed a woman.

• Jeff Franklin (Prozac and Ritalin), Huntsville, AL, killed his parents as they came home from work using a sledge hammer, hatchet, butcher knife and mechanic's file, then attacked his younger brothers and sister.

• Neal Furrow (Prozac) in LA Jewish school shooting reported to have been court-ordered to be on Prozac along with several other medications.

• Kevin Rider, age 14, was withdrawing from Prozac when he died from a gunshot wound to his head. Initially it was ruled a suicide, but two years later, the investigation into his death was opened as a possible homicide. The prime suspect, also age 14, had been taking Zoloft and other SSRI antidepressants.

• Alex Kim, age 13, hung himself shortly after his Lexapro prescription had been doubled.

• Diane Routhier was prescribed Welbutrin for gallstone problems. Six days later, after suffering many adverse effects of the drug, she shot herself.

• Billy Willkomm, an accomplished wrestler and a University of Florida student, was prescribed Prozac at the age of 17. His family found him dead of suicide – hanging from a tall ladder at the family's Gulf Shore Boulevard home in July 2002.

• Kara Jaye Anne Fuller-Otter, age 12, was on Paxil when she hung herself from a hook in her closet. Kara's parents said ".... the damn doctor wouldn't take her off it and I asked him to when we went in on the second visit. I told him I thought she was having some sort of reaction to Paxil...")

• Gareth Christian, Vancouver, age 18, was on Paxil when he committed suicide in 2002, (Gareth's father could not accept his son's death and killed himself.)

• Julie Woodward, age 17, was on Zoloft when she hung herself in her family's detached garage.

• Matthew Miller was 13 when he saw a psychiatrist because he was having difficulty at school. The psychiatrist gave him samples of Zoloft. Seven days later his mother found him dead, hanging by a belt from a laundry hook in his closet.

• Kurt Danysh, age 18, and on Prozac, killed his father with a shotgun. He is now behind prison bars, and writes letters, trying to warn the world that SSRI drugs can kill.

• Woody __, age 37, committed suicide while in his 5th week of taking Zoloft. Shortly before his death his physician suggested doubling the dose of the drug. He had seen his physician only for insomnia. He had never been depressed, nor did he have any history of any mental illness symptoms.

• A boy from Houston, age 10, shot and killed his father after his Prozac dosage was increased.

• Hammad Memon, age 15, shot and killed a fellow middle school student. He had been diagnosed with ADHD and depression and was taking Zoloft and "other drugs for the conditions."

• Matti Saari, a 22-year-old culinary student, shot and killed 9 students and a teacher, and wounded another student, before killing himself. Saari was taking an SSRI and a benzodiazapine.

• Steven Kazmierczak, age 27, shot and killed five people and wounded 21 others before killing himself in a Northern Illinois University auditorium. According to his girlfriend, he had recently been taking Prozac, Xanax and Ambien. Toxicology results showed that he still had trace amounts of Xanax in his system.

• Finnish gunman Pekka-Eric Auvinen, age 18, had been taking antidepressants before he killed eight people and wounded a dozen more at Jokela High School – then he committed suicide.

• Asa Coon from Cleveland, age 14, shot and wounded four before taking his own life. Court records show Coon was on Trazodone.

• Jon Romano, age 16, on medication for depression, fired a shotgun at a teacher in his New York high school.

Missing from list... 3 of 4 known to have taken these same meds....

• What drugs was Jared Lee Loughner on, age 21...... killed 6 people and injuring 14 others in Tuscon, Az?

• What drugs was James Eagan Holmes on, age 24..... killed 12 people and injuring 59 others in Aurora Colorado?

• What drugs was Jacob Tyler Roberts on, age 22, killed 2 injured 1, Clackamas Or?

• What drugs was Adam Peter Lanza on, age 20, Killed 26 and wounded 2 in Newtown Ct?

Those focusing on further firearms bans or magazine restrictions are clearly focusing on the wrong issue and asking the wrong questions, either as a deliberate attempt to hide these links, or out of complete and utter ignorance.

Don't let them! Force our elected "representatives" and the media to cast a harsh spotlight on this issue. Don't stop hounding them until they do.
 

ColdBoreMK23

Noob Saibot
Reserved for later. In the middle of a case right now, but ill weigh in from a medical standpoint.

Pro-gun by the way.


I broke my back... It's spinal.
 

Scoot Magee

But I didn't want to dash
The sad thing is, it's hard for me to blame anyone for this other than people that leave guns/weapons laying around.

It's impossible for us to know which medications someone with psychological problems should be on because everyone is different and reacts differently to different medications. That makes it extremely difficult for the person attempting to help people with mild issues, let alone severe problems. The best we can do right now is to provide options for them and continue to change what they take until it is the right balance for them specifically. You can't blame someone for wanting to help someone that clearly needs it. The only thing you can really do is blame someone that blindly gives drugs to kids and that's nearly impossible to prove.

And on the other side of that, you never know what it is going to change in that humans mind. Is that great wall of tension inside the patients mind directly tied to their 'conscience'? If so, removing it with medication is like removing someones inhibitions or worse, so you can't blame the patient either. Especially when most of the examples given are too young to understand something like that, even without any issues.

Society would have to change in order to give these patients proper treatment.
Ask yourself this question. How many "crazy people" with no history of prescription meds have committed mass shootings? The media always says these are people that didnt seek the help they needed yet someone prescribed them medication.
 

