Homeless in Arizona

From this article it sounds like the government wants to try Jared Lee Loughner twice for the murders he committed when he attempted to assassinate Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in Tucson.

It sounds like both the Federal government and the state of Arizona want to try him for the murders.

It sounds like even if Jared Lee Loughner accepts a plea bargain with the Feds that will force him to spend the rest of his life in prison the Pima County Attorney also wants to try him and execute Loughner if he gets a conviction.

I suspect this is a violation of his 5th Amendment right prohibiting a person being tried twice for the same crime.

PHOENIX -- A possible plea deal in the deadly shootings that wounded then-U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords would send Jared Lee Loughner to prison for the rest of his life, a person familiar with the case said Saturday.

Jared Loughner pleads guilty to assassinating U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords

A court-appointed psychiatrist will testify Tuesday that Loughner is competent to enter a plea in the shooting rampage that killed six people and injured 13, including Giffords, said the person, who was not authorized to discuss the case publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

A status conference in the federal case had already been scheduled for Tuesday in Tucson.

The person, speaking about upcoming events in the case, said the plan is for Loughner to enter a guilty plea in the murders and attempted murders. The plan is contingent on the judge in the case allowing Loughner to enter the plea.

The Los Angeles Times reported earlier Saturday that Loughner was set to change his plea. He had originally pleaded not guilty.

Bill Solomon, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office, said he could not comment on Loughner's case and the possibility of a guilty plea.

The Pima County attorney's office, which has said it could also pursue state prosecution of Loughner, declined to comment, said spokeswoman Isabel Burruel Smutzer.

Loughner had pleaded not guilty to 49 federal charges stemming from the Jan. 8, 2011, shooting outside a Tucson supermarket where Giffords was holding a meet-and-greet with constituents.

Authorities said he shot Giffords, opened fire on the crowd and was subdued by bystanders. Giffords was shot in the head and subsequently left Congress to devote her time to rehabilitation.

Giffords and her husband were traveling in Europe, and spokeswoman Hayley Zachary said Saturday she had no information on developments in Loughner's case.

U.S. Rep. Ron Barber, a Democrat who was elected in June to replace Giffords in Congress after she resigned, also was wounded in the shooting. A spokesman for Barber did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

U.S. District Judge Larry Burns ruled previously that Loughner isn't psychologically fit to stand trial, but that he could eventually be made ready for trial after treatment.

An Arizona college that Loughner attended released numerous emails about him that painted a picture of a struggling student with emotional problems who disturbed others with his strange behavior.

Experts have concluded that Loughner suffers from schizophrenia, and prison officials in Missouri, where Loughner has been held, have forcibly medicated him with psychotropic drugs.

Even though psychologists have said Loughner's condition is improving, his lawyers have vigorously fought the government's efforts to medicate him. At one point, a federal appeals court halted the forced medication, but resumed it once mental health experts at the prison concluded that Loughner's condition was deteriorating further.

He was removed from a May 25, 2011, court hearing when he lowered his head to within inches of the courtroom table, then lifted his head and began a loud and angry rant.

His psychologist has said that since Loughner has been forcibly medicated, his condition has improved. He sat still and expressionless for seven hours at a hearing in September 2011.

Jared Loughner pleads guilty to assassinating U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords

TUCSON -- The final chapter of the deadly Tucson shooting saga played out in a federal courtroom Tuesday when suspect Jared Loughner was found competent by a judge to stand trial and immediately pleaded guilty to 19 charges, including the wounding of former U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.

Prosecutors agreed in exchange not to seek the death penalty. Instead, Loughner has agreed to a life sentence without possibility of parole.

Loughner pleaded guilty to 19 charges, with U.S. District Judge Larry Burns dismissing 30 others. Sentencing is set for Nov. 15.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Wallace Kleindienst said the Pima County Attorney's Office, which could still prosecute Loughner in state court, did not participate in the plea agreement. He said his office has not been informed about what Pima County prosecutors plan to do.

Pima County County Barbara LaWall's office did not respond to inquiries about the matter from The Arizona Republic.

Loughner's plea included guilty pleas for the murders of U.S. District Judge John Roll and Giffords staffer Gabe Zimmerman. It also included guilty pleas for the attempted assassination of Giffords and the attempted murders of Giffords employees Pam Simon and Ron Barber. Barber succeeded Giffords as U.S. representative from Tucson.

Loughner also pleaded guilty to causing the deaths of the others killed at Giffords' constituent event at a grocery store just outside of Tucson. Because it was an official congressional event, it was a federally protected activity.

There was stillness in the courtroom as the judge read the names of those killed, wounded or placed in danger during the shootings.

