Judge Allows Forced Medication for Arizona Shooting Suspect

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: August 27, 2011 

Jared L. Loughner, the man accused in the shooting rampage in Tucson, kept himself awake for 50 hours straight after an appeals court stopped his forced medication. He walked in circles until he developed sores and then declined antibiotics to treat an infected foot. Already thin, he stopped eating and shed nine pounds.

U.S. Marshal's Office, via Associated Press

Jared L. Loughner

Related

• Lawyers for Defendant in Giffords Shooting Seem to Be Searching for Illness (August 17, 2011)

• Court Won’t Bar Forced Medication Of Tucson Suspect (July 24, 2011)

• Times Topics: Arizona Shooting | Jared Lee Loughner

Judge Larry Burns of Federal District Court described Mr. Loughner’s behavior in explaining his refusal to overrule prison doctors who decided to resume forced medication on July 18. The drugging, he said, “seems entirely appropriate and reasonable to me.”

The ruling came in a pretrial hearing on Friday that offered insight into Mr. Loughner’s condition at a federal prison in Springfield, Mo., where he is on suicide watch. Mr. Loughner’s lawyers had argued that a court should review whether the forced medication could resume.

Christina Pietz, a psychologist who is treating Mr. Loughner, testified by telephone that he was “less psychotic” than he had been and that she was now more concerned about depression.

She worried that videotaping her sessions with him — as Mr. Loughner’s lawyers requested — would only exacerbate his ills. She said he turned “almost defeated” and withdrawn when she broached the idea on Wednesday.

“He feels as though he has no control about what’s going on around him, and this is just one more element,” she said.

Ms. Pietz said Mr. Loughner sobs uncontrollably at times and steps aside during their meetings to cover his face.

Judge Burns reaffirmed his earlier ruling to prohibit the videotaping, even after Mr. Loughner’s lawyers agreed to limit their request. He said it would add to Mr. Loughner’s stress and impair the psychological evaluation.

Mr. Loughner has pleaded not guilty to 49 charges in the Jan. 8 shooting that killed six people and wounded 13 others, including Representative Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona, at a meet-and-greet event held by the congresswoman outside a grocery store.

Mr. Loughner has been at the Missouri prison since late May after experts determined that he suffers from schizophrenia. Judge Burns ruled him mentally unfit to stand trial.

He was forcibly medicated from June 21 to July 1 after prison doctors found that he was a danger to others. The federal Court of Appeals for the Ninth District halted the medications while it considered an appeal of Judge Burns’s decision to allow the drugs. The appeals court has scheduled a hearing in San Francisco on Tuesday.

The prison decided to resume the forced medications on July 18 after doctors found that Mr. Loughner’s condition had significantly worsened and that he was a danger to himself. Defense lawyers argued that the prison was violating the district court’s order, but the appeals court refused to step in.

Friday’s hearing was held in San Diego, where Judge Burns is based. He was appointed to the case after all federal judges in Arizona recused themselves. John Roll, the chief federal judge for Arizona, was killed in the shooting.