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Dr. Drew

Santa Barbara Rampage

Aired May 27, 2014 - 21:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. DREW PINSKY, HLN HOST: This is my message to everybody out there, if you have mental illness -- when people start exhibiting signs of profound mental health breakdowns online, we need to be able to identify it and do something about it.

Here`s where I stand: do the treatment, because once if you don`t, if you reject treatment, don`t embrace treatment, don`t follow through, whatever it might be, the outcomes can be really disastrous, and then God help you.

The most common question we got on Twitter was, why didn`t you step in?

Something I`ve been chanting that kind of incredible disconnection from other people having any value.

We call it psychopathy or severe sociopathy.

(voice-over): Tonight, we talk about mental illness all the time on the show, and I am tired of sounding the alarm.

We all must do something about this and we must do something now.

Another seven people died this weekend. Every member of my behavior bureau is standing by with ideas for solutions.

Let`s get started.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: Good evening. Samantha Schacher is my co-host.

We have coming up every member of my behavior bureau standing by, listening to our discussion, all five will be with us throughout the show. You will be able to get information about this tragedy, we are going to make sense of it in a way you will not hear anywhere else, and I promise you, I`ll give you my thoughts, as well.

SAMANTHA SCHACHER, CO-HOST: Yes. And we also have an exclusive with a man who knew him. The things he told me, quite alarming.

PINSKY: The whole thing is alarming and disturbing.

SCHACHER: Enough`s enough.

PINSKY: I am -- OK, I`m tired of this, but I`m going to be patient. Let`s work our way through this. It is a very upsetting story.

Six people murdered by a young man who himself died in the carnage. By the way, anyone that says that this guy should have been treated differently or maybe forced to take meds -- how much worse could the outcome have been for this kid or his parents or his family or for the families of this community?

Now, we have a picture of a disturbed individual determined to kill attractive women and happy young males. That`s right, what`s what he zeroed in on.

It is bizarre, it is illness, and he posted these videos on social media beginning last month. They`ve been removed from YouTube, but we got ahold of them. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ELLIOT RODGER, ALLEGED KILLER: From the day of retribution, I am going to enter the hottest sorority house of UCSB, and I will slaughter every single spoiled, stuck-up blonde (EXPLETIVE DELETED).

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This chilling video shows Elliot Rodger, the 22- year-old Santa Barbara college student, that police say killed six and injured 13.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He looked directly at me, talked to me, then shot at me multiple times.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Elliot Rodger stabbed to death three men in his apartment, then drove to a sorority house and opened fire. Two women died outside there.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mentally disturbed 22 year old angry at the world because apparently he couldn`t get a date.

RODGER: Tomorrow is the day of retribution -- the day in which I will have my revenge.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A plan Rodger outlined in a 137-page manifesto.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Rodger writes, he was frustrated because she was short, upset over his parents` divorce, and because he was not successful with women.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I will kill them all and make them suffer, just as they have made me suffer. It is only fair.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PINSKY: OK, guys, you can judge when you see stuff like this. When we go out on social media and we are members of the social media community, you see something like that, you can make a judgment. This is a post modern world that needs to end, when we look at things and go, oh, whatever you`re into -- nonsense.

To discuss this with me, Michelle Fields, correspondent for PJ Media. Evy Pompouras, former special agent with the Secret Service. Danine Manette, criminal investigator, author of "Ultimate Betrayal."

Michelle, I`ll have you talk first. What do you make of all this?

MICHELLE FIELDS, PJ MEDIA: Look, I think he`s someone who felt incredibly entitled. He thought that he was entitled to women, that he was entitled to wealth, and that he deserved it, and he felt that there was an injustice and he was going to go out and get that justice, whether it`s killing whoever he can, that`s what he wanted.

But I do think the cops dropped the ball. His mother called the cops a while ago when she saw some of these videos. The cops went to his apartment, and they just talked to him, he seems fine and they left. I think they dropped the ball in that situation.

