Suicide by Cop – The Ultimate “Trap”

Louise C. Pyers, M.S. 

Staff Member, PPSC

 Article published in the July/August, 2001 issue of the FBI National Academy Associates Magazine, Volume 3, No. 4

 http://www.theppsc.org/Staff_Views/Pyers/suicide_by_cop.htm

Suicidal individuals, in their desperation to escape their emotional pain, will use a variety of instruments such as guns, ropes, pills, knives, etc… to fulfill their suicidal wish.  In some cases, the "instrument" is an unsuspecting law enforcement officer.

According to recent studies, police-assisted suicide or "suicide by cop" occurs in 10-15% of officer-involved shootings. Studies by Dr. Karl Harris, former Deputy Medical Examiner of Los Angeles County, Richard Brian Parent of Simon Fraser University and Dr. H. Range Huston of Harvard University School of Medicine show similar results.

Click on link to read the entire article ~~

Suicide Rate Linked to High Unemployment

A new study finds a strong relationship between a nation’s unemployment rate and the percentage of its citizens who take their own lives. But surprisingly, the link can be either positive or negative, depending upon the wealth of the individual country.

By Tom Jacobs http://www.miller-mccune.com/blogs/news-blog/suicide-rate-linked-to-high-unemployment-3688/

A QUIET INJURY: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

Posted on January 10, 2012 by pgwalt3212

Most people have heard of PTSD.  This is a common response to an event like being in a battle in Iraq, being shot by a criminal, being raped or surviving a serious car accident.    For many people these types of events begin an extended period of pain and require a lot of recovery.   PTSD can take months, years or decades to subside and can lead to innumerable of problems with relationships, careers, marriages, alcohol abuse and life.

What many people do not know is that the Vietnam Veterans Memorial basically evolved due to PTSD.  I was in Vietnam as a teen ager with the Army.  I saw some combat and tragic deaths there from accidents , including an explosion in 1970 that killed a dozen of my fellow soldiers who were unloading a truck filled with ammunition.  I was troubled by many memories of my year there.

After the military I went to college and began to investigate what was then not quite accepted as a disorder.   I did some research independently and testified before the Senate on the subject in 1977.  My research found elevated rates of divorce and other signs of mal adjustment among veterans with heavy exposure to combat.  I wrote an article on the subject for the Washington Post and a journal known as Military Medicine.

The House and Senate ultimately developed the Vet Centers to reach out to veterans struggling with psychological injuries.  Veterans of Vietnam were the primary users.  Yet veterans of World War II and Korea also took part.  Today the Vet Centers are helping vets especially from Iraq and Afghanistan
I had an interesting idea  –  suppose there was a memorial on the Mall in Washington DC engraved with the names of those who perished in the Vietnam War?   Would this help those suffering from PTSD? Would the survivors guilt felt by many be helped by seeing the names honored there?

In 1979 the idea became more than that.  I took two weeks off of work and developed the idea working day and night .   I came upon some thoughts  from college-  writings of Carl Jung, a student of Sigmund Freud.  Jung theorized that Collective Psychological States exist among communities, schools and nations.  My theory developed further.  There were profound societal impacts from that divisive era.
Just as the veterans needed healing, so too did the nation.   The Memorial, I hoped, would do something to help both.

I began the effort in 1979.  I will spare you from reading a long and boring story of how the Wall  got completed in only three years.  Many people helped.    But this Blog is about PTSD. PTSD usually begins by observing or being a victim of violence.   PTSD occurs when certain symptoms, such as reliving the event, loss of sleep, hyper-vigiliance, last for over a month.   Soldiers, journalists, police officers and convenience store clerks are among those who come into contact with traumatic events.    Yet this can happen to anyone.  I know someone who had to defend himself and mortally wounded , legally I should add,  his attacker.  Most people do not recover from this sort of thing quickly.  These types of events come out of nowhere and can many times take a toll on our lives.  Think about the students who survived the carnage of Virginia Tech.  All were experiencing a normal day of college when a mad man brought about chaos.

Many  thousands  of soldiers are now returning who have witnessed graphic and bloody scenes with  civilians and/ or US soldiers killed by terrorist bombs or other causes.  Many have taken lives in combat and struggle with the memories.   War is gruesome.  Experiencing horrific scenes leaves an indelible mark on the psyche.   Some are debilitated by the trauma that did not have the same impact on other soldiers who saw the same thing.  The science of the mind is not as scientific as we might like it to be.  There is much that those in the area need to know about the causes.  Yet there is plenty known about ways to aid recovery.
Veterans of Vietnam and, more recently, Iraq, have taken their own lives from events flowing from PTSD.  And many of these people could have been saved by seeking help.

