Given today's (April 16th, 2007) tragic fatal shootings in Virgina, it seems timely to take note on the following collection of facts. We do not have, at this time, any details behind the identity or the motivations of the shooter.
While the shootings might very well be due to any number of causes, we would not be surprised if there were psychiatric drugs involved.
Based On information seen here: and elsewhere.
Be sure to visit the SSRI Stories website which has a moderately complete list of over 1500 deaths associated with various psychiatric drugs
In 1964 A paper published in The American Journal of Psychiatry found that major tranquilizers ( Thorazine, Haldol, Mellaril etc.) can "produce an acute psychotic reaction in an individual not previously psychotic.
In 1970 a textbook on the side effects of psychiatric drugs pointed out the potential for violence from these drugs stating, "Indeed, even acts of violence such as murder and suicide have been attributed to the rage reactions induced by chlordiazepoxide (Librium) and diazepam (Valium)."
In 1975 a research paper described a negative effect from the major tranquilizers called "akathisia" (from the Greek a - meaning "without" or "not" and akathisia meaning "sitting".) Akathisia is a drug-induced insanity which was first recognized as an inability of people taking the drugs to sit still comfortably.
In 1984 a study of Xanax reported, "Extreme anger and hostile behavior emerged from eight of the first 80 patients we treated with alprazolam (Xanax)."
In 1985 an investigation into Xanax, reported in the American Journal of Psychiatry, claimed that more than half (58 percent) of the treated patients experienced serious "dyscontrol", i.e. violence and loss of control compared with only eight percent who were given a placebo.
In 1985 another article published in the American Journal of Forensic Psychiatry described five cases of "extreme acts of physical violence" due to akathisia caused by Haldol. These cases included acts of extreme, senseless, bizarre and brutal violence.
On March 6, 1985, Atlanta postal worker Steven W. Brownlee, pulled a pistol from his pocket and shot and killed a supervisor and a clerk. Another clerk was wounded. Brownlee had received treatment and psychotropic drugs at the Grady Memorial Psychiatric Unit.
On November 20, 1986: 14-year-old Rod Mathews beat a classmate to death with a bat in the woods near his home in Canton, Mass. He had been prescribed Ritalin since the third grade.
On April 23, 1987: William Cruse was charged with killing six people in a shooting rampage in Palm Bay, Florida. Cruse had been seeing a Kentucky psychiatrist and stated he had been taking psychiatric drugs for several years.
On November 26, 1987 Bartley Dobben killed his two young children by casting them in a 1,300 degree foundry ladle. He had been placed on a regimen of psychiatric drugs in 1985
On May 20, 1988, Laurie Dann walked into a Winnetka, Illinois second grade classroom carrying three pistols and began shooting innocent little children, killing one and wounding five others before killing herself. Subsequent blood tests revealed that both Lithium and the antidepressant Anafranil were in her bloodstream at the time the murder was committed.
On September 26, 1988, 19-year-old James Wilson took a .22 caliber revolver into an elementary school in Greenwood, South Carolina and started shooting schoolchildren, killing two 8-year-old girls and wounding seven other children and two teachers. Wilson had been in and out of the hands of psychiatrists for years and within 8 months of the killings he had been on several psychiatric drugs which can generate violent behavior. Since the age of 14, he had been given psychiatric drugs, including Xanax, Valium, Thorazine and Haldol.
On January 17, 1989, Patrick Purdy opened fire on a school yard full of young children in Stockton, California. During his vicious and unprovoked assault, Purdy killed five school children and wounded 30 others. Purdy then killed himself. During the two years prior to the murders of the Stockton children, Purdy had been on two strong psychiatric drugs of categories known to cause violence.
In 1991, at the American Psychiatric Association’s annual meeting, Dr. William Wirshing, a psychiatrist at UCLA, reported that five patients appeared to have developed akathisia from Prozac. Dr. Wirshing believed the akathisia had “led them all to contemplate suicide.”
On April 28, 1992, Kenneth Seguin drugged his two children, aged 7 and 5, took them to a pond, slashed their wrists and dumped their bodies in the water. He then drove home and killed his wife with an ax while she slept. He was on Prozac at the time
In November 1992, Lynwood Drake III, in San Luis Obisbo and Morro Bay, California, shot and killed six people with a hand gun before he killed himself. Metabolized Prozac and Valium were both found in his system
In December 1993, Steven Leith of Chelsea, Michigan, walked back into a school meeting and fatally shot the school superintendent and wounded two others including a fellow teacher. He was on Prozac at the time of the shootings
In 1995 16-year-old Brian Pruitt fatally stabbed his grandparents. He had a history of psychiatric treatment and had been prescribed psychiatric drugs.
On November 3, 1995, Sergeant Steven B. Christian, a twenty-five-year commended veteran of the Dallas police force drove to a police sub-station and seriously wounded an officer outside in his attempt to get inside and shoot others. Christian was shot and killed by two fellow Dallas police officers. The autopsy revealed high levels of an antidepressant in his blood
February 19, 1996: 10-year-old Timmy Becton grabbed his 3-year-old niece as a shield and aimed a shotgun at a Sheriff's deputy who had accompanied a truant officer to his Florida home. Becton had been taken to a psychiatrist in January and had been put on a psychiatric drug.48
May 25, 1997 While on vacation in Las Vegas, 18-year-old Jeremy Strohmeyer raped and murdered a 7-year-old girl in the ladies’ rest room in a casino. He had been diagnosed with ADD and prescribed Dexedrine. He had begun taking the drug a week before the killing.
