State of Connecticut Claims Disclosure of Adam Lanza’s Records “Can Cause A Lot of People to Stop Taking Their Medications” in FOI Hearing
The following is a media release from Shelia Mathews of AbleChild:
Ablechild vs.ChiefMedical Examiner: FIC Docket No: 2013-197, Attorney: Patrick B. Kwanashie, AAG
(Office of the Attorney General) argues release of Adam Lanza records to public
“can cause a lot of people to stop taking their medications”. Ablechild argues
that lack of transparency comprises informed consent and puts public health “at
risk”.
December 14, 2012, 20 year-old Adam Lanza fatally shot
twenty children and six adults in a mass murder at Sandy Hook Elementary School
in the village of Sandy Hook in Newtown, Connecticut. He committed suicide by
shooting himself in the head.
Many would agree that to prevent future tragedies from
occurring like those in Newtown and Colorado we should have a deeper
understanding of what the key components and common factors are that drive a
person to such acts of violence. Ablechild, a national parent rights
organization with parent members within Sandy Hook and Newtown, has been on the
front lines of the Newtown tragedy as it unfolded. It has been asking for
accountability in the form of disclosure of all records pertaining to the
shooter as a means of transparency, to provide the public with facts that could
be pertinent in protecting their safety. Sadly this transparency has eluded the
Newtown “investigation” from the start.
One of these questions was whether or not Adam Lanza was
under the influence of one or more drugs to include all prescription drugs.
“What plagues this investigation is that some are simply
fixated on having it remain secret in spite of the urgency of transparency that
is clearly needed to protect the public,” said Patricia Weathers Cofounder of
Ablechild. “It is alarming that here we are very close to a year later and the
public still remains in the dark, records are still sealed, and the State is
now saying that it is opposing a release of the records because those records
“can cause a lot of people to stop taking their medications”.
This opposition
comes despite the fact that 31 school shootings and/or school-related acts of
violence have been committed by those taking or withdrawing from psychiatric
drugs resulting in 162 wounded and 72 killed and despite the fact that
Ablechild for years has been asking for a federal investigation into the link
between psychiatric drugs and these violent acts, without result.
Mrs. Weathers went on to add, “If there is nothing to hide
then disclose, especially if this information has the potential for
reevaluating the use of certain prescription drugs that evidence shows are
contributing to the rapidly growing acts of violence in this country in recent
years. Our organization thinks that both the Medical Examiner’s office and
State’s actions are unacceptable and reprehensible because in actuality they
place the public at risk.”
What should be more alarming to the public is that the media
doesn’t question this failure to disclose that is being arbitrarily wielded by
the State Medical Examiner’s Office, despite the evidence that at the very
least should call for a review. In the midst of this tragedy the State itself
has scrambled for solutions in the form of firearm prevention legislation and
sweeping mental health funding without ever actually demanding that all
evidence be reviewed first before passing such legislation.
Newtown was the second deadliest mass shooting by a single
person in American history, after the 2007 Virginia Tech Massacre and comes 14
years after Columbine. What is telling in all of this…America is still chasing
its tail while the public pays a heavy price!
For more information on Ablechild’s demand for
accountability and transparency within the State of CT watch our case before
the Freedom of Information Act Commission.
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