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Judge to decide if accused Planned Parenthood shooter will be forcibly medicated
Denver Gazette ^ | 9-1-2022 | Dennis Huspeni

Posted on 09/02/2022 6:48:13 AM PDT by G Larry

After weighing three days of testimony from dueling experts on whether Robert Lewis Dear should be forcibly medicated to make him competent to stand trial on murder charges, Senior Judge Robert Blackburn said he would take the matter under advisement and issue a ruling “as soon as practicable.”

Dear, 64, faces 179 counts in state courts for the Nov. 27, 2015 attack on the clinic, which claimed the lives of three and injured five others. Ke'Arre Stewart, Jennifer Markovsky and University of Colorado Colorado Springs police Officer Garrett Swasey died at the women's clinic. Five other people — five of them law enforcement officers — were wounded during the course of a five-hour standoff.

(Excerpt) Read more at denvergazette.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; US: Colorado
KEYWORDS: banglist; colorado; crime; justice; shooter
"...forcibly medicated to make him competent to stand trial..."???

When has this ever been a consideration when Conservatives, Christians, or Jews, were the victim?

1 posted on 09/02/2022 6:48:13 AM PDT by G Larry
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To: G Larry

This is creepy. Is there any precedent? Has this been ordered by a court before?

I deplore what this man did. Protesting murder with more murder is plain wrong, hypocritical, and does the Pro-Life cause grave harm and no good. This is still creepy and Stalinesque, no matter the political persuasion of perp or victim.


2 posted on 09/02/2022 6:58:52 AM PDT by CatHerd (Whoever said "All's fair in love and war" probably never participated in either.)
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To: G Larry; All

I’m pretty sure I know this guy. This is an extremely bizarre story. I’m not going to spill my guts about it here - I’ve mentioned this on the interweb before, anyway, maybe even on this board - but if any of you are of a journalistic type bent, give me a jingle and I’ll tell you what I know.

Democrats like guys like this. They are going to trot him out and make his civil rights an issue and I wouldn’t be surprised if he escaped or something. No kidding.

Anyway, I’m not saying I know everything or that I’m 100% certain of every claim, but I’m not going to lie, either. This story is a lot weirder than you think.


3 posted on 09/02/2022 7:10:26 AM PDT by Scarlett156 (8/30: Gave D Miscavige sh1te on twatter. Yesterday: Unusual power outage when posting on twatter.)
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To: CatHerd

This is creepy. Is there any precedent? Has this been ordered by a court before?

Usually the defendant has to be seen and evaluated by at least 2 psych docs and be declared incompetent.

Then put in a mental hospital for treatment to become competent.

Mandatory medication takes a special court proceedings, usually.


4 posted on 09/02/2022 7:36:40 AM PDT by Scrambler Bob (My /s is more true than your /science (or you might mean /seance))
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To: Scrambler Bob

Thanks. I knew about court-ordered psych treatment. Mandatory meds still seems creepy to me, especially if they are among the more dangerous meds that are FDA black boxed and can easily be fatal in the elderly. This should require additional court proceedings, and I am glad of that. Still, it really, really bothers me.


5 posted on 09/02/2022 7:44:33 AM PDT by CatHerd (Whoever said "All's fair in love and war" probably never participated in either.)
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To: CatHerd

Yes, defendants have been forcibly medicated.

The prosecution’s doctors list four antipsychotic medications with the word “and”. Not “or”. Really?

If the defendant has delusional disorder, he does not have disordered thinking in general. He can function, in general. He does not have hallucinations. He has never been diagnosed with schizophrenia. His delusions are not very likely to respond to medication, and definitely not to medication alone: he would need intensive psychotherapy, which he is unlikely to receive or accept while locked up.

I have no idea what his delusions are, or how they would make it impossible to try him, unless he keeps shouting that the courts have no authority.

This smacks of political trials where it is not enough to find someone guilty; he must break, confess, repent, submit.


6 posted on 09/02/2022 7:48:49 AM PDT by heartwood (Someone has to play devil's advocate.)
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To: heartwood

Agree with you - “it is not enough to find someone guilty; he must break, confess, repent, submit.”