SCHACHER: Michelle, I`m so happy you said that -- because you just mentioned social media, Dr. Drew, I think his YouTube video was sufficient enough evidence to get these police officers to go, wow, let`s search his apartment. They would have found guns. They would have found ammo. They would have found all of these disturbing writings, then he would have been arrested, placed under a 5150, and perhaps this wouldn`t have happened.

PINSKY: Danine, I think you would have agreed with that, yes?

DANINE MANETTE, CRIMINAL INVESTIGATOR: No.

PINSKY: No?

MANETTE: I disagree completely.

No. Listen, this is how I feel about this situation. I think this is not so much a mental health and not so much a gun control issue as I do a parenting issue. If you`re concerned about your kid enough to call the police, then you need to get in your car and get over and see what`s going on with your kid.

I don`t understand why his mother called the police and didn`t bother to go over there at that time.

(CROSSTALK)

PINSKY: She did. She was on her way as she was dialing 911. The fact is, why do you take a kid who`s delusional and send him to college without the proper psychiatric care and when it`s given to him, mandate it`s followed through with? That`s the part I have a problem --

MANETTE: That was her apartment. It was in her name. She could have gone in there and dug through whatever she wanted to.

PINSKY: Of course, yes, Danine, I agree.

MANETTE: She didn`t go for a month later, Dr. Drew, a month later.

(CROSSTALK)

PINSKY: I want to show you a rant. You`re right, Danine. I`m going to show you a rant on YouTube, watch this, and, Evy, you`re going to give me a reaction.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RODGER: I`m 22 years old and I`ve never had a girlfriend. I`m still a virgin. I`ve never had the pleasure of having sex with a girl, sleeping with a girl, kissing a girl. I`ve never even held a girl`s hand. Hell, I don`t even have a young girl`s phone number in my cell phone.

That`s just such an injustice, because I`m so magnificent. I deserve girls.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: Go ahead, Evy.

EVY POMPOURAS, FORMER SECRET SERVICE AGENT: OK. So, there`s a lot of factors here. The one thing that screams out to me when I hear this is narcissistic personality disorder.

PINSKY: Absolutely, 100 percent.

POMPOURAS: There`s a lot of criteria here where you`re hearing, he has a sense of entitlement, almost like I deserve this, I am this, why don`t I get that, he objectifies women as things to accumulate, right, and he`s almost like, well, if I can`t have this, I deserve this -- well, then you`re going to all feel my wrath.

So, that`s one of the many layers we`re dealing with --

PINSKY: Let me read you from his manifesto, which I read last night. I had to slog through 140-some odd pages of his life since the age of 3. It got to this point where he says, quote, "I am Elliot Rodger, magnificent, glorious, supreme, eminent, divine. I am the closest thing there is to a living god."

Evy, if that is not a delusional personality disorder, I don`t know what is, and the envy that comes when he is frustrated is what resulted in the violence, would you agree?

POMPOURAS: Absolutely, I 100 percent agree with you. That`s what this is.

This is an internal issue he has. Women just happen to be the object that he used to release his aggression. It`s about power, authority. That`s how a lot much predators react, or when you have that type of criminal behavior.

I want to feel superior. Everything around me is making me feel inferior, I have no control. So I want control back. What a better way to get control back than to exude this type of power over other people, taking somebody`s life. That`s the ultimate sense of playing god and taking that power back.

PINSKY: Danine, you`re reacting strongly to this.

MANETTE: Yes, I am. Because it`s so interesting to me that this kid has delusions of grandeur one side and an inferiority complex on another.

PINSKY: That`s how narcissism works.

No, Danine, that`s how it works. It`s a reaction. It`s a polarity. They feel small and inferior. And, by the way, people that knew him went out of their way to be nice to this kid and he was the problem. That`s the part he couldn`t see.

MANETTE: He thought he deserved everything, but he didn`t want to work for a job, didn`t want to put himself out there to meet people. You read the whole thing just like I did, he didn`t want to make the effort to do anything. He just felt he deserved it.

PINSKY: Well, he was impaired and he didn`t understand that part. And it wasn`t taking the help he needed to improve.