September 27, 1997: 16-year-old Sam Manzie raped and strangled another boy to death. At the time of the killing the younger boy had been selling candy door to door for the local PTA. Manzie was under psychiatric “care” and was being “medicated.”
October 1st, 1997: 16-year-old Luke Woodham stabbed his mother--50-year-old Mary Woodham--to death and then went to his high school in Pearl Mississippi where he shot nine people killing two teenage girls and wounding seven others. Published reports say he was on Prozac.
December 1, 1997: Michael Carneal, a troubled 14-year-old, killed three students and wounded five others at Heath High School in West Paducah, Kentucky.
1998, there were three events in which boys, one as young as 11, killed classmates and teachers.
February, 1998 a young man in Huntsville, Alabama on Ritalin went psychotic chopping up his parents with an ax and also killing one sibling and almost murdering another.
March 6, 1998: Mathew Beck, a lottery accountant in Connecticut, reported promptly to his job, hung up his coat and methodically gunned down four of his bosses, one of whom he chased through a parking lot before he turned the gun on himself. Beck had been seeing a psychiatrist and taking three types of “medication."
March 24, 1998 in Jonesboro, Arkansas, 11-year-old Andrew Golden and 14-year-old Mitchell Johnson shot 15 people killing four students, one teacher, and wounding 10 others.13 According to one report, the boys were believed to be on Ritilan.
May 21, 1998: Springfield, Oregon: 15-year-old Kip Kinkel murdered his own parents and then proceeded to school where he opened fire on students in the cafeteria, killing two and wounding 22. Kinkel had been on Prozac.
May 28, 1998: Brynn Hartman murdered her husband, comic Phil Hartman, then committed suicide. She had been prescribed and had been taking the antidepressant drug Zoloft, which the coroner found in her system along with alcohol and cocaine
September, 1998, a study published in The Journal of Forensic Science found that of 392 youth suicides in Paris between 1989 and 1996, 35% used to take psychoactive drugs.
April 16, 1999: 15-year-old Shawn Cooper of Notus, Idaho took a 12-guage shot gun to school and started firing, injuring one student and holding the school hostage for about 20 minutes. Terrified students ran for their lives, some barricading themselves in classrooms. Cooper had been taking Ritalin when he fired the shotgun's rounds.
April 20, 1999: Columbine, Colorado: 18-year-old Eric Harris was on the antidepressant Luvox when he and his partner Dylan Klebold killed twelve classmates and a teacher before taking his own life in the bloodiest school massacre in history. The coroner confirmed that the antidepressant was in his system through toxicology reports while Dylan Klebold's autopsy was never made public.
April 29 1999: A 14 year old boy shot two children, killing one, at W.R. Myers High School in Taber Alberta. He was student of the school who was seeing a psychiatrist who prescribed him Dexadrine just prior to the shooting.
May 4, 1999: Steven Allen Abrams rammed his car into a preschool playground in Costa Mesa, California, killing two and injuring five. He had been placed on probation in 1994 which required him to see a psychiatrist and take Lithium
May 20, 1999: Conyers, Georgia: 15-year-old T.J. Solomon was being treated with a mix of antidepressants when he opened fire on and wounded 6 of his classmates.
March 5, 2001, Charles Williams, 15, killed two students and wounded 13 others at Santana High School in Santee, California
March 7, 2000: Williamsport, Pennsylvania: 14-year-old Elizabeth Bush was on the antidepressant Prozac when she blasted away at fellow students in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, wounding one.
May 26, 2000: Nathaniel Brazill, 13, killed his English teacher on the last day of classes in Lake Worth, Florida.
In 2000, a 6-year-old who shot and killed another 6-year-old at Buell Elementary School in Mount Morris Township, Michigan
March 22, 2001: El Cajon, California: 18-year-old Jason Hoffman was on two antidepressants, Effexor and Celexa, when he opened fire at his California high school wounding five. Hoffman had also undergone an "anger management" program.
April 10, 2001: Wahluke, Washington: 16-year-old Cory Baadsgaard took a rifle to his high school, and held 23 classmates and a teacher hostage while on a high dose of the antidepressant Effexor.
In 2003, two students were killed at Rocori High School in Cold Spring, Minnesota by a fellow student, age 15. He is awaiting trial.
March 21, 2005: Red Lake Indian Reservation, Minnesota: 16-year-old Native American Jeff Weise, reportedly under the influence of the antidepressant Prozac, went on a shooting rampage at home and at his school, killing nine people and wounding five before committing suicide.
And now, sadly, we add to this very incomplete list:
April 16, 2007: Cho Seung-Hui, 23, a student at Virgina Tech shoots down and kills over 30 people on the Virginia Tech campus. He had been troubled, and had been on medication for depression.
2 comments:
"February, 1998 a young man in Huntsville, Alabama on Ritalin went psychotic chopping up his parents with an ax and also killing one sibling and almost murdering another." is made up.
On March 10, 1998, Jeffrey Franklin who was on 3 medications as well as possibly other non-prescription drugs killed his parents and ATTEMPTED to kill 3 of his 4 younger siblings.
Bartley Dobben was off his medications when he killed his sons. He was schizophrenic and needed to be medicated but had taken himself off them upon direction of a "minister" at a "church" he was attending. Because he was not medicated, he believed God was speaking to him and honestly thought he was saving his sons from going to hell.
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