The maximum sentence for the crimes is mandatory life in prison without eligibility for parole. Loughner's defense lawyer, Judy Clarke, said her client's plea agreement carries multiple life sentences.

Before today's hearing began, Assistant U.S. Attorney Wallace Kleindienst said if the plea deal took effect, Loughner would be sent back to Missouri. First, however, Loughner was expected to spend three or four days in Tucson to visit with his parents.

In making his pleas to the judge, Loughner admitted that he planned to use his weapon to kill Giffords and others attending her Congress on Your Corner event on Jan. 8, 2011. He also admitted intending to injure or kill others attending the event. The shootings left six dead and 13 wounded.

The plea agreement requires Loughner to waive ownership of the Glock pistol, ammunition and 12-gauge shotgun seized at shooting scene last year. He also must forfeit any future money he may be offered to write his story or give interviews.

The deal was finalized in court early Tuesday afternoon after Burns found Loughner mentally competent to stand trial in light of evidence presented at the hearing and testimony on the professional observation of experts.

"My personal observations of him leave no questions in my mind that Loughner knows what's going on today," Burns said.

Lougher later told the judge he understood he was giving up the right to contest his guilt, and that the mandatory minimum penalty was a life sentence.

"Is that what you want to do? Have you made that choice to give up those rights and plead guilty?" Burns asked. Loughner, looking attentively at the judge, replied, "Yes."

At that point, his demeanor was very different from prior hearings in which he seemed lackadaisical and unfocused.

Tuesday's behavior seemed in keeping with what Dr. Christina Pietz, Loughner's forensic psychologist, told the court during the hearing. She said she believed Loughner was competent to stand trial after spending months in a prison psychiatric hospital in Missouri.

Loughner, dressed in a khaki uniform, sat quietly in the courtroom as Pietz described her review of 2,000 pages of Loughner's journal, computer entries and other material. From that, she concluded that he had shown signs of depression since 2006 and may have developed symptoms of schizophrenia in his junior year of high school.

Between 2008 and 2010, Loughner's parents and friends became concerned that he would commit suicide because of his depression, and started a suicide watch. In one video he filmed of himself, he said he was so depressed he wanted to assassinate someone.

When Pietz diagnosed Loughner with schizophrenia after the shootings in 2011, he was described as being "disappointed, upset." He told Pietz he wished he took depression medication, Pietz said. She said she believed medication had subsequently helped Loughner because he began making comments about feeling badly about what he had done. He also showed some understanding of his actions, saying he wanted to be executed, and crying about a child's death in the event.

Pietz also said Loughner expressed shock that Giffords survived, telling her he was disappointed that he failed to kill the lawmaker. He said of himself, "Jared is a failure."

Since being imprisoned, Loughner expressed interest in having a job, which Pietz said was a sign of mental competency. He now works two prison jobs, one rolling towels for inmates.

Pietz said she believed Loughner to have a factual, rational understanding the role of a jury, a judge, prosecutors and judicial proceedings. During inmate group competency therapy, Loughner was asked what he would do if he left prison. He replied, "I'm never gonna get out."

Loughner is also able to orient time and place, and no longer shows signs he is hearing voices or other auditory stimuli.

If he were moved to general prison population, Pietz said, she would not be concerned he would harm anyone as long as he is medicated. However, she added, "My concern is someone will harm him."

Pietz emphasized that Loughner had never been forcibly medicated in prison. She called it passive involuntary medication, because he had never refused it.

News of the pending plea agreement spread quickly Monday, resulting a gaggle of media descending on the Tucson courthouse to cover the event. The courtroom was packed, and roughly 80 people watched the hearing from an overflow room.

Tucson shooting victims filled four rows or about a third of the courtroom, with Barber, who took Giffords' seat in the U.S. House, sitting up straight in the front.

Earlier Tuesday, Mark Kelly, Giffords' husband, said in a statement that he and Giffords were satisfied with the proposed plea agreement.

"The pain and loss caused by the events of Jan. 8, 2011, are incalculable," said Kelly, who did not attend the hearing. He said he and Giffords have been in touch with the U.S. Attorney's Office throughout the legal process. "Avoiding a trial will allow us -- and we hope the whole southern Arizona community -- to continue with our recovery and move forward with our lives."

Giffords and Kelly have been out of the country, hosting a long-planned cruise of the Mediterranean that docked in Rome Monday. They have not yet returned home to Houston, where Giffords has been undergoing outpatient therapy for her brain injury.

In July, Giffords and Kelly were photographed together at a summit of the French Alps. Kelly was visiting a nearby mountain research station with other astronauts to commemorate their shuttle missions.

