Swordsman Kills Three; Wounds Three!!!

[Aelia Jusa]

Originally posted by Sir Kenyth: Schizophrenia is a very sad and often misunderstood disease. An old school friend of my brothers was treated for it since he was a teen. Thorazine, among other things were used. He is very strange. Self absorbed and impulsive. He was found by police wandering the streets in the wee hours of the morning. He was agitated, weilding a pistol, and muttering to himself. He got into a shootout with the officers. Though he was shot multiple times, they were minor wounds. He was lucky beyond belief! No one else was hurt. He hadn't been taking the medication regularly and was vividly hallucinating that "they" were out to get him. Anyone could have been "them" as "they" were always disguised. I blame his parents for not monitoring his medication. The idiot prosecutor wanted the insanity plea thrown out despite the medical record. He was institutionalized temporarily and is back out. God hopes that someone watches his medication from now on.

The problem with medication also of course is the terrible side effects nearly all schiphrenia medications have, even the newer ones, which discourage compliance enormously, especially when there is a lack of monitoring. The move to deinstitutionalise and move to community care was a travesty, mostly because the community care, at least here in Australia, is hugely lacking and most are left unattended in hostels or homeless. It doesn't help either that there is so much misinformation about schizophrenia and people are allowed to make 'humourous' movies like Me Myself and Irene prolonging the view that schizophrenia is having multiple personalities, and the fact that whenever a person who commits a crime who happens to have schizophrenia this is reported, whether it is the cause or not. In some cases the schizophrenia is to blame, though more often they harm themselves rather than others, but usually the schizophrenia is totally unrelated and yet by reporting it it is seen as the cause and increases the stigma and fear.

[Lord of Alcohol]

In the end, there can be only one. He wasnt it!

[HolyWarrior]

and if we had sword control laws, this wouldn't have happened.

[Dagorion]

I know this is a sad and sick thing to think but while reading that article I didn’t think "Oh my god, people were killed." I thought "Heay, I wander what they are going to do with the sword now the guy obviously doesn't need it..." [img]graemlins/uhoh1.gif[/img]

[Cerek the Barbaric]

A very sad and tragic incident for everyone involved. My heart goes out to the loved ones of all the victims, including the family of the young man.

Rokenn - I doubt this incident will be "blamed" on the Highlander movies or TV show. Paranoid delusions and irrational behavior are common symptoms of schizophrenia. This young man may have enjoyed the Highlander series, but if it hadn't been that, it would have been something else. This is definitely a case of a mental disease being the cause.

Sir Kenyth - Just a countercomment to your remark about the family not monitoring his medication. My former coworker has a brother who is schizophrenic. He has had a couple of "episodes" himself where he entered public businesses and acted in a somewhat threatening manner when he wasn't taking his medication. The problem with the disease is that - when they take their medication - the person suffering from schizophrenia is as "normal" as anybody else. That's why he was able to be a volunteer fireman and EMT. Unfortunately, the medicine works so well, that they start to believe they are "cured" and don't need it anymore..so they quit taking it...which leads to delusions and further resistance to resuming thier medication. My friends family DID monitor their brother very closely. One of them checked on him every single day...but there is NO WAY to MAKE them take the medicine. When the brother went off his medication, he believed his family was "out to get him" and that they were all plotting against him. For cases such as this, the ONLY way to monitor thier medications is to have them put in an institution or other facility where they are given daily injections of their medication. This isn't as easy as it sounds, because (even in an institution) the treatment of daily injections has to be approved by the State before it can be implemented (in NC anyway).

My coworkers brother is a perfect example. After his last "episode", the family finally arranged to have him put in a facility for schizophrenics. They also managed to have the daily injections approved. The brother improved rapidly and was soon very much "normal" again. He did so well, in fact, that the facility called the family in to discuss discharging him and allowing him to return home. He would still recieve the daily injections from a home health nurse. Well, he came home and did very well for awhile, but he recently started refusing to take his medication. Within just a couple of weeks, he started having the same paranoid delusions that his family was "out to get him" again. The last I heard from my friend, they were trying to get him back into the facility he had been staying at.

[Gangrell]

Man, that is really a sad story there. It's bad when he has that kind of an illness, though it is worse when his family and friends saw him having conversations with himself and did nothing about it. It bothers me too that reporters try and suck the story into bigger proportions than what it already is. I'm really shocked they didn't blame it on video games or D&D, but just because he liked Highlander movies doesn't mean he got the idea to hurt people with a sword from it.

[Donut]

Originally posted by HolyWarrior: and if we had sword control laws, this wouldn't have happened.

I wondered how long it would be for one of the shooty people to make a crass comment such as this.

Of course if he had a shooty thing it would have said "gunman kills six"

[Melusine]

Originally posted by Dagorion: I know this is a sad and sick thing to think but while reading that article I didn’t think "Oh my god, people were killed." I thought "Heay, I wander what they are going to do with the sword now the guy obviously doesn't need it..."

Well, you're right, I do find that a little sick and sad and I'm at a loss as to your reason for posting about it. Maybe you can buy a big bottle of empathy and a new heart on Ebay or something...

[ 07-01-2003, 10:44 AM: Message edited by: Melusine ]

[Xen]

Oh very,very sad.

[Rageheart]

That stinks........i wonder what triggered him to do something like this....maybe a combo of schizophrenia and something bad happening to him