South Carolina Ping List
Posted on 12/04/2004 2:32:26 PM PST by neverdem
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - Authorities say three years ago, Christopher Pittman, then 12, shot his grandparents as they slept because they had scolded him for fighting. But Christopher's father, Joe Pittman, thinks his son killed because his sense of right and wrong was clouded by the anti-depressant Zoloft.
Joe Pittman spoke out against the drug in a Food and Drug Administration hearing early this year. The boy, who had threatened suicide, was put on the drug three weeks before the slayings, and his dose was doubled just two days earlier.
Joe Pittman's hands shook as he read his son's confession to a roomful of strangers during the hearing.
"I took everything out on my grandparents, who I loved so very much," wrote then-12-year-old Christopher Pittman. "When I was lying in my bed that night, I couldn't sleep because my voice in my head kept echoing through my mind, telling me to kill them."
But prosecutors and police say Christopher's actions during and after the November 2001 slayings show he clearly knew what he was doing was wrong.
The boy waited until his grandparents were sleeping and took a pump-action shotgun from a gun cabinet. He crept into the couple's dark bedroom, first shooting 66-year-old Joe Frank Pittman in his open mouth, then firing into the back of 62-year-old Joy Pittman's head.
Christopher then set the house on fire and drove off in the family car. When he got stuck on a dirt road 20 miles away, he told hunters he was kidnapped by a man who killed his grandparents, set the fire, drove him into the woods and ran away.
Christopher was living with his father's parents in hopes of turning his life around. He told defense experts he felt abandoned by his mother and his relationship with his father was rocky. No one answered phone calls to Joe Pittman's home.
A month before the slayings, Christopher was hospitalized in Florida, where his father lives, after he threatened to kill himself. The boy was prescribed the anti-depressant Paxil, but another doctor soon put him on Zoloft instead.
Pittman decided to send the boy to live with his grandparents in Chester County, a rural area between Columbia and Charlotte, N.C.
Christopher, who turns 16 in April, is being prosecuted as an adult and faces 30 years to life in prison if convicted at his trial, set to start next month. His lawyers argue that his case should be moved to Family Court, where if convicted, he could only be kept in custody until he turns 21.
Karen Menzies, one of Christopher's lawyers and an attorney specializing in lawsuits against anti-depressant makers, said medical research is available to support the Zoloft defense.
In the three years the teen has spent in jail awaiting trial, the FDA has become increasingly wary of doctors prescribing Zoloft and other antidepressants for children.
In October, the agency ordered the drugs to carry "black box" warnings - the government's strongest warning short of a ban - about increasing the risk of suicidal behavior in children.
"The science has been out there for a while. The prescription drug companies have been able to hide it," Menzies said.
On the other side is Pfizer Inc. (PFE), the maker of Zoloft, which has aided the prosecution, according to Solicitor John Justice, who has since taken himself off the case for health reasons.
The company has vigorously fought cases claiming antidepressants cause violent or suicidal behavior.
A spokesman responded to inquiries by pointing out an October statement on the company's Web site addressing concerns of suicide attempts, saying studies show "no statistically significant difference" between children using Zoloft and nonusers. The statement, though, does not discuss any possible link between the drug and violent acts against others.
Trying to blame a drug for causing someone to commit a crime is an uphill fight, but it has been done successfully.
In April, a Santa Cruz, Calif., jury acquitted a man of attempted murder after he beat his friend, then blamed the episode on Zoloft.
National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers spokesman Jack King said the "Zoloft-made-me-do-it" defense likely means that the Pittman case will come down to defense vs. prosecution experts.
"It's going to be a battle of whose experts the jury believes," King said.
Christopher's maternal grandmother, Delnora Duprey, of Wildwood, Fla., said her grandson is no longer on any medication and is the "sweet, quiet, laid-back" boy she knew growing up. "He's the old Christopher again."
Menzies said the teenager is getting good grades and behaving behind bars.
Duprey says the "whole entire family is behind Christopher 150 percent."
She thinks Zoloft had to have caused Christopher to kill his grandparents because he loved them both, especially the grandfather he called "Pop-Pop."
"We used to joke that he was his Pop-Pop's shadow," Duprey said.
However, those who dealt with the boy after the crime feel differently.
"Anybody who could kill his grandparents in the fashion he did shouldn't be let loose on the public at age 21. And that would have been the best-case scenario," said former prosecutor Justice, who pushed to move the case to adult court.
The current prosecutor, Barney Giese of Columbia, said through his office that he doesn't talk about cases before they go to trial.
Chester County Sheriff Robbie Benson said interviews with Christopher left him shaken because he could not believe the lack of remorse. "This was cold-blooded."
Menzies said those observations might help her case.
"The boy was still suffering from the side-effects of this medication after the incident," she said. "I think we see a different Christopher now."
Columbine shooter was prescribed anti-depressant
School Shootings Linked to Psychotropic Drugs Such as Prozac, Ritalin, Luvox, and Paxil
Troubling. They claim the med leads to suicide attempts, then use it to justify cold blooded murder?!?
The lack of remorse is not a side effect of Zoloft.
Anti-depressants have their place, but it should only be a bridge until the person can get really well by treating the CAUSE rather than the SYMPTOMS. The anti-depressants do not even claim to address the cause -- only the symptoms.