After the 2011 shootings, Loughner was indicted on 49 counts, including several which could have been punishable by death were he convicted. But questions about his sanity emerged immediately.

Burns ordered him to undergo psychological evaluation in early March 2011 at the request of the prosecution, and then sent him to the federal prison hospital in Missouri.

He was back in court in Tucson at the end of May for his first competency hearing, but he had to be removed from the courtroom after going into a rant in which he indicated that he believed he had killed Giffords.

"Thank you for the free kill. She died in front of me. Your cheesiness," he said.

Loughner was found incompetent to stand trial and was sent back to Missouri to undergo restoration to competency. Competency is defined as being able to understand the court proceedings and assist his attorneys with his defense. Court documents said he was diagnosed as schizophrenic.

But he refused to cooperate with restoration efforts, and after prison officials determined he was a danger to himself and others, they forced him to take medication. Clarke, Loughner's attorney, objected on numerous grounds, saying that the government was trying to make an end-run around the law by using the dangerousness argument to make him take the same drugs used in restoration of schizophrenics.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals briefly took Clarke's side and stopped the medication while it reviewed the issue. But after another incident at the hospital in July 2011, prison officials decided to require the medication again, and this time the 9th Circuit upheld the medication.

Loughner was calm at his next Tucson court appearance in September 2011, but Burns found him still incompetent and sent him back to Missouri for four more months.

Clarke continued her appeals. According to Clarke's filings in the 9th Circuit, by March 2012, Loughner was on a drug regimen that included anti-psychotics, anti-anxiety drugs, antidepressants and a drug to counteract symptoms similar to Parkinson's disease.

The restoration ended in late May. Loughner was scheduled to appear in Tucson on June 27. If Loughner remained incompetent, the government would eventually have to drop charges against him and initiate a civil commitment to a mental institution.

But when Clarke and prosecutors filed a joint motion to postpone the hearing until Aug. 6, it signaled that they might be working out a deal.

News leaked out last Saturday night that Loughner might be found competent and enter into a plea agreement.

On Monday, in an order written by Burns, it was learned that Clarke had requested the change-of-plea hearing.

Clarke could have attempted an insanity defense, but history shows that juries are leery of not-guilty-by-reason-of-insanity verdicts. Loughner could easily have been found guilty and sentenced to death.

The deal apparently made sense to the prosecution as well. If they went to trial, they ran the risk that Loughner's delicate mental state could deteriorate. There would be a chance he'd be found not guilty by reason of insanity. There would be a greater chance that any conviction would be vigorously appealed, and Loughner might not have been competent at the time of his execution.

Republic staffers Bob Ortega, Jaimee Rose and 12 News staffer Joe Dana contributed to the report.

Tucson gun grabbers at work!!!!

Hours after Jared Loughner pleaded guilty to 19 counts of murder and attempted murder in the mass shooting on Jan. 8, 2011, the Tucson City Council unanimously voted to endorse a federal measure that would make it more difficult for "criminals and other dangerous people" to purchase a gun.

The vote followed testimony from several of the victims of last year's shooting near Tucson, many of whom had sat through Loughner's hearing earlier in the day.

At least eight of those who had been at the Safeway in January 2011 attended the meeting to speak as a group and urge city leaders to become some of the first in the state -- if not the country -- to advocate for stricter requirements on gun ownership.

"This whole community is well-suited to champion this cause," said Patricia Maisch, who was at the Safeway on the day of the shooting and is credited with helping to disarm Loughner as he tried to reload. "People say we are swimming upstream. At least we're swimming."

The Tucson resolution calls upon Congress to enact the Fix Gun Checks Act of 2012, which would ensure those who are prohibited from buying a gun are listed in a national instant criminal background-check database.

The measure would require a background check for every gun sale. It also specifically asks Gov. Jan Brewer to increase reporting of the state's prohibited gun purchasers to the background- check database.

In addition, the measure calls for President Barack Obama and GOP challenger Mitt Romney each to come up with a plan to reduce gun violence and prevent future mass shootings.

Pam Simon, a former outreach coordinator for then-U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, said that it was long overdue for national leaders to address gun violence. Giffords was wounded in the attack.

"As moments of silence have stretched into months of silence, we waited for our national leaders, hoping they would act," Simon said. "That silence eventually became deafening."

The Tucson council's decision comes in the wake of at least two major mass shootings that have taken place in the U.S. since the tragedy near Tucson. On July 20, a heavily armed shooter opened fire during a midnight showing of a new Batman movie in Colorado, killing 12 and injuring more than 50 others.

In yet another mass shooting that took place Aug. 5, a gunman killed six and wounded four others at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin.

