Effects of Paxil on man who murdered his employer

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Tue, 19 Oct 2004 18:07:11 -0400

Subject:Paxil: Effects of Paxil on man who murdered his employer

 

This article states: " Dr. Ann Blake Tracy, an advocate against

antidepressants like Prozac, Zoloft and Paxil, said there is no doubt

Kinyon's use of antidepressants were behind the events of that day.. .

 

Tracy, who has led a crusade against the antidepressants for more than

a decade, has a different view, saying SSRIs " will produce impulsive

murder and suicide. "

 

" I think that's what we had in this case, " she said. "

..

 

Paxil effects

 

Date October 18, 2004

 

Justin Hill

 

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DAILY HERALD

 

Life changed after Louis Darrell Kinyon started taking antidepressants.

 

The family members who encompassed much of his world are only a small

part of it now, and the comforts of home have been replaced by the

discomforts of the Utah County Jail.

 

Kinyon is an inmate now, awaiting his fate as prosecutors work to make

him pay -- with his life -- for what they say is his role in the

slaying of his boss earlier this year in Pleasant Grove.

 

Several years ago, Kinyon, a father of four, led a different life. He

coached baseball, basketball and any other sport his children played.

He was a Scoutmaster. His family was always with him -- they went

camping and four-wheeling.

 

" He was a family man, " said his wife, Valorie Kinyon.

 

But that life gradually began to change shortly before Kinyon's 40th

birthday, when a doctor diagnosed Kinyon with fibromyalgia, a chronic

pain illness that is sometimes accompanied by depression, and doctors

prescribed an antidepressant.

 

" At first, we noticed a big change in him, " Valorie Kinyon said. " He

was more mellow. "

 

Kinyon slept more -- his way of dealing with stress -- taking a nap at

lunch every day. He also " got more belligerent, moodier, " his wife

said. His family wouldn't know what would happen from minute to minute.

 

" You never knew what was going to happen, " she said, adding later, " I

figured Darrell was suicidal before. "

 

Kinyon stopped coaching, camping and four-wheeling.

 

Then came Monday, Feb. 2.

 

That morning, Kinyon returned to work at the Provo River Water Users

Association after serving a suspension his wife says was for his

attitude over a computer. When Kinyon came back, he was fired, his

wife said.

 

According to police, Kinyon lost his temper during a morning meeting,

knocking over a candy machine and pushing papers off desks.

 

After he was fired, management confronted Kinyon about child

pornography police say an employee discovered on Kinyon's company

computer, Valorie Kinyon said. The state has since charged Kinyon with

sexual exploitation of a minor -- a charge the defense says cannot be

substantiated.

 

Kinyon went home, two stop signs away, with his son who also worked at

the Provo River Water Users Association,Valorie Kinyon said. Shortly

thereafter, police say Kinyon returned to work with a 9 mm handgun,

shooting and killing Kent Neil Griffith before turning the gun on himself.

 

Dr. Ann Blake Tracy, an advocate against antidepressants like Prozac,

Zoloft and Paxil, said there is no doubt Kinyon's use of

antidepressants were behind the events of that day.

 

" They're fitting the pattern, " Valorie Kinyon said. " How can you say

it's not? "

 

Kinyon's defense team is preparing to argue Kinyon suffered from

extreme emotional distress caused by the use of Paxil and other drugs,

Kinyon's attorney, Rhome Zabriskie, said last month.

 

" We feel good about the direction it's going, " Zabriskie said.

 

Paxil is one of the drugs in a class of antidepressants known as

SSRIs, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, which also includes

Zoloft, Prozac and Luvox.

 

On Friday, the Food and Drug Administration sent letters to the makers

of all antidepressants, directing them to add a " black box " warning

describing the increased risk of suicidal thoughts and behavior in

children and adolescents who have been given the drugs. The warning is

the most serious in the labeling of prescription medications.

 

The FDA is also developing a Patient Medication Guide to be given to

patients who are taking the medication, advising them of the risk.

 

The letters come seven months after the FDA asked makers of those

drugs to include a warning label recommending close observation of

adults and children treated with the antidepressants for depression

and the emergence of suicidal thoughts and behavior.