Whatever the causes, there is good treatment available from civilian and government mental health professionals.   Some of the best research done on PTSD is by the National Institute for Mental Health.  I like this poem by Veterans Administration psychiatrist Mary Rorro.  She treats many veterans with PTSD. She also encourages them to do what she does. Mary enjoys playing musical instruments.

Clean Slate
Years not long a story untold all that remains is a name etched in stone
My fallen brother you answered the call
If only I could erase your name from this wall

Written by c. Mary C. Rorro
November 2010

If you know someone who seems to be experiencing PTSD please encourage them to get help.  There is plenty available.  And get them to do something like learn to play the guitar.  That is my advice!
To learn more about the Education Center at The Wall and to help us build it, go to: http://www.buildthecenter.org/
By Jan Craig Scruggs, M. Ed and Esq.

Occupy - Do something with your life.

Occupy - Do something with your life....... watch the video and read the words..... for they are reflections of what life is, what it can be if you take the time out of your busy schedule to enjoy those things you enjoy and the persons you love... I got this video from someone on facebook and I don't know the owner but just in case I infringed on their copyrights. I apologize and hope that the spirit it is shown is the same spirit that was intended for all of us to be happy and content with what we have accomplished, where we have been and where we are going!!!!!!!

Glory Hell Part 2

Living in one of the richest lands on this Earth, we take for granted our wealth and wellness and are often tempted to separate ourselves from the poor and despaired. It appears the rich are uplifted above those seeking hope and aspiring better things in life. Looking down upon their bad eminence of life, they flaunt their success and untaught greed to those working the labors of the land and making ends meet with sweat and toil and sometimes even blood. The poor, proud but unable to reach the stars in the sky appear to be lost in the darkness. Evading the crime and the pain of the treacherous Earth, they use their proud imaginations to reach beyond their economical and social boundaries to grasp upon the straws of hope and triumph to attain a better social life for themselves as well as their family.

Satan, sitting high on the throne of evildoers with immortal vigor in wealth and exaltation of life in the darkness, invites those who want to be successful to join his legion of dark angels and fight for his cause to overcome the words and principles of God. He is strong and eager to destroy the emotions of hope and quickly attempts to inflict despair or horror to those who resist or refuse his ways. Daily, in his struggle to conquer Heaven, he trusts his demons to do their jobs and thrust themselves out there in society to spread the word of evil and corruption so that each and every person they contact will know the magnificent words of the Devil and seek an alliance with these evildoers to attain the promises they so desperately sought in the name of wealth and power abandoning their own morality.

Fighting this feeling constantly, people on Earth must make a choice between good and evil. They must decline the feelings of envy and covet no one’s possessions or persons and work hard to follow the parables written to protect those faithful to the Lord and willing to include dignity and respect within their parameters of success and higher places. They must condemn the evil promises to be part of the greatest share on Earth and acknowledge that strife and hard work will be needed to attain their success in life. They must know to follow what is good and not evil and expose the Devil’s work and stand against Satan’s aim to conquer both body and souls for his quest of dominance and power while working hard to regain control of the Heavens.


Already claiming Hell as his dominance he will continue to fight the good with an ambitious mind and allow men to covet more and more to satisfy his hunger for greed and power. He will make wars and break up unions of relationships that are harmonious and created on the makings of Earthly possessions and glorious emotions created by love, happiness and faith. Surely, he will not stop until his claim to Heaven is attained and firmly in his grasp with the help of those who are willing to fight and die for his cause. He knows the resistance is futile if he can get a foot inside the door that opens up the path of evilness and corrupt thinking and abandons the parables written for men to follow the words of God and his prophets and angels.

Satan will debate and assure us his way is the best way. His influence will promise success and wealth in both materialistic matters and financial gains. Equal in strength in many ways, he can stand up to the best of the angels as his demons fight the fight to give him Heaven and not care whatever the cost is for such a victory. These wars between angels and demons will surely take a toll. Millions will stand to lose if the good loses the war and the demons take over their spirits. One cannot sit there idle and watch this battle for a spectator’s view for the outcome will surely impact them personally each and every time an angel falls.

Fighting for the Lord should not make one a fugitive of the war or the moral matters at stake here. One must resist the demons and fight them off with every ounce of strength they have to prevent going to the flaming Hell and lose their entrance into Heaven’s gate. Choosing love and compassion over hate and torture, the spirits of this darkness must avoid choosing the evil and fight Hell’s flames and fury with all the vigor and force they may possess. Turning their backs on evil and seeking the good will create a noise that will be heard around the Earth as others will decide and choose which direction to follow their hearts and soul to survive this madness on Earth and this endless war between good and evil.