"We shouldn't feel troubled when we want to go to Safeway to do some shopping or when you want to go see a movie or, God forbid, in one of his houses of worship," said Kenneth Dorushka, who attended the meeting with his wife, Carol. Both had attended Loughner's hearing earlier in the day.

The Tucson mayor and City Council voted on the measure at its regular meeting Tuesday evening, which drew about 150 people. The timing of the vote -- coinciding with Loughner's competency hearing that morning, as well as with another agenda item to consider proclaiming Tucson an "immigrant welcoming city" -- was unintentional, Tucson Councilwoman Karin Uhlich said.

"None of us could have anticipated what an emotional day this would be for the victims and survivors of the January 8 shootings and the wider community," Uhlich said. "But perhaps it is the right time to have this on our agenda."

Nevertheless, in anticipation of increased interest, the city moved the meeting from Tucson City Hall to the Tucson Convention Center.

Former Tucson councilwoman Molly McKasson was one of the dozens of people who showed up in support of the measure.

"How many people have been killed this year by a semi-automatic weapon?" said McKasson as she addressed the current council. "How many people have died and families have been completely broken apart by gun violence just this year?"

Roxanna Green, mother of 9-year-old Christina-Taylor Green, the youngest victim of the Tucson shooting, stood at the rostrum with other victims but did not speak. Green had not attended Loughner's hearing earlier in day but hugged several other victims after the council vote.

Several victims and council members spoke, but some of the simplest testimony seemed to affect the audience the most.

"I am Mavy Stoddard," one of the oldest victims of the Tucson shooting said slowly in a small voice. "My husband, Dorwan, was killed. He died in my arms, and I was shot."

As she spoke, several people in the room could be seen with tears in their eyes.

"We need you so badly to support us," Stoddard continued in her plea to the council. "You have a little more power than we have."

Did Jared Loughner understand the plea bargain he just accepted????

A mental evaluation report for Tucson shooter Jared Loughner sheds new light on the decision to allow him to enter into a plea deal rather than stand trial.

The report by Loughner's prison psychologist, dated April 24, 2012, but not posted to the federal court website until Thursday, said that Loughner was competent to stand trial, but the psychologist and Loughner's defense attorneys feared his grasp on reality was so fragile that it might not last through the stress of an extended trial.

Loughner, 23, was found competent to stand trial in Tucson on Tuesday and pleaded guilty to 19 of the 49 counts against him. His plea agreement stipulated that he would face life in prison rather than the death penalty for the murders.

"Mr. Loughner does suffer from a severe mental illness," the report says, "and his condition may wax and wane. Consequently, the possibility exists that he may decompensate during the criminal process."

The report by Dr. Christina Pietz, who testified at Tuesday's competency hearing in U.S. Districct Court, also mentioned that Loughner's attorneys were already negotiating a plea bargain with prosecutors back in April.

During her discussions with Loughner, Pietz wrote, "He indicated a desire for a favorable outcome but acknowledged he would most likely be sentenced to life in prison."

The charges against Loughner stemmed from the Jan. 8, 2011 shootings outside a supermarket near Tucson where then-U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was hosting an event for constitutents. Six people died, including a federal judge, a congressional staffer and a 9-year-old girl; 13 were wounded, including Giffords.

After his arrest, Loughner was sent to a Missouri prison, where he received treatment to restore him to competency. In legal terminology, competency refers only to whether a criminal defendant understands the proceedings against him or her and is able to assist attorneys with the defense. It does not mean a person is or was sane or insane. Competency usually comes into play in cases where a defendant is mentally ill.

As part of his restoration regimen, Pietz' report says, Loughner attended classes to school him on what happens in court. She noted that Loughner understood some of the constitutional rights he would waive if he entered into a plea agreement. Furthermore, he was able to retain the information he learned in class.

Though much of the information in the report came out during Pietz's testimony Tuesday, there are new details. Loughner has essentially spent his time in the Missouri prison hospital going from cage to cage. He lives in a cell where he is under observation 24 hours a day, because he is on suicide watch. When he leaves his cell, he goes to another isolated room to exercise. When he is allowed to go outside on the prison yard, he stays within an area separated from other inmates by wire mesh. When he attends group therapy or competency class, he is still kept in a contained area where he can communicate with other participants but cannot touch them.

Until January of this year, Pietz wrote, Loughner still believed that he had killed Giffords. And when he finally admitted that she was alive, he was disappointed. When Pietz questioned him about what disappointed him he answered, "That I failed. I'm not an assassin. That I ruined my life for nothing. I think differently now. (...) It's another failure if she's alive. Jared Loughner failed again. He's a failure. So all of this would be for nothing."