Scoot Magee

But I didn't want to dash
Whats easier to medicate with, having insurance, going to a doctor, usually having to visit this doctor periodically, having to pay range of amounts for medication based on your insurance

OR

going to your corner store for an unlimited addiction starting at $2.
So you agree that drugs contribute to mass shootings in general or no?
 

Hellbringer

1 2 3 drink
Dont underestimate how much of those medicine companies have influence on the goverment. They make tons off money and you see how far money gets you.
 

BDMao88

Filthy Casual
Dont underestimate how much of those medicine companies have influence on the goverment. They make tons off money and you see how far money gets you.
Yet he wants us to contact our representatives...

Drugs don't' cause you to do an act, they make it that much easier to do it.
 

Scoot Magee

But I didn't want to dash
I also bring this here because the media is making the argument that addiction to violent games (mortal kombat) is to blame. Not addiction to drugs apparently.
 

Doombawkz

Trust me, I'm a doctor
Yeah, well until they get Cyrax's fatalities right then I could care less because they'll lose every case.
 

Hellbringer

1 2 3 drink
So suggestions are, make drugs even more illegal and spend MORE money on drugwars :D

Im not sure if i wanna start this debate :p
 

Scoot Magee

But I didn't want to dash
So suggestions are, make drugs even more illegal and spend MORE money on drugwars :D

Im not sure if i wanna start this debate :p
No that's not the argument. How about stop advertising these damn drugs as fixing mental health when it creates more problems down the road.
 

Scoot Magee

But I didn't want to dash
Good psychiatrists don't seek to prescribe drugs to their patients, but if talk therapy hasn't worked, then drugs are the only solution left. Your argument is that the drugs are making them do it? They're not mentally ill? Wouldn't a smarter solution be not to give guns to mentally deranged people? The alternative you're suggesting is not to give psychiatric drugs to mentally deranged people, which makes no sense. Give them guns, but not pills that do help millions of other people, without incident.

The point is that mental illness and guns should not mix, but I don't see psychiatrists, patients, or most nra members subscribing to that belief. The only people who would like to continue to see deranged people be afforded the same rights as stable, law abiding gun owners is the head of the nra, gun sellers, and gun manufacturers. Getting rid of the right to own guns, or getting rid of all psychiatric medication are equally stupid, but so is allowing and advocating for mentally deranged people to be able to own guns.

Your thread proves my point: deranged people, with gun access, sometimes commit mass shootings, knifings. The fact that they're on medication is as irrelevant as saying they play Call of Duty or Mortal Kombat. Lots of people are on medication, play Call of Duty, Mortal Kombat, and don't commit mass killings. The most harmful link is that they're deranged and have guns, not that they're deranged and play video games, or they're deranged and are on meds. Even if they knifed people, and didn't shoot them, statistically your odds of surviving/evading that kind of attack would be better than surviving/evading a gunman. And, it would be easier for police to take down a deranged "knifeman" than a gunman. So, don't bring up the "hey, should we stop them from owning knives, too?" No. There's a reason you don't bring a knife to a gunfight.
So they were deranged before taking meds yet didn't shoot anyone until after medicated? Please bring up 1 instance where a mass shooting was committed by a deranged person who has never been on meds.
 

Doombawkz

Trust me, I'm a doctor
So they were deranged before taking meds yet didn't shoot anyone until after medicated? Please bring up 1 instance where a mass shooting was committed by a deranged person who has never been on meds.
And this is where you lose all weight in your argument.

There have been crimes where people have been without medication and lived with mental failings for their entire life, simply due to the fact that such diseases weren't well known or researched until the recent years, and couldn't be properly medicated as such. Just from the fact that these illnesses have existed since medieval times, and have persisted since guns have, should show that non-medicated mass shootings would have had to happen much more frequently than the 15-odd examples you happen to have thrown together.

Give me evidence, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that there are more people killing while on medication than people whom are not killing while on medication. Outliers shouldn't form the opinion of a whole when they aren't even a remotely relevant fraction of the total people whom don't share their dispositions.
 

Scoot Magee

But I didn't want to dash
And this is where you lose all weight in your argument.

There have been crimes where people have been without medication and lived with mental failings for their entire life, simply due to the fact that such diseases weren't well known or researched until the recent years, and couldn't be properly medicated as such. Just from the fact that these illnesses have existed since medieval times, and have persisted since guns have, should show that non-medicated mass shootings would have had to happen much more frequently than the 15-odd examples you happen to have thrown together.

Give me evidence, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that there are more people killing while on medication than people whom are not killing while on medication. Outliers shouldn't form the opinion of a whole when they aren't even a remotely relevant fraction of the total people whom don't share their dispositions.
Name a no motive mass shooting where medication wasn't involved. Also why when guns were easier to obtain and drugs weren't a huge factor was there no mass shootings of this type.

I'm not talking domestic violence, not shootings with motives, not terrorist, it's no motive random shootings.

Not to mention the side effects of these drugs are available for people to read. Thoughts of suicide anyone?
 

insomnia_ftw

It's simple.. We normalize the superman.
There is a difference between finding a correlation and finding an actual cause. I'm not aware of the statistics myself, but if more people do in fact go on killing sprees while on medication, that still means almost nothing. All that would prove is the fact that more people have gone on killing sprees while medicated; whether or not the medication is the cause of their behavior is an entirely more difficult thing to prove and requires taking every possible variable into consideration. You've basically taken a step in the right direction, but then stopped there thinking you had an answer.

If every time you are sad, it rains, you don't say "see, it rains when i'm sad, therefore me being sad is causing it to rain". I forget which logical fallacy that is, but it is one.