Exclusive: Jared Loughner Radically Changed Before Alleged Shooting, Friend Says

[RamboLiberal]

Source: ABC News

A longtime friend of Jared Lee Loughner, the suspect in custody following the murder of six people in an apparent assassination attempt on Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, said there was a mysterious, significant change in him a year before the shooting.

"He was a good person that just somehow changed so much," former classmate and friend Tong Shan told ABC News in an exclusive interview. "I don't know what the hell happened to him."

-----

"I don't know might have caused him to change, but from the way he was talking to me on Myspace... you can see. It was just questions and questions and random, weird questions that didn't go together," she said. "He wanted to know everything... He would just trip out.

"I don't know why it didn't jump out at me, like, 'Hey, something's wrong."

Shan last spoke to Loughner in October, after he was suspended and dropped out of school and before he purchased a semi-automatic handgun from a gunshop in Tucson. But she said while Loughner was "anti-government," he was never violent and never mentioned plans to buy a gun


Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/jared-lee-loughner-suspected-gabrielle-giffords-shooter-school/story?id=12575278

[JustFiveMoreMinutes]

1. WHERE IS HIS FAMILY?!!!!!!!!!!?????????????

Why all the 'so called Friends' who didn't really know him that well or even tried it seems...............

[valerief]

3. That's the million dollar question. nt

[maxsolomon]

7. where are the families of the street schizos i see every day?

they are in denial or in self-preservation mode. i have a friend who's sister is schizophrenic. it's exhausing.

[Mz Pip]

15. Some may actually be trying to help

Our entire family has been trying to help my SIL for over 30 years. It's been tough to do because there are laws that make it impossible to do much of anything unless the person threatens himself or others. Over the years we have called county mental health agencies and were told there was nothing we could do. Her parents have been essentially supporting her financially but have been able to do little else.

There may be people out there who see this woman pushing around a shopping cart and collecting bottles wondering where her family is. They might be surprised to learn how involved we have all tried to be. And yes, it is exhausting. And frustrating.

[maxsolomon]

19. and many families just don't have the resources - mental, financial - to help

i don't get to see the families trying to help. i get to see the ranting and threats. and then we get to see the results.

in Seattle, we just had a schizophrenic, who had moved from Florida to be with a woman he'd met on the internet, kill a random stranger with a hatchet, in broad daylight, in front of schoolkids. his brother in Florida, and his GF who'd taken out a restraining order both wanted him committed. he had to kill 1st for that to happen.

as usual, the stories are coming out that everyone who had contact with the AZ shooter - friends, teachers - had alarm bells going off, but no one could do anything about it until it was too late. when we hear about the parents and family it will be similar.

[PJPhreak]

24. "they are in denial or in self-preservation mode"

I too have a close family who is severely mentally ill,self-preservation mode is sometimes the only way a person can themselves handle that persons illness,a lot of us are not able or equipped to deal with the situation.

A lot of people don't undestand this.

You are right.It is exhausting.

[geckosfeet]

8. He lived with his parents.

[JustFiveMoreMinutes]

10. Exactly WHY we should have HEARD from them by now.

but instead we get 'high school friends' of a 22 yo who knew him 5 years ago!!! :)

[northernlights]

12. maybe his parents are busy with something other than

satisfying your need that they explain what happened. :shrug:

Probably have been advised not to speak to press. Probably wondering what when wrong; how did they miss it. Probably busy lining up lawyers and shrinks for their son.

[glinda]

17. They are hiding. Am sure they feel pretty crappy right now.

[Name removed]

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[HuckleB]

25. +1

[EFerrari]

14. Families who deal with serious mental illness

sometimes are dealing with it over more than one generation and most of the time are stressed out and can't do one more thing.

[Name removed]

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[SharonAnn]

30. If he's over 18 or 21, there's little the family can do. We've tried with

my nephew, but there's little we can do.

Until he's determined to be a threat to himself or others, law enforcement can't take him in.

Without insurance and his willingness to sign himself in, no mental health facility will take him in.

The family tries what they can, prays a lot, watches, waits, and hope that no one gets killed.

It's awful. Really awful.

[valerief]

2. I thought Loughner was a loner. nt

[Posteritatis]

4. Doesn't necessarily mean he never had any friends or anything

The media likes calling anyone who's even a little introverted a "loner" these days anyway; it's a pretty useless term.