Even if Loughner gave up on the idea that Gifford's death was "faked," he continued to dispute the surveillance video that showed him shooting.

Pietz wrote that Loughner will likely still exhibit some psychotic symptoms, but they should be minimal on medication.

"Mr. Loughner's attorneys continue to be concerned that Mr. Loughner will decompensate during a long, stressful trial. This concern is understandable," she wrote. "Following most meetings with his attorneys, Mr. Loughner was exhausted. He rarely talked to staff following these meetings and often immediately went to sleep. Because of Mr. Loughner's cognitive limitations resulting from his psychotic illness, working with him might be more difficult. It may take longer to review the evidence with Mr. Loughner and prepare him for trial. He may find the evidence especially distressing, as do some defendants that are not mentally ill, and struggle to maintain his composure or motivation.

"In some areas, his attitude appears to have remained more rigid than would be optimal. For example, he still appears irritated, or even angry, when reminded that Representative Giffords survived, and he also bitterly contests how some of the videotape from the Safeway incident is different from what he remembers."

In a ruling issued Wednesday, U.S. District Court Judge Larry Burns ordered that Loughner be returned to the prison hospital in Missouri pending his sentencing, Nov. 15.

Ellen Davis of Ahwatukee wants to turn America into a gun free police state???

Like most gun grabber Ellen Davis says "she is not against individuals having guns" ... but "assault weapons are such a risk to society that they need to be controlled".

And from this article it sounds like she considers a Glock handgun to be an "assault weapon" that needs to be controlled. And if that is true I suspect that she probably considers ANY gun an "assault weapon" that needs to be controlled.

Gun grabbers now using shrinks and doctors to do their dirty work

Jobs program for shrinks???

And of course the socialists will say you don't have any Constitutional rights if your shrink thinks you are a danger to society.

It can seem all but impossible to understand why anyone would commit a mass murder as Jared Loughner did near Tucson last year, as James Holmes is accused of doing in Aurora, Colo., last month, as Wade Michael Page did at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin last Sunday, and as happens, on a smaller scale, about 20 times a year in the United States.

Often, the specific "why" for a murderous rampage stays hidden within the twisted delusions or obscure psychosis of a particular killer. But forensic psychologists and other behavioral scientists are increasingly identifying reasons that can predispose someone to commit mass violence, and "warning behaviors," such as a fast- growing fascination with weapons and violence, that should signal the need for intervention.

"We'll never be able to predict which individual, out of many, will carry out an act of targeted violence," says J. Reid Meloy, a forensic psychologist and professor of clinical psychiatry at the University of California-San Diego.

But, Meloy said, it's often possible to identify people who fall into high-risk groups and to take some action to intervene -- from requiring counseling to restricting someone's access to weapons to seeking involuntary commitment, or many other steps in between.

"These strategies are being applied all over the country every day now, by mental-health professionals, teams in corporate settings and universities, by law-enforcement officers," he said. While he declined to offer specific examples, citing privacy concerns, he said there are many cases where the risk is being reduced, though it's impossible to say whether an act of violence is actually being stopped.

After Seung-Hui Cho killed 32 people and shot 17 others at Virginia Tech in April 2007, Virginia began requiring all universities across the state to create threat-assessment teams, groups including security or law enforcement, psychologists, counselors and administrators. The teams identify when an individual could pose a risk and consider how to respond. Many large corporations also have established threat-assessment teams or policies.

Meloy said he's working on a case now in which he's helping to plan a strategy to handle a person engaged in threatening behavior in a workplace setting "where a mass shooting could be carried out relatively easily."

Intervening often isn't simple or easy. People in schools or workplaces may report worrisome behavior, but the information may not get to the right authorities, or they may not take what, in retrospect, may seem like the right steps. Or there may be other limitations.

Before the Virginia Tech shooting, Cho had been identified as stalking women and setting a fire in a dorm, both potential "warning behaviors" of further danger, said clinical psychologist and attorney Brian Russell of Lawrence, Kan. Campus police took Cho to a mental-health agency, which sent him to state court for an involuntary-commitment hearing. But when Cho's attorney asked to keep his record clean by letting him go to outpatient mental-health treatment voluntarily, the judge agreed.

"He checks in, he immediately checks out, and gets guns he couldn't have gotten with a court order for inpatient mental treatment or a judicial commitment," said Russell.

Loughner, who pleaded guilty Tuesday to last year killing six people and wounding 13, including then-Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, had been suspended from Pima Community College after a series of run-ins with police and college administrators. On Oct. 7, 2010, three months before his attack outside a Tucson-area Safeway, police delivered a letter to the home of Loughner's parents, saying he couldn't return to college until a mental-health professional confirmed that he didn't pose a danger to himself or others.

