Milford, CT School Sued for Student’s Mental Health Treatment Prior to Murder

According to the Newtown Patch, a recently filed lawsuit, regarding the stabbing of Maren Sanchez alleges that “Maren reported to the high school guidance department her concern that Christopher Plaskon was emotionally disturbed and was threatening to commit suicide or acts of serious self-harm by cutting himself with a knife, and that she believed it was important for high school personnel to help Plaskon, then 16, to prevent him from engaging in potentially violent conduct dangerous to himself or to others.”

With the ever-increasing number of school shootings across the nation, one must wonder if this lawsuit may be the tipping point for a national discussion on schools involvement in arbitrarily identifying students with alleged psychiatric disorders and recommending mental health “treatments,” known to be associated with an increased risks of suicide and violence?

The National Association of School Psychology, NASP, is responsible for the information that is supplied to the school psychologists that function within the school and evaluates and identifies students for eligibility for special education.  A common factor in all mass shootings and stabbings committed by students is the failure of the school system or institution to release the mental health records of the perpetrator.

The mental health records, which would reveal whether psychiatric drugs were involved during the incident, more than the choice of weapon, is the critical information needed to identify contributing factors that may help to eliminate this massive public health crisis.  Without the information contained within the mental health records, the public, as well as our lawmakers, cannot write effective legislation to protect students, families, as well as all consumers.

Is the NASP a monopoly with strong conflicts of interests that relies on privacy to shield their role in the increased risks of violence and suicide plaguing our education system?

According to the NASP services listed below, and their claim regarding the school psychologists’ unique qualifier, this lawsuit provides the public with a unique opportunity to initiate a conversation about how much power this association is given and the risks it creates for our children. After all, even NASP knows there is no known abnormality in the brain that is any alleged psychiatric disorder, making these diagnoses suspect.

Nevertheless, the NASP writes, “School psychologists are uniquely qualified members of school teams that support students’ ability to learn and teachers’ ability to teach. They apply expertise in mental health, learning, and behavior, to help children and youth succeed academically, socially, behaviorally, and emotionally.”   So, the NASP basically does it all.

Data collection and analysis
Assessment
Progress monitoring
School-wide practices to promote learning
Resilience and risk factors
Consultation and collaboration
Academic/learning interventions
Mental health interventions
Behavioral interventions
Instructional support
Prevention and intervention services
Special education services
Crisis preparedness, response, and recovery
Family-school-community collaboration
Diversity in development and learning
Research and program evaluation
Professional ethics, school law, and systems”

Is this safe? After all, it is near impossible to eliminate their involvement with a student who attends the public education system.  The NASP political influence on lawmaking only grows stronger each year.  A student has a very difficult time to refuse psychiatric evaluations and still receive special education help and is not provided informed consent on the subjective nature of their assessment tools – basically opinions of behavior.

The Milford Lawsuit is interesting in that the family seems to have chosen the right target – the school’s involvement with the perpetrator’s mental health treatment.

The State missed this opportunity in the Sandy Hook mass murder to investigate the link between mental health “treatment” and the mass shooting and to hold those treating Lanza accountable. In fact, the State used the killings to push for more mental health “treatment,” based on no evidence that Adam Lanza lacked access to school-based or community-based mental health services or that those services were not the best that money could buy. The mental health billing records, autopsy, and toxicology of Adam Lanza were never released to the public, despite AbleChild vs. Chief Medical Examiner Freedom of Information request.