“Marilou Danley, the woman investigators hoped would provide key details into the motive behind her boyfriend’s deadly shooting attack, said she remembers [spree killer Stephen Paddock] exhibiting symptoms such as lying in bed and moaning.” nbcnews.com also reports “She said he would lie in bed, just moaning and screaming, ‘Oh, my God.'” Strange that NBC hasn’t shared the relevant revelation from The Las Vegas Journal that . . .
Paddock was prescribed diazepam in June; as he had been the previous year. The Journal says . . .
Paddock purchased the drug — its brand name is Valium — without insurance at a Walgreens store in Reno on the same day it was prescribed. He was supposed to take one pill a day.
Diazepam is a sedative-hypnotic drug in the class of drugs known as benzodiazepines, which studies have shown can trigger aggressive behavior. Chronic use or abuse of sedatives such as diazepam can also trigger psychotic experiences, according to drugabuse.com.
I’m not sure how someone experiencing psychotic episodes could have planned the Mandalay Bay spree killing. That said, while correlation doesn’t equal causation, there’s no doubt that plenty of mass killers were on benzodiazepines.
And this not the first time observers have pointed to a connection between psychiatric drugs and suicides, homicides and mass murder. The question is, did the medication somehow trigger Stephen Paddock’s murderous frenzy or did it prevent him from carrying it out sooner?