Well before James Holmes was arrested on charges of killing 12 people and wounding 58 at an Aurora, Colo., movie theater on July 20, University of Colorado psychiatrist Lynne Fenton raised concerns about his behavior with members of the university's behavioral-evaluation and threat-assessment team. The team reportedly never investigated Holmes, though, because he had dropped out of the university.

"The problem is that most people who are seriously mentally ill aren't going to do anything violent, and our ability to predict dangerous behavior is not that great," said Richard Cooter, an associate professor of forensic psychology at George Washington University in Washington, D.C. "If you tried to commit everybody who said something odd or weird or pick your term, you'd be locking up a lot of people."

Richard S. Adler, a clinical and forensic psychiatrist in Seattle, agreed. "It is exceptionally hard to predict who will be violent. The fact of the matter is I could see you today and you're relatively safe and tomorrow you could be not safe." Focusing on behaviors

In trying to understand what leads someone to commit mass murder, forensic psychologists sometimes focus on specific behaviors that show a growing or accelerating risk of violence. They also analyze the psychiatric and personality traits common to different types of mass killers.

Politically motivated terrorism aside, most mass murderers fall into one of three broad categories, many researchers say:

Those exhibiting psychopathic behavior. "At the core of the psychopath is always a profoundly malignant narcissism," said Russell. "They focus on what they need, and feel an entitlement to get what they need at the cost of anything to anyone else." In a 2004 study of 64 mass murderers, forensic psychologist Meloy said the pathological, narcissistic belief that they had a "right" to kill was ubiquitous.

Those who are delusional. They maintain a persistent, irrational belief in the face of contrary facts, said forensic psychologist David Bernstein of New York City. "Those beliefs become their reality. There's an arrogance involved," he said. Particularly of someone with paranoid delusions, "you believe people are conspiring against you; there is something about you that is so special, people are plotting against you in some way."

Those who are severely depressed and suicidal. Loughner can be included in this category, though he also is severely delusional and heard voices, according to his psychologist, Christina Pietz. She diagnosed Loughner as schizophrenic, a type of psychosis, and spent more than a year treating his illness with medications and therapy before U.S. District Court Judge Larry Burns ruled Loughner mentally competent last week, clearing the way for him to plead guilty.

Adolescent mass killers, such as Columbine High School shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, who killed 12 students and a teacher in April 1999, differ from adult mass murderers in some ways. One study, in 2000, found that adolescents are more likely to collaborate with others, are more likely to reveal clues -- Facebook postings, for example -- that they are planning something, and are less likely than adult killers to commit suicide. A 1999 study found that, in common with adults, youthful killers often were seen as loners, showed strong interest in violence and violent fantasies, and spent a lot of time planning the mass murder, which was usually triggered by some perceived rejection or disciplinary action.

Among the traits that many mass murderers -- adolescent or adult -- share are anger and a delusional sense of self-justification.

"Most of us learn to let things go, to see when something happens that it's not that big a deal in the scheme of things," said Bernstein. "These people focus and ruminate on their perceived wrongs; it becomes all-consuming. They feel they're correcting an injustice -- they're not the monster, the other people are the monsters."

On Aug. 3, 2010, for example, after he was forced to resign for stealing beer from the Hartford Distributors' warehouse where he worked, Omar Thornton pulled two Ruger semiautomatic pistols out of his lunch box and shot eight people to death. He called 911 before committing suicide, ranted about racism no other worker there perceived, and said "these people here are crazy," adding that he wished he'd shot more of them.

"All these guys are angry about something," said Cooter. Speaking of Page, the Sikh temple killer, he said that "from what I can tell, he wasn't psychotic; he was just an angry guy." Holmes, who dyed his hair to resemble the movie character The Joker, "obviously has a massive delusional system revolving around Batman, is probably schizophrenic too, and was very angry," possibly about failing in his studies at the University of Colorado, said Cooter, who emphasized that he doesn't have personal, direct knowledge of either case. Signaling intentions

Some "warning behaviors" seem obvious, like a growing fascination with weapons, a focus on violent fantasies or previous mass killers, and expressed threats that may be subtle or direct.

A Secret Service study in 2002 found that in 81 percent of school-shooting cases, at least one person knew about the plans in advance; and in 93 percent, people around the attackers noted disturbing behaviors ahead of time, such as acquiring guns or writing poems or essays on homicidal themes.

A study last year said most adult mass killers, too, signal their intent in some way, though not to their actual target.

Often, too, there's what psychologists call an "energy burst warning," a sudden jump in activities relating to the target.