Michelle, I`ll give you last thoughts.

FIELDS: But going back to his parents -- I mean, his parents, obviously, knew the situation here, that their son was very sick. Why would they send him two and a half hours away --

PINSKY: That is the question.

FIELDS: -- knowing that he is sick and that`s putting other people`s lives in danger.

PINSKY: And how much worse could it be for this kid? This kid is in misery. He is suffering. He is not getting what he needs. Why not? That`s the big question here. Why didn`t somebody step in and give this kid what he need?

If you look past the outrageous statements, the delusions, it`s a sad story. It`s a really sad story for this kid. Why wasn`t he intervened upon in a way that was therapeutic for him as opposed to requiring him to be a normal kid, which he was not? He was not.

And somebody wasn`t accepting that. It might have been him. It might have been, because we live in a world people don`t have to accept treatment. We`ll get into that and more, bring in the behavior bureau and one of Elliot Rodger`s friends. He`s here with me.

We are back after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RODGER: Tomorrow is the day of retribution, the day in which I will have my revenge against humanity.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: One of the saddest, saddest moments on social media.

I`m back with Sam.

We`re talking about Elliot Rodger, the 22-year-old college student, stabbed three men in his apartment, shot and killed two women at the sorority house, 13 others injured, used his car, used knives, used guns.

And, Sam, that last comment I made before the break, I noticed you really reacted to that.

SCHACHER: Yes, your speech, you humanized him. I know people don`t want to hear that. I mean, I immediately saw him as this monster for killing these people, but for you to say he wasn`t normal, trying to fit in a world that wanted him to be normal, it got me emotional.

PINSKY: It`s a sad story, but it doesn`t make it any less outrageous or doesn`t --

SCHACHER: Doesn`t excuse it.

PINSKY: Doesn`t excuse it.

Let`s bring in the behavior bureau. Got Erica America, Z100 Radio personality, psychotherapist, Judy Ho, clinical psychologist and Wendy Walsh, psychologist, author of "The 30-Day Love Detox."

I remind everybody we have brought together all of our professionals all through the night tonight, we are going to make sense to the extent it can be made sense of, and I warn people, a lot of it can`t be made sense of, but we`re going to help understand what happened at UCSB.

On the phone, I have Lenny Shaw, he knew Elliot Rodger.

Lenny, I`m going to talk to you first.

LENNY SHAW, KNEW ELLIOT RODGER (via telephone): OK.

PINSKY: Did he discuss this with you, this feeling of being rejected by women and his intense desire to have social contact?

SHAW: Oh, yes. I saw Elliot, met Elliot about maybe seven or eight times, maybe at the most 10 times. Yes, that was a nearly constant refrain of his.

PINSKY: Now, my understanding is he complained about not having social interaction, yet the evidence of this in his calendar is that he was busy all day in social interactions and other kids tried to reach out to him and he was the one being rejecting.

Did you see that sort of thing?

SHAW: Well, he was -- you immediately see how awkward he was in just about any situation and how shy he was and how he was kind of afraid to mix in.

Now, let me just quickly add, he didn`t talk about his unusual -- to put it mildly -- feelings about women, to just about anyone. Our mutual friends had indicated that I was cool and so, he felt free to express his wilder fantasies.

PINSKY: Did you ever try to get him to mental health professionals, ever want to report him to police?

SHAW: It was not -- I didn`t feel that I knew him well enough, did not know his family at all, our mutual friends were people about his age I met. These were former students of mine who are now adults.

PINSKY: Were they concerned about him?

SHAW: Oh, they were always concerned about him.

PINSKY: Lenny, my understanding is when you heard this happened at Isla Vista, you knew immediately it was him.

SHAW: Oh, yes, yes, I knew immediately it was him. Yes.

PINSKY: Go ahead, Sam.

SCHACHER: Yes. Lenny, so, this guy that we see in his manifesto, he seems very confident, but we hear people describe him as awkward and shy. Was he a combination of both, was he the guy that you saw in the video, or did you see a different version of Elliot?