Whether they live in a darkened den of shame or the glorious halls of light, the struggle will bear many losses and many winners. The internal thunder and lightening will meet this challenge with the good prevailing over the evil and turning our hearts to the Lord and his son, Jesus Christ. Following the word of God, one will sit comfortable among His angels and be free of torment and pain and sorrow forever. The price to pay for suffering a mortal’s life is the ultimate glory of avoiding Hell’s Glory and living among the upright wings of angels in Heaven and facing no foe or evil forever.
The darkened and black smoke and fire is filled with horror and wickedness. Satan’s invention of torment and deception is at its best as he forces men to re-think the quality of life and the wellness of attaining their goals through the good or evil paths designed with strange fire and steep grades to conquer. Men’s fear to fall asleep and follow the devil is real. It is difficult to fight an enemy that can penetrate the mind and seek comfort inside the mind of good persons who will awaken with questions and fears on their minds giving the Devil the satisfaction that he can conquer their spirit if his attack upon them is proper and without adversity of the good and upright thinking related to the parables of the Bible and the words of decency. Inflicting mixed feelings of confusing flight from the light and seeking the comfort of the darkness, he draws men upon a compulsion to do something that will sink their moral to a new low and give them the stamina to continue their plight downward until they reach the pits of Hell down deep inside the Earth.

Therefore, when one awakens each morning and opens up their eyes towards the light, one must know of the evildoer’s determination of destruction and will to destroy what is good and avoid the Devil’s wrath by being a good disciple of the Lord and his followers. They must understand the workings of pain and not dwell on the matter so to sink a lower deeper woe that abandons their ability to climb back into the arms of justice and hope. It is imperative that men control their anger and seek better ways to avoid provoking violence or pain on others. It is said that once you submit your attempts to conquer the spirit of others you will abolish your temptations and expire your wants to covet others wealth and power. You will sustain in life with sufficient happiness and survive the very substance of eternal being with those who have been faithful and divine in their quest for eternal life and happiness. Thus one must behave with grace and be humane to other persons.

Men must be fair persons and provide dignity to others as they would want to be dignified themselves. Treating persons with perpetual love and kindness will result in high exploits and better reasons to exist. Resisting vice and accomplishing nobler deeds will return your heart to a state of persuasions that resists war and the killing of peers as well as opponents in the dark. Standing in front of love and leaving hate behind will open up a whole new world where men can coexist in peace and harmony forever.

Glory in Hell

Man’s disobedience of the scriptures and parables written in the Holy Bible has resulted in many mortals speculating the end of the world and the existence of Heaven and Hell. The century old arguments that Hell was created after the Garden of Eden was lost and tainted leading men to conjecture that once Eve took that first bite in the apple, the fruit of life, Hell was created by the Serpent or Satan and all his followers. A person can only assume that such a place as Hell is a withdrawing of all that is pure and godly. One can also assume that between Heaven and Earth , the good go to Heaven and the evil go to Hell. Thus the battle lines are drawn and the battle between pure and vile are predictably utterly ugly and violent capturing bodies and spirits between those who follow God and those who have revolted from believing in God.

Sadly we are all aware of God’s tolerance for allowing Satan to test mankind including his own son, Jesus Christ. Through the growth of both men and time, the whole subject of Hell and the presence of Satan has drawn mankind into taking sides in believing or not believing the gospel as it is taught and what the truth really is between Heaven and Hell.

Hell has been called a place of chaos many times as its darkness is both cursed and filthy that astonishes all who arrive there and seek comfort among Satan’s fallen angels and soldiers. Certainly not a good place to be except for those who embraced Satan, it can be called a place where fallen angels talk and plot about Satan’s plan to take over Heaven and regaining his status among the elite before cast away and excommunicated from the Heavens of Earth . Using this ideology of good versus evil and that Hell is the place where such ideas and contemptuous behavior originates, we must have faith in the Creation those who follow Him and chose not to follow the Devil. Thus even today, Satan comforts his legion of followers of dreams and promises of regaining Heaven and ultimately be the supreme power among mankind contradicting the creation of paradise and all its promises.

The strategy for regaining Heaven is complicated and consists of elements of deception and willful lies that can fool even the best along with speeches or words that are designed to allow others to believe that in order to win, chaos must be created to distort the truth and allow the infernal minded within the circle of power to sit there in judgment of others and take the necessary action required to make the evil plan work. Promises of hope and change leads the chorus with assurances that offer many relief of responsibilities and dutiful performance as the regulations and traditions are cast into the water and new rules of order are created to make the plan work.

The first element of the plan is the temptation to break the golden rule that will break off deliberate death of goodness and deliver evil to mankind from all different regions of the Earth. Thus the first disobedience of the forbidden tree is exemplified with the loss of other moral values and decency among men. This same ideology is applied to every fiber of our society as we lose Eden and then the world to Satan if he gets his way.