Loughner, who is due to be sentenced to multiple life terms on Nov. 15, was a prime example, according to a citation in a recent study in the journal Behavioral Sciences and the Law.

In the dozen hours before the shooting, Loughner dropped off film at a Walgreens with photos of himself in a red g-string holding a Glock pistol next to his crotch; he checked into a Motel 6; left a phone message with a friend; posted a photo of the Glock to his MySpace page and wrote "Goodbye friends." He did several Web searches on "assassins" and "lethal injections." He tried to buy ammunition at a Walmart but left when a clerk expressed concern about his behavior. He went to another Walmart and bought ammunition and a black diaper bag, was stopped by a police officer for running a red light, went home but ran away when his father confronted him and asked what was in the bag, then went to a Circle K, from where he took a taxi to the Safeway where Giffords was meeting constituents.

Could any of the people he ran across in those 12 hours have seen a red flag? As the 2011 study notes, "Warning behaviors can only constitute warnings if the behaviors are detected."

In his 2004 study of 64 mass killings, Meloy noted "there was often pre-offense knowledge of specific and generalized threats among third parties, and they failed to act to prevent the killings" and "most people who had overheard a threat seemed to have dismissed it as incredible or implausible."

Though he concedes that in many places mental-health care options are limited and inadequate, Meloy, who calls himself an optimist, makes two observations.

The first is that, for all of the media attention to mass killings, the 20 incidents a year that occur on average means they remain exceedingly rare in a country of more than 311 million people.

The second: "After 9/11, New York came up with a catchy phrase, 'See something, say something.' If you're going to maintain a safe community and social fabric, and if someone is behaving in ways that concern you, you have to say something," says Meloy. "And I think, increasingly, people are willing to do that."

Doctors target gun violence as a social disease

Source Sounds like the gun grabbers are trying to do their dirty work with doctors and shrinks now.

MILWAUKEE -- Is a gun like a virus, a car, tobacco or alcohol? Yes say public health experts, who in the wake of recent mass shootings are calling for a fresh look at gun violence as a social disease.

What we need, they say, is a public health approach to the problem, like the highway safety measures, product changes and driving laws that slashed deaths from car crashes decades ago, even as the number of vehicles on the road rose.

One example: Guardrails are now curved to the ground instead of having sharp metal ends that stick out and pose a hazard in a crash.

"People used to spear themselves and we blamed the drivers for that," said Dr. Garen Wintemute, an emergency medicine professor who directs the Violence Prevention Research Program at the University of California, Davis.

It wasn't enough back then to curb deaths just by trying to make people better drivers, and it isn't enough now to tackle gun violence by focusing solely on the people doing the shooting, he and other doctors say.

They want a science-based, pragmatic approach based on the reality that we live in a society saturated with guns and need better ways of preventing harm from them.

The need for a new approach crystallized last Sunday for one of the nation's leading gun violence experts, Dr. Stephen Hargarten. He found himself treating victims of the Sikh temple shootings at the emergency department he heads in Milwaukee. Seven people were killed, including the gunman, and three were seriously injured.

It happened two weeks after the shooting that killed 12 people and injured 58 at a movie theater in Colorado, and two days before a man pleaded guilty to killing six people and wounding 13, including then-Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, in Tucson, Ariz., last year.

"What I'm struggling with is, is this the new social norm? This is what we're going to have to live with if we have more personal access to firearms," said Hargarten, emergency medicine chief at Froedtert Hospital and director of the Injury Research Center at the Medical College of Wisconsin. "We have a public health issue to discuss. Do we wait for the next outbreak or is there something we can do to prevent it?"

About 260 million to 300 million firearms are owned by civilians in the United States; about one-third of American homes have one. Guns are used in two-thirds of homicides, according to the FBI. About 9 percent of all violent crimes involve a gun -- roughly 338,000 cases each year.

Mass shootings don't seem to be on the rise, but not all police agencies report details like the number of victims per shooting and reporting lags by more than a year, so recent trends are not known.

"The greater toll is not from these clusters but from endemic violence, the stuff that occurs every day and doesn't make the headlines," said Wintemute, the California researcher.

More than 73,000 emergency room visits in 2010 were for firearm-related injuries, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates.

Dr. David Satcher tried to make gun violence a public health issue when he became CDC director in 1993. Four years later, laws that allow the carrying of concealed weapons drew attention when two women were shot at an Indianapolis restaurant after a patron's gun fell out of his pocket and accidentally fired. Ironically, the victims were health educators in town for an American Public Health Association convention.

That same year, Hargarten won a federal grant to establish the nation's first Firearm Injury Center at the Medical College of Wisconsin.

