Jared Lee Loughner had become increasingly erratic in recent months,

[one_voice]

so much so that others around him began to worry.

Police officials on Saturday said that Mr. Loughner had a criminal record of some kind, but they did not provide any details. They also hinted that he might have had the help of a second person, adding that they were searching for another man.

Don Coorough, 58, who sat two desks in front of Mr. Loughner in a poetry class last semester, described him as a “troubled young man” and “emotionally underdeveloped.” After another student read a poem about getting an abortion, Mr. Loughner compared the young woman to a “terrorist for killing the baby.”

“No one in that class would even sit next to him,” Mr. Coorough said. Another fellow student said that he found Mr. Loughner’s behavior so eccentric — including inappropriate remarks and unusual outbursts — that he wondered if he might be on hallucinogens. Mr. Loughner grew up in Tucson and was an unremarkable student at Mountain View High School, classmates said.

Grant Wiens, 22, who graduated in 2006 from Mountain View High School, a year ahead of Mr. Loughner, described him as “a kind of rare bird, very shy.”

*snip*

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/09/us/politics/09shooter.html?_r=1&hp=&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1294549714-lH7JjIAFlv7COh8gCsn03g

[kentuck]

1. This sure makes him sound like a liberal....

"Mr. Loughner compared the young woman to a “terrorist for killing the baby.”

[Name removed]

29. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[ohheckyeah]

2. I have an internet friend got

who lives in Tucson. Her daughter knows Loughner and says he got into Ecstasy. She and her now ex boyfriend used to hang with the guy at his place until he started using E and playing with guns.

[one_voice]

3. Yes, well drugs and guns...

don't mix. Maybe he had some kind of psychotic break...good thing your friends daughter nixed those get togethers..

[ohheckyeah]

6. Yes, it is.

She's talked to the Tucson police. It seems there is a manhunt going on for an accomplice.

[JackBeck]

7. Ecstasy is the last drug to make someone violent.

Ecstasy makes a user feel euphoric and full of love. I seriously doubt there is any relation between the use of E and any infatuation with guns.

[Odin2005]

10. Neuroscientist V. S. Ramachandran has sugested studying MDMA for autism...

...because of it's social-connection-enhancing properties. Definitely not something that would someone a killer.

[JackBeck]

15. I was quite shy before I tried the drug at a controlled Valentines Day party in college.

Never once did I have a psychotic ideation to kill anyone at the party.

And then when doing the drug any time after that in multiple settings both public and private, no one I've ever known or interacted with developed a tendency to go a killing spree.

[Odin2005]

19. Very interesting. I've read that it is one of the safest illegal drugs out there.

Much less dangerous than tobacco and alcohol. Only the stimulant khat is safer, IIRC. I wish I could find that article i read it in.

[Maru Kitteh]

20. You're assuming normal brain chemistry - something a schizophrenic does not have.

It's become quite clear Mr. Loughlan did a great deal of self-medicating. I'm very curious to see in the coming days exactly how much actual medical care he has received.

[JackBeck]

21. Ecstasy has been used to treat a lot of mental illness, including schizophrenia.

http://myhealthbowl.com/latest-health-news/ecstasy-mdma-pills-may-help-to-treat-autism-schizophrenia-and-post-traumatic-stress-a-new-study-says/

http://www.umm.edu/patiented/articles/what_general_guidelines_treating_schizophrenia_000047_7.htm

[notesdev]

28. It may not all have been self

I think we need to know if somebody else was medicating him.

Using the mentally ill as proxy assassins has happened before.

[Duer 157099]

16. The problem is that sometimes these drugs that produce euphoria

have a rebound effect after the drug wears off, such that there's a depletion in the neurochemical (eg serotonin) that was previously elevated.

[JackBeck]

17. Yes, it's called Blue Tuesday.

But no one that ever did E ended up picking up a weapon and shooting 19 people. That would be the last thing on their mind.

American culture has this odd fetish with blaming everything except an untreated mental illness.

[Duer 157099]

18. I've never done E

Although I have read lots and lots of info about it and have really wanted to try it, but never did.

I don't know specifically if there is any rebound effect with E, just that in general it is a phenomenon associated with drugs that alter mood.

[Jamastiene]

22. That doesn't add up to me at all either.

I would say the last thing on an E user's mind is killing or murder or guns.

Actually, E might be a good treatment for the hatemongers of the world if only we could slip them some often enough to E the hate right out of them.

[JackBeck]

26. RIght wing hatemongers need treatment for their mental illness.

I think we agree that Ecstasy could be a breakthrough treatment to cure them of this chronic disease.

:pals:

[Odin2005]

27. Spread the love!

:)

[Ellipsis]

4. Busted for Drug possession

It obvious that the sheriff's department knew who the kid was and sounds like how they came to know him was before he turned 18.

I feel sorry for his mother.

[lpbk2713]

5. The police really need to find that "person of interest".

If Loughner is this unbalanced then he would be easily manipulated by someone who wanted
to harm Giffords and saw a good way to have it done without being directly involved.

[Odin2005]

8. Sounds like classic Schizophrenia onset.

[BanzaiBonnie]

11. Right age for it

[Odin2005]

12. Yup,

Late teens/early 20s is the usual onset time, which makes sense since a developmental dysfunction in the prefrontal cortex is implicated in Schizophrenia and that is the last part of the brain to mature in ones late teens and early 20s.

[Puregonzo1188]

14. Yes, the NYT articles mentioned this. I really wish it would get more attention than the is-he-a-

liberal-was-he-a-tea-partier stuff. I think this much more likely the case. And if so this just very, very sad on all counts.

[emilyg]

24. Very sad for all involved .

[EFerrari]

25. Yep.

[HubertHeaver]

9. He was noticeably unbalanced? Where did he obtain the Glock?

[markpkessinger]

23. MSNBC reported that he bought it legally

I think the reports of him being "noticeably unbalanced" came from people who spent time with him on a regular basis. But if he hadn't been previously diagnosed, and there was nothing on his police record, then it would simply have been a matter of having to maintain an appearance of being relatively "normal" for as long as it took to purchase the gun and fill out the information for the background check. So that really doesn't seem implausible to me.

[Puregonzo1188]

13. I think the increasingly irritate behavior is what's key here, not what books he did or didn't read

and trying to make sense of his ramblings. I think he untreated mental illness, which makes this a tragedy on so many levels.