Creating confusion and chaos within the Garden of Eve demonstrated the power of the Serpent or Satan and goes on further in history to destroy much that is good and tainted forever to become evil. This first attack of righteousness and decency was the beginning of choosing between Satan and the chosen Seed. This chaos and confusion is followed by more temptation and invoke promises of aid to those who are poor and seeking shelter. Spreading out his mighty wings he promises his heart is true and pure as he bows before the very persons whom he wishes to convert into faithful disciples and spread his evil words.

Pulling out all the stops of a darkened but fiery Hell he seduces them into more temptation and allows them to revolt without restraint as he stirs up the people with envy and revenge that are symbolic of the Serpent and contrary to the wishes of the Creator. Some good men will fight back in vain attempts to bring back the truth but as the masses begin to dwell down there in the bottomless spaces of perdition the combustion and creation of hate and ambition overrides many mortals thus leaving the good in the dust and burned by the wicked fire. Engulfed in flames this dismal situation escalates into world chaos as more and more join the fray to rebel and seek other orders of living prophesized and promised by holy men disguised as men of integrity and honesty but in reality, representatives of Satan and his ambition to regain Heaven.

Thus the world turns to torture and Hell like violence as the wrath of hate is spread among those once godly and believers in the gospel and Holy Bible. As a great furnace, Satan will burn bridges of morality and subject mankind to lasting pain and sorrow. He will make all situations dismal and hopeless as many witness the fall of the mortals and the rise of the evildoers within this place called Earth and Hell. Peace will turn into war with pretense of goodness and the protection of civilization. Regions will sorrow and light will become darkness. Dungeons will be filled with shades of abuse and torture as a huge deluge of detestation will fall upon those faithful to God and those parables spoken in the goodness of the Creator.

The rebellious will be successful and victory will be theirs as they set foot upon every continent destroying its very moral fiber. In utter darkness they will remove hope and replace it with sorrow as the winds destroy habitation and the Earth will swell with fire. Fearful of many, there is a sea of silence that absolves itself from the causes of crime and destruction. Grass will turn into dust and hazards will exist within the very homes of many as chapels and temples will fall to assassinations and detonations by those who follow the Serpent and its entire wrath. These fallen angels will encourage and trumpet through united thoughts and evil counsel the very words that dispel hope and charity for mankind.

Anguish and doubt and fear and sorrow and pain will dominate mankind until this war is over. One must choose between the good and evil and suffer the consequences for choices made with or without the wisdom provided by God and his enemy Satan.

Christmas 2011 - Never Forgetting –Where you came from!

Economic times are tough and people are struggling to make it through these hard times. Jobs are scarce and the paycheck keeps shrinking as it doesn’t buy as much as it used to when the dollar was worth more than it is today. The rate of inflation and the feelings of depression have taken a toll on us and we are about to abandon everything we have worked for, fought for or lived for just to survive this rigorous lifestyle we have chosen to be better and to have more than ever before.

Realistically, we all have at one time in our life, exceeded our ability to live within our means and moved out of our old neighborhood into a new neighborhood that was taxing and draining our financial ability to sustain life as we want it to be rather than what we need it to be. We all have forgotten some of the most vital things in life in order to compete with the Joneses and to get away from where we were once in our existence and arrived at a final destination that is so stressful, frustrating and full of anxiety we sometimes think we are losing control of our lives competing with others for success.

Surely we must all agree that none of us are suffering from amnesia as we try to forget or have already forgotten where we came from. We have forgotten the basic things in life that got us through the hard times and developed into a new class of creature that forgets to shop frugally, conserve the use of electricity and water and gas to keep the utility bills down and lived in a house that was just the right size for you and the family without the designed extra space or bedrooms filled with materialistic things rather than people in your own family.

We have tasted the success and believe today that success comes naturally. We have forgotten that it took hard work to get there and the help of many to keep the ball rolling towards that successful point in life. You realize that there were no shortcuts and you lived by principle; the principle that gave you power and energy when you had good days and also bad days. You traveled the road to excellence and wealth in a car that ran good enough to get you there and back but without fancy wheels, turbocharged engine or DVD to watch along the way. Some of us carpooled to conserve the gas and others took the bus but today, we see two or three cars parked in the driveways and wonder how in the world they can sustain such burden when others are making it without these luxurious items or delights.

In the words of Albert Pike, “Above all things let us never forget that mankind constitutes one great brotherhood; all born to encounter suffering and sorrow, and therefore bound to sympathize with each other” it is time to recognize that there are ways we can contribute to society’s forgotten by sharing the wealth a little and express your gratitude for your success through thinking of those less fortunate and give back some of what you earned and share it so that you can enjoy the highest appreciation in the world and that is to live the words you so greatly expressed during those times you were struggling and finally making it to the point in your life where you feel successful and gratified for your own accomplishments that began with a dream somewhere in a smaller more conservative setting and igniting your dreams to come true. It is said that “we forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget” and in order to have a “bright future, you can’t forget your past.”