1983 Zoloft Report Reveals Story of Violent Reaction

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[sSRI-Research] Zoloft Report Reveals Story of Violent Reaction

 

 

Zoloft report reveals story of violent reaction

By Jason Cato The Herald

 

http://www.heraldonline.com/local/story/4350171p-4122860c.html

 

(Published December 19, 2004)

 

One patient who was prescribed Zoloft during a company sponsored clinical

trial in the 1980s was taken off the antidepressant after developing

thoughts of killing himself and others, according to a drug company

document

made public last week.

 

The document will be available to attorneys for Christopher Pittman, the

15-year-old who is charged with the November 2001 murders of his

grandparents in Chester County. Pittman's defense will center on a claim

that an adverse reaction to Zoloft caused him to become violent and

homicidal.

The document, called a drug experience report, was given to The Herald by

one of Pittman's attorneys after a California judge declared that the

document is no longer protected by secrecy laws.

 

The report was filed with the Food and Drug Administration in August

1983 by

Pfizer, the maker of Zoloft. The portion of the report that has been

available to the public for 21 years states that the patient was taken off

the drug because of treatment failure and nausea, anorexia and dysuria, or

painful urination.

 

But medical investigator Dr. Joseph Mendels provided another reason

when he

withdrew the patient from the study, according to the document.

 

The patient " began to verbalize feelings of killing other people and then

himself, " a handwritten note from Mendels states.

 

A Pfizer spokesman said the document does not prove that Zoloft caused

such

thoughts. It is simply an assessment by one doctor of one patient.

 

" This is anecdotal patient information, " said Bryant Haskins from the

company's New York office. " And this information is not relevant to this

case. "

 

Karen Barth Menzies, one of Pittman's attorneys, disagreed. She used the

document in a recent hearing in Charleston to convince Judge Daniel Pieper

to force Pfizer to make other documents available to defense lawyers. She

said these documents will prove that the company has known for years that

Zoloft can cause people to become violent.

 

" When you have people who became violent and homicidal on the drug and it

goes away when it's stopped, like happened with Christopher, then I think

it's highly relevant, " said Barth Menzies, a Los Angeles attorney who

specializes in antidepressant cases.

 

Pittman is charged with killing Joe Frank Pittman and Joy Roberts

Pittman on

Nov. 28, 2001. Police say he shot his grandparents while they were in bed

and then set their Chester County home on fire before fleeing in a family

vehicle. He was 12.

 

He had been on a five-week regimen of antidepressants, first Paxil then

Zoloft, before the killings. Doctors had diagnosed him as being mildly

depressed.

 

In addition to the drug experience report, the defense team will have at

their disposal 28 Pfizer documents discovered during civil cases unrelated

to Pittman's ordeal. The company also must search its database for other

documents related to homicide, hostility and violence, as well as turn

over

patient data from nine clinical trials performed on children, Pieper

ordered.

 

The judge will have to rule later as to whether any of these documents can

be used as evidence in the case. Until then, the records will remain

secret.

 

A California state judge ruled Monday that Pfizer's interest in keeping

secret a number of documents in a case there does not outweigh the

right of

public access to court records. Two of the documents in that case,

involving

the suicide of a teenager, are among those requested by Pittman's lawyers.

 

One of those is the 1983 report. The other is the " Zoloft Prosecutors'

Manual, " a guide for criminal prosecutors facing what the company calls a

" Zoloft defense. " Barth Menzies' firm, Baum Hedlund, is also involved

in the

California case and provided the manual to The Herald.

 

The company-created playbook spells out what such defenses must show in

order to be successful: that the drug can cause people to become

violent and

that the drug caused a specific person to become violent.

 

According to the manual, neither point can be proven because no scientific

evidence exists linking the drug to violent behavior.

 

" There is no study that provides credible scientific support to the

allegation that Zoloft can cause a person to become violent toward

others, "

it states.

 

Haskins, the company spokes-man, said all clinical analysis done on Zoloft

is public record. The drug, classified as a selective serotonin reuptake

inhibitor, was introduced on the U.S. market to treat depression in 1992.

Since then, more than 250 million prescriptions for Zoloft have been

written, Haskins said.

 

" It's been around for a long time, and there is a lot of safety data, "

Haskins said. " (But) there is no scientific information anywhere that

shows

Zoloft causes violent behavior. "

 

Barth Menzies said the drug company's own documents will more than prove

that is not true.

" We believe they show Pfizer itself is very aware that Zoloft can cause

violent behavior, " she said. " There are numerous reports of people taking

Zoloft and becoming homicidal and that it was drug related. "

 

As for convincing a jury that Zoloft caused Pittman specifically to become

homicidal, Barth Menzies said that will come down to a battle of the

experts.

 

The trial is scheduled to begin Jan. 31 in Charleston. Judge Pieper is

mulling a defense motion to send the case back to juvenile court. If

Pittman

is found guilty as an adult, he faces a sentence of up to life in prison.

 

Pittman is still being held in a Columbia detention center, although the

judge set his bond at $175,000 on Thursday.

 

Jason Cato . 329-4071

jcato

 

2004 The Herald, Rock Hill, South Carolina