 

" Now you've got the Food and Drug Administration jumping on this

bandwagon, " said Richard Southard, an attorney in New York City who

has been a commentator on Fox News Live for several high-profile cases

including the Lori Hacking murder.

 

But, lawyers, including Southard, say employing a defense based on the

use of Paxil and other SSRIs hasn't been successful on the whole.

 

" It's unsuccessful right now because there aren't enough experts

coming forward saying the link exists, " Southard said.

 

There are cases, however, where defendants were exonerated by an

involuntary intoxication defense based on the use of SSRIs -- one in

California and one in Connecticut, said Andy Vickery, a Houston

attorney who represents families of people he says have died as a

result of violence and suicide caused by Prozac, Paxil and Zoloft.

 

A number of studies indicate there is a link between SSRIs and

violence among adults, said Edward Havas, an attorney in Salt Lake

City who has handled four to six civil cases alleging that the use of

SSRIs caused an aberrant reaction in Utah patients that led to a

suicide or attempted suicide. Some people believe those studies, while

others refute the data, he said.

 

There is evidence the drugs cause a relatively small population to act

in an atypical manner, Havas said.

 

In the civil arena, Vickery obtained a $6.4 million jury verdict

against GlaxoSmithKline, the British company that makes Paxil, in a

case where a man on the drug killed his wife, daughter, granddaughter

and himself.

 

All of Havas' cases, which involved patients who were not suicidal but

became so after they were on the drug for a relatively short amount of

time, were settled, he said. The settlements are confidential.

 

However, Dr. Michael Rhodes, program director for the Utah Valley

family medicine residency at Utah Valley Regional Medical Center, said

thousands of studies have been done on SSRIs and adults, including

behavioral studies, involving tens of thousands of patients. There's

been no difference between the placebo and treatment groups in terms

of violence and suicide.

 

" Most experts agree it doesn't cause any problems, " Rhodes said. He

said he thinks the drugs are overused because " we know they're safe,

and it's an easy fix. "

 

But a definitive study on the topic has never been conducted, Rhodes

said. All the studies so far have been retrospective, and to settle

the issue definitively, someone would have to conduct a study looking

into the future with two groups -- half using the drug and half using

a placebo, he said.

 

Tracy, who has led a crusade against the antidepressants for more than

a decade, has a different view, saying SSRIs " will produce impulsive

murder and suicide. "

 

" I think that's what we had in this case, " she said.

 

Tracy, who has testified at antidepressant-related court cases and

before the FDA and congressional subcommittee members, took her

analysis of the case one step further, saying Kinyon was misdiagnosed

when his doctor told him he had fibromyalgia.

 

As Tracy read a list of symptoms of hypoglycemia, an abnormally low

level of sugar in the blood, Valorie Kinyon said her husband had many

of them and gave examples.

 

" I think he had low blood sugar, " Tracy said. " It runs in the family.

He had all the symptoms. "

 

Over a period of several years, Kinyon was prescribed many

medications, including Prozac and Paxil. At the time of the incident

at the Provo River Water Users building, Kinyon was taking Paxil as

well as another antidepressant, trazodone, and several other drugs for

other medical conditions: tramadol HCl, TOPROL-XL, Coumadin and CELEBREX.

 

The benefits of Coumadin may be reduced when patients are taking the

drug while on a trazodone treatment, according to the medical Web site

AccessMedNet. Adjustments in dosage or periodic monitoring are

recommended.

 

Kinyon's use of antidepressants also caused a lesion on his brain,

which was diagnosed in 2000, Tracy said.

 

But, while this type of medical information has been unsuccessful as

the basis of a criminal defense, Southard, the New York City attorney,

predicted that will change in the future.

 

As more people use the drugs, there's more opportunity to use the

defense, and more debate about the safety of the drugs leads to

additional studies, he said.

 

" It's an unsuccessful defense, which I predict will become more and

more successful as time goes on, " Southard said.

 

º Justin Hill can be

 

reached at 344-2548 or jhill.

 

Learn more

 

Dr. Ann Blake Tracy, an advocate against antidepressants like Prozac,

Zoloft and Paxil, is scheduled to lecture at 7 p.m. Oct. 27 at the

Total Health Institute in Lindon. For more information call 796-8114.