"Unlike almost all other consumer products, there is no national product safety oversight of firearms," he wrote in the Wisconsin Medical Journal.

--"Host" factors: What makes someone more likely to shoot, or someone more likely to be a victim. One recent study found firearm owners were more likely than those with no firearms at home to binge drink or to drink and drive, and other research has tied alcohol and gun violence. That suggests that people with driving under the influence convictions should be barred from buying a gun, Wintemute said.

--Product features: Which firearms are most dangerous and why. Manufacturers could be pressured to fix design defects that let guns go off accidentally, and to add technology that allows only the owner of the gun to fire it (many police officers and others are shot with their own weapons). Bans on assault weapons and multiple magazines that allow rapid and repeat firing are other possible steps.

--"Environmental" risk factors: What conditions allow or contribute to shootings. Gun shops must do background checks and refuse to sell firearms to people convicted of felonies or domestic violence misdemeanors, but those convicted of other violent misdemeanors can buy whatever they want. The rules also don't apply to private sales, which one study estimates as 40 percent of the market.

--Disease patterns, observing how a problem spreads. Gun ownership -- a precursor to gun violence -- can spread "much like an infectious disease circulates," said Daniel Webster, a health policy expert and co-director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research in Baltimore.

"There's sort of a contagion phenomenon" after a shooting, where people feel they need to have a gun for protection or retaliation, he said.

That's already evident in the wake of the Colorado movie-theater shootings. Last week, reports popped up around the nation of people bringing guns to "Batman" movies. Some of them said they did so for protection.

Kevin Walsh comments on the Loughner

Kevin Walsh made a comment that President Bush deserved to die to a Republican who called and asked him to vote for Bush in the last election Bush ran for President in.

While Kevin's statement was legal and was definitely NOT a threat to kill President Bush, that didn't stop the Secret Service from declaring him insane and using that as an excuse to lock him up in the Maricopa County "nut house", which is Desert Vista Hospital in Mesa.

He was locked up there for 3 months until the Secret Service determined he was not a threat to the President.

While Kevin Walsh is a racist and I don't agree with any of his views in that area it certainly doesn't make it right for the Secret Service to jail him as a political prisoner like they did.

Kevin's comments follow:

Starting next month the Arizona Republic will limit the availability of electronic versions of its articles to those who aren't paid subscribers. It makes sense. They have to pay the bills somehow, and old fashioned people who are willing to pay to have a paper copy of a newspaper in their hands are becoming fewer. I decided to make use of it while it's there, and read an electronic version of the latest news in the Loughner case. They attached as a PDF file the competency report submitted prior to Loughner's guilty plea, and I read it. There were some surprises for me.

One was that Loughner was getting 8 mg of risperidone per day. When I was in the psychiatric hospital, I was told that they never gave anyone more than 6 mg per day, and my dosage was never more than 4 mg. I then looked up the maximum dosage online, and it said that while more than 6 mg was not recommended, if it was necessary, up to 16 mg per day could be given. I also looked up giving risperidone and geodon to patients at the same time, and I found that was still contraindicated because it caused cardiac arhythmia. They gave them both to me at the same time anyway. My mother was the one who looked it up online and found that they weren't supposed to do that. They stopped it after one week because the combination was causing me great sedation.

Another surprise was the justification the psychologist gave for calling Loughner delusional. It was that he didn't believe Giffords was still alive. He said no one could survive such a wound. That's a popular misperception about gunshot wounds to the head, and also a reflection of how popular consciousness hasn't caught up with advances in medicine. 30 years ago a gunshot wound like that probably would have been fatal, and Loughner wasn't the only one surprised that Giffords lived. Loughner also thought that the images of Giffords after the shooting were of an actress portraying her. I don't find that crazy either. Giffords did look very different after the shooting, mainly because her head had been shaved. If that's all they have to go on, I don't see why Loughner was declared incompetent to stand trial. Loughner was mistaken, but I'm not sure he was delusional.

One thing that bothers me about the whole affair is the legal paradox that it's possible to have been incompetent to stand trial at the time of the crime yet still to have been sufficiently in possession of one's reason to know the difference between right and wrong. That never made sense to me. If someone is so far gone he can't understand a trial, he's so far gone he doesn't have moral responsibility for what he's done. Accepting a guilty plea makes no sense. If the judge honestly believes Loughner was incompetent to stand trial, he should reject the guilty plea and direct the jury to find Loughner not guilty by reason of insanity. If the judge doesn't believe he was incompetent to stand trial, he should dismiss all the charges against him with prejudice because he was deprived of his right to a speedy trial.

Here are some previous articles on Jared Lee Loughner's attempted assassination of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in Tucson.