Truly, what is the point of forcefully medicating a person in hopes of giving him 3 life sentences? Fact is, they can already keep him locked up in a Pysch facility in perpetuity unless/until he is deemed competent to stand trial. If he was in his right mind, he’d be better off in prison, where he can while away is life sentence watching TV, posting on Facebook, muscle-building in the gym, or studying the law to appeal his convictions.


7 posted on 09/02/2022 9:32:19 AM PDT by torqemada (BIDEN IS NOT MY PRESIDENT #RESIST)
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To: heartwood

Thank for your helpful and informative reply.

Yikes, all four of those drugs are black boxed by the FDA and can be fatal to older adults with dementia (many doctors think they are dangerous for all older adults).

I did not see anything about dementia being ruled out. Delusions and hallucinations can occur in dementia patients, and they are very prone to develop hospital delirium (aka ICU psychosis), the hyper form of which features both (with some cycling between the hyper and hypo forms). If he has dementia, that cocktail could easily be deadly. Even if he does not, it still could be.

I wonder how competent to stand trial someone doped up on such a cocktail would be, as well.

From the article: “For example, Dear claimed the anti-psychotic medication he was prescribed in 2018 gave him a heart attack, and has refused any drugs since, including for his hypertension.”

Sounds like he has a history of mental illness of some kind. Ah, I see in another article that he was diagnosed with delusional disorder. Just as you said, this dangerous cocktail of drugs is highly unlikely to cure his delusions:

“Treatment for delusional disorder most often includes psychotherapy (talk therapy) and medication, but delusional disorder is highly resistant to treatment with medication alone.”

https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/9599-delusional-disorder

It might well kill him, or render him zombie-like. Are corpses and zombified individuals competent to stand trial?

It is not all that uncommon for those suffering early-onset dementia to be misdiagnosed as having psychiatric disorders, especially if they suffer from one of the less common types of dementia, and even more commonly when first presenting with paranoia, delusions and/or hallucinations.

Perhaps they did rule out dementia. But they better be mighty sure of that. How can they be so very certain? Even without dementia, his age and past history of heart attack while taking an antipsychotic should signal extreme caution.

As much as I deplore what he did, this seems to stray into the territory of “cruel and unusual” to me.

If I my loved one had been injured by him, or a loved one killed, I like to think I’d be as satisfied with a declaration of “criminally insane” as with a life sentence in prison, if it meant he’d never be let out. As a citizen, I certainly would be satisfied, as he could do no more harm to society. The trouble is, there seems to be no guarantee of no release, or is there in some states?

If there can be no guarantee at present, should we not change the law so there can be in cases such as this one? It would be as effective at protecting society, and would likely cost the taxpayers less. Repeated psychiatric evaluations for the court and court costs add up in a hurry, as do the inevitable appeals after a guilty verdict in such cases.


8 posted on 09/02/2022 9:32:42 AM PDT by CatHerd (Whoever said "All's fair in love and war" probably never participated in either.)
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To: G Larry

If the guy was incompetent when he did the deed, how can he be placed “under the influence,” to stand trial? Being under the influence when you commit the deed is no defense.


9 posted on 09/02/2022 11:50:53 AM PDT by Lion Den Dan ( )
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To: G Larry

His body, his choice?


10 posted on 09/02/2022 5:41:55 PM PDT by gundog ( It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. )
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To: CatHerd

It really is not compassionate to allow a seriously mental person to not take their meds.

It does not work out for them.

In spite of the ‘caring’ rulings on this subject.


11 posted on 09/02/2022 9:19:26 PM PDT by Scrambler Bob (My /s is more true than your /science (or you might mean /seance))
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To: Scrambler Bob

I would normally agree, but see my #8. All four of those drugs carry FDA black box warnings, and can be fatal in older adults, especially if any dementia is present:

https://freerepublic.com/focus/news/4090297/posts?page=8#8

And they want to give him all four at once, even though he suffered a heart attack after taking just one some years ago. You can look up these four drugs and their side effects and see the FDA warning for yourself.

Also, as you can see in my #8, these drugs likely will not do much good. He does not have Schizophrenia or Bipolar Disorder; he has Delusional Disorder.


12 posted on 09/02/2022 9:48:06 PM PDT by CatHerd (Whoever said "All's fair in love and war" probably never participated in either.)
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