Young people are susceptible to being prescribed anti-depressants for a variety of reasons. A suicide threat is a serious thing. But a lot of depressant manifestations are due to chemical imbalances caused by a notorious poor diet, common among young people. Where do neuro-transmitters come from? Building blocks, i.e. nutrition. Supplements of neuro-transmitter building blocks are available, but the manufacturers of Zoloft et al won't tell anyone about that.
Again, the meds have a place, but the cause needs to be addressed, not merely the symptoms. Maybe this kid was not even depressed, just messed up . . .
Bottom line: I wouldn't want him dating my daughter.
If this JD was on antidepressants, it would mean, hopefully, that they were prescribed for depression.
So, he started out in a state of "mental unbalance".
Blaming the drugs for a really unbalanced act is a tad premature, given the current level
of knowledge in the evolving "science" of Psycho-pharmacology.
Not all drugs are appropriate to all people, ergo, tarring the drug may prevent it from helping
those for whom it could be effective.
deep pocket sniffing ambulance chasing shark lawyer alert.
'Sfunny. I take Elavil (Amitryptaline) to help with the pain of diabetic peripheral neuropathy ('off label') and I have not had the urge to murder anybody...
If there is in fact a "chemical imbalance," it should be detectable by chemical means. However, no chemical tests are ever done. Instead, it is just assumed that an imbalance exists, and anti-depressants are prescribed, often one after another, until they find one that "works." And this is supposed to be scientific?
Zoloft is just like candy. It can't possibly hurt you.
And anybody who thinks that there is something wrong when half the country is taking psychotropic drugs is a psychopath who should seek help from a psychiatrist who will fix it with whatever drug the pharmaceutical companies are pushing this week.
</sarcasm>
SSRIs have saved far more lives than they have ever taken.
No doubt, that's true. The main reason I posted it was because I was unaware so many of the school shooters were on either SSRIs or ritalin or both until recently. I had read that Harris, of Columbine infamy, was prescribed a SSRI. He was rejected for enlistment to the Marine Corps in the week before the slaughter, either because was taking the drug or he lied about taking it. Perhaps Harris was undergoing what some have called SSRI withdrawal syndrome.
IIRC, the kid in the article on this thread had been started on Zoloft a few weeks before the killings, having the dose increased only days before it happened. This is in the same time frame for which the SSRIs just received their "black box warning" for suicide alert. It seems obvious to me, although I have a professional interest in adverse drug reactions, that there's a small subset of patients who become quite irrational and agitated, when either treatment has just been started an extreme example of it being Serotonin syndrome, or when treatment is stopped abruptly, and that the aggression they exhibit can be towards themselves or others, in the latter case without any apparent motive.
The second link that I gave in comment# 2 has an obvious error in it. It says Ritalin is a SSRI which is not true. Ritalin is a stimulant related to the amphetamine class of drugs which has psychosis as common adverse drug reaction. Most of it's links are useless. That's what I get when I didn't examine the entire link.
I hope he wasn't listening to Huey Lewis and The News, "I want a New Drug." Those poor old guys will face a lawsuit.
Pittman case moves forward
Benjamin Etzioni / Staff Writer
The Christopher Pittman double murder case may end up in juvenile court after all.
Judge Daniel Pieper denied a motion - Friday in Charleston - by the defense to dismiss the charges against Pittman saying the boy's constitutional right to a speedy trial has not been violated.
Pittman has been in a Columbia detention center for more than three years awaiting trial for the murder of his grandparents, Joe and Joy Pittman, in Chester in November of 2001.
Pieper will soon rule on a motion to have the case sent back to juvenile court, where the maximum sentence would keep Pittman in jail until he turns 21. If tried as an adult, Pittman could face life in prison if convicted.
According to a spokesperson for the 5th Circuit Solicitor's Office, the date and the venue for the trial have not been finalized yet. Friday's pre-trial hearing was held in Charleston because that is where Pieper is currently sitting.
When the trial does eventually go forward Pittman's attorneys will have the use of previously concealed drug documents at their disposal.
The defense will argue that an adverse reaction to antidepressant medication, specifically Zoloft, led to his violent behavior.
Pieper denied an attempt by Pfizer, the drug company that makes Zoloft, to block attempts to get certain documents admitted in the case.
The defense alleges that these documents will show that Pfizer has known and concealed information that proves Zoloft can cause some people to become hostile and possibly homicidal. Pittman had taken Zoloft and another antidepressant for more than a month before the killings.
Was this juvenile murderer on Ritalin before he went on the anti depressant? Many of these so called anti depressant juvenile killers were on Ritaling at one time.
The second factor that these headline hunters omit is: Where his parents abusing drugs before he was conceived and after his mother became pregnant?
Last but not least was this kid on illegal street drugs like Crank and other street drugs which have documented records of horrible violence committed by those abusing these powerful/illegal drugs?
Was this juvenile murderer on Ritalin before he went on the anti depressant? Many of these so called anti depressant juvenile killers were on Ritalin at one time. The potential of later violence after Ritalin is so severe that our military will not take any in the military who has ever been on Ritalin.
The second factor that these headline hunters omit is: Where his parents abusing drugs before he was conceived and after his mother became pregnant? Babies born to drug abusing parents have changed brain waves and PET scans. Often they are walking/ticking human time bombs waking to explode with no warning.
Last but not least was this kid on illegal street drugs like Crank and other street drugs which have documented records of horrible violence committed by those abusing these powerful/illegal drugs?
When you have time, would you please remove this reply.
SBC/Yahoo must have burped with a double reply.
Thanks.
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