Monday, August 4, 2008
Questions about the Anthrax Suspect and His Interactions with Mental Health Professionals
The allegations about the anthrax suspect and his interaction with mental health professionals raise several questions:
- Why would a top bioterror expert go to a fresh-out-of-school sociologist, a group addiction counselor, as opposed to an experience psychiatrist or psychologist? Why would he talk about homicidal tendencies in a group counseling session, as opposed to a private session?
- How could someone committed to a mental institution on the basis that he was a likely mass murderer and a danger to himself and others simply "sign himself out" of the mental institution?
- Why was a newly certified group addiction counselor who herself has a history of battery, drugs, DUIs and bankruptcies fully briefed on one of the most sensitive criminal investigations in history?
- If he really did confess to homicidal tendencies, why would mental health professionals wait 8 days after he signed himself out of the psych ward before obtaining a restraining order against him or re-committing him to the psych hospital (this guy was a top a bioweapons expert and supposedly a homicidal maniac, so he could easily murder the group counselor and others)?
It is possible that Ivins is, in fact, the anthrax killer. The FBI needs to present its full case to the public before that can be determined once and for all. But the evidence presented so far by the FBI is not very impressive.
Update: FBI agents strongly suggested to the social worker that she file court papers to obtain a restraining order against the anthrax suspect (it wasn't even her own idea).
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