[maxsolomon]

5. Dear "longtime friends":

when people "mysteriously, significantly change" and "just trip out" in less than a year, IT'S BECAUSE THEIR SERIOUS MENTAL ILLNESS IS MANIFESTING.

if you care, do something - talk to them. talk to their other friends. talk to their siblings. talk to their parents.

[RobinA]

32. Easy to Say

Unfortunately, the "longtime friends" are usually late teens early twenties and are just starting to handle their own lives themselves and aren't really equipped to deal with serious mental illness in a peer. We don't exactly educate people on mental illness. We do educate them on drugs and have a habit of ascribing all weird behavior in young adults to drugs.

I was a "friend" once when I was in college. Everybody said he had changed, was into drugs heavily. The thing we kinda missed was that everybody was into drugs, and nobody acted like this guy. We didn't know schizophrenia from a dump truck. We knew something was wrong but had no idea what to do. He had a bad relationship with his parents, so they weren't an option. He's dead now. Drowned several years later swimming in a river in western PA in November. Never got help. I don't know what we would have done if we had known to do something.

[maxsolomon]

36. I think we should educate kids on schizophrenia

it's going to manifest itself in young adulthood, typically. when kids are at college or in the military, or out of the nest, at least.

but you're right - it's easy to say. it was noticeable, though - but the observers didn't have the wherewithal to do anything about it.

[Davis_X_Machina]

6. This is very sad...

...early-adult onset is characteristic of a number of mental illnesses, as much as a passionate embrace of a cause.

Not an excuse, and maybe not a defense at law, but still something to ponder. I work with young people, and I've seen it slowly creep over kids, like kudzu.

[woo me with science]

20. Yup, this is typical age of onset for schizophrenia. nt

[cutlassmama]

23. Yep, classic

[kestrel91316]

9. A year before. Right about the time Sarah MANSON ordered the hits.

[Zen Democrat]

11. Does Jared Loughner have parents? Has anyone heard a thing from them?

You know, I'm pretty sick of all the false equivalency going on. Yeah, I've had enough when we know that a liberal didn't shoot President Kennedy, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr., Bobby Kennedy, Gov. George Wallace, John Lennon, or President Reagan.

(And please don't try to tell me that Oswald was a Communist -- because Oswald wasn't in that window, and he wasn't on the knoll.)

I think it IS about the guns. Liberals can say some extreme things, but they aren't influencing any "gun-nut base" - is there a group of liberal minded people who hoard firearms and threaten to use them against political opponents? Our commentators can be very passionate, but don't say "lock and load" or "reload." I'm telling you, it's the GUNS in the hands of NUTS who are whipped into a frenzy by people in the media speaking their coded language!

[FailureToCommunicate]

16. +1

[marions ghost]

18. +100

n/t

[shireen]

13. deleted, posted to wront thread. sorry

[redraider1974]

21. My brother has schizophrenia and

the last time that he had a break from reality and was hospitalized into a mental institution I vowed that I would watch him take every friggen risperidone every day from now on because he will simply NOT take his anti-psychotic medication on his own. I make him stick his tongue out after he swallows his pill so that I can see the white trail reminants of the pill that goes down his throat every day. Call that taking away his dignity or whatever but you have to do this or he will end up breaking from reality again.

[LisaL]

22. I have seen no information that the alleged shooter was diagnosed let

alone getting any type of treatment.

[Posteritatis]

28. The armchair psychologists show up for every one of these incidents

As often as not with some wonderfully sketchy baggage of their own, of course.

[YDogg]

26. Welcome to DU

Best to you and your brother.

[timo]

27. i hate having to do that

I have a daughter on them and it drives me nuts but its soooo much better than when she is in flip out mode!!

[Doctor_J]

29. He was saturated with Fox "News" and hate radio

fucking killers.

[slackmaster]

37. We don't know that he ever watched Fox or listened to radio at all

Not yet.

[Salal40]

31. Being mentally ill is not against the law

Therefore many of the mentally ill receive no mental health treatment until they become a danger to themselves and/or others. Only those who've been committed to state care can be forced to take medication, and any such over ride must be within the facilities guidelines and have a doctor's order. If the over ride is needed on a routine or somewhat regular basis then, a court order is needed in most states to continue with treatment that denies a person's constitutional rights. Effective mental health treatment of the mentally ill is often times legally refused by the ill individual: Family, friends and teachers are often ineffective in getting the person to accept treatment or convincing the legal community that forced treatment is necessary.

[Name removed]

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