Jared Loughner update - tales of a crazed psychotic torture victim

It has been almost a year since Jared Loughner's murderous rampage in Tucson. A collage of his insane internet writings has been posted here, http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/2011/12/23/20111223jared-loughner-lonely-world-before-attack.html, which allows some glimpse into his descent into homicidal madness.

An even better look into his madness is found in an article published a few weeks ago, recounting his experiences in prison since his arrest (http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/2011/11/16/20111116loughner-life-in-prison-details.html). The details are quite horrific.

Honestly, I am not even sure what is the point of bringing him to sanity. So he can face trial to be condemned to the death sentence?

I mean, really, this man was caught red-handed in the act of gunning down a crowd. What is the possible point of a trial? And even if they could bring him to complete sanity, that would only cause him more suffering, as he would realize the import of what he has done. No doubt this already contributes to his swings of mania and depression.

Meanwhile, his continued life is literal torture. Here is a man who was wracked with paranoid fantasies of being controlled and manipulated by the government, back when he was a free man! Now, he really IS being controlled and manipulated by the government, and his every waking moment is nightmarish.

Wouldn't the most compassionate thing be to end his suffering sooner rather than later? I get the feeling this whole "slowly grinding wheels of justice" thing is just a full-employment scam for lawyers.

Chilling tales of misery follow:

On July 1, cut off from medication, Loughner entered the darkest chapter of his confinement. He got "significantly worse," Pietz testifed. His pacing got out of control. He went in circles up to 14 hours one day. "He paced so much that he created a blister on his foot," Pietz said. "The blister became infected. The infection actually moved up his leg." Loughner resisted treatment.

At one point in early July, he stayed awake for 50 hours straight. On one night, staff found him sitting on the concrete floor with his knees tucked into his chest. He spun in circles on his buttocks for two hours. Pietz explained in court that when Loughner paces, "he's obsessing, ruminating about the events in his life, what he believes his life is going to be."

Around this time, he used a plastic spork, a tined spoon, to fling his feces on his bed. He stopped eating normally and dropped 5 pounds in one day. Prison staff took urine samples to gauge his nutrition. "During this time he was sobbing uncontrollably," Pietz said. "He was telling staff he wanted to die."

Judge Burns read the weekly clinical reports and later, in a telephone hearing, noted the severity of the decline. "He was up for many hours at time, 50 hours at a time, pacing, walking in circles for hours, yelling, screaming, crying, rocking back and forth in the shower," Burns told lawyers, according to transcripts.

By July 18, Loughner had deteriorated so much that the clinical team decided to give him emergency forced medication without a court order because he was an imminent danger to himself. Since July 18, Lougher has gradually improved with treatment and a regimen of five drugs. But he still shows disturbed behavior, and doctors say he has a long way to go.

Improvement has been bumpy. On Aug. 26, Pietz told Burns, "Currently any time I interview him he paces back and forth. He's rocking back and forth. There are many times he will sob uncontrollably."

A month later, Loughner's defense team argued the medications were making him more depressed. Pietz testified "he's very depressed," so much so that when she gave him books and puzzles, he couldn't focus on them. "He has clearly said he wants to commit suicide. He has written a note indicating (so) to his father," she said.

At that time he called his father, and the prison's special investigative services team, which monitors phone calls, became concerned enough to call Pietz and tell her "you need to listen" to them. "He wanted to see (his father) one last time, then he would kill himself," Pietz testified. Loughner even complained there was nothing in his cell that he could use for the act. Later they found another suicide note.

His delusions and hallucinations abated but didn't disappear. On Sept. 4 staff found Loughner standing in the middle of his cell, talking as if somebody else were there. He kept repeating, "Stop, stop, stop." Eleven days later, Loughner told one of Pietz's colleagues he was having conversations with imaginary friends.

Ballenger says Loughner is between 20 and 40 percent better. Both Pietz and Ballenger have said that Loughner stands a good chance of returning to mental competency. Regardless, he will need treatment for the rest of his life, Pietz testified in late September.

Pietz also testified that another encouraging sign was how Loughner was now discussing the Safeway footage. In the fall he agreed for the first time to watch it with her. "Yes, and I'll draw you a picture of it so you'll understand it," he told her.

She told Judge Burns that her treatment plan involves viewing a tape described by investigators as grisly and asking Loughner what was different between the images and what happened. His reaction could determine how firm a grip he has on reality, one important factor in whether the therapists think he can be mentally competent to stand trial, Ballenger says.

There are other signs that he is grasping real events. Already, Loughner has softened from his courtroom outburst in May, when he was heard to say of Giffords: "Thank you for the free kill. She died right in front of me."

"He now believes that she is alive," Pietz testified in late September. "He's less obsessed with that. He understands that he's murdered people. He talks about that. He talks about how remorseful he is for that. He understands the implications of what he did and the impact of what he did."