SHAW: Well, he was both of those things, but he was also -- I did see him on more than one occasion actually with tears in his eyes. I`m not trying to humanize him. He was still crying -- wasn`t out and out crying, but his eyes were moist. He was still talking about, you know, about his - - about himself, and he was still feeling sorry for himself, but he did show some emotion.

He wasn`t always the person that you -- that scary person that you see particularly in that final video.

PINSKY: Thanks, Lenny.

He may not have been without emotion, but he was without empathy. At least towards the ends here.

Judy, you`re nodding at that.

JUDY HO, PSYCHOLOGIST: I am, and I`m thinking back to the last block where we talked about the fact this narcissism is part of his profile. But where does it come from and how does it play into the fact he wanted to commit a mass murder, and this is where the research shows us interesting things, because people who tend to go and shoot up schools and movie theaters are people who are single, young, white males, who tend to come from affluent families.

And these types of people are more likely to take their personal pain out on the entire world thinking that the world owes them something, whereas when you look at all the other social demographics -- people can be violent, but tend to just aggress on intimate partners and family members.

PINSKY: They`re trying -- the violence is part of their survival mechanism, not as part of some sense of entitlement.

I want to read you more from the manifesto. And, Erica, I`m going to have you react to this, quote, "Because of all the injustices, whatever they might be perceived as such, I went through and the world view I developed because of them, I must be destined for greatness, to change the world, shape it into an image," not any image, but image that suits him.

Go ahead.

ERICA AMERICA, Z100: Yes, I think that`s delusions of grandeur and delusions of persecution, for women as a whole. That`s why he wanted to take it out on all of them. This was absolutely not just Asperger`s. I think it`s really not good for him to be going around, if that`s what it was, something much more severe.

I looked -- I went into my DSM, I looked at everything. In my opinion, I think it`s either a form of schizophrenia with delusions or psychotic mania with delusions as well, mixed with antisocial personality disorder or schizophrenia with antisocial behavior because the fact that he didn`t have remorse, could talk about annihilating people, and killing them with no sense of -- it was really a perfect storm of many things. There`s many people with Asperger`s and people who are virgins until they are 22 --

PINSKY: I`m bringing an Asperger`s expert in a few minutes and we`re going to talk about what Asperger`s --

AMERICA: I don`t think that`s what it is.

PINSKY: I agree with you. You`ve put together an interesting diagnostic profile for him. It includes narcissistic rigidity that often, all those things have, that you mentioned there.

Wendy, I wonder if you agree with what Erica said.

WENDY WALSH, PSYCHOLOGIST: I agree with a lot of what she says. I want to make the point because there are reports he had an early diagnosis of Asperger`s, that, in fact, may have negated any chance for other diagnoses because, obviously, he had many overlapping diagnoses. We`re all a snowflake.

But as soon as his behavior pattern, his speech pattern, his social patterns, were a little on one side of normal, they said, oh, he`s just an aspy. So, it made them dismiss other signs.

PINSKY: I hope not.

AMERICA: Just because someone --

PINSKY: Go ahead, Erica.

AMERICA: No, just because someone has Asperger`s disorder and has trouble with interactions and has focused hobbies, because I know a bunch of people like this, doesn`t mean they are going to become the next serial killer.

HO: Certainly that part, Erica, did not help with his relationships with women and others.

AMERICA: Definitely.

HO: I don`t know if I see the delusional part, though.

PINSKY: Delusions of grandeur. Not disconnected from reality completely, but delusions of grandeur.

AMERICA: He`s still smart.

PINSKY: We`ll argue on a thought disorder spectrum or personality disorder spectrum and that`s for other places than here.

But, Sam --

SCHACHER: Yes, what about his motivation for fame?

(CROSSTALK)

PINSKY: Hold on.

SCHACHER: OK.

PINSKY: I got something to say. This kid took -- he had a disconnect, emptiness, he was trying to solve a problem he couldn`t solve and the things our society offered him was everything toxic, everything that works against actually filling and feeling good about one`s self. We need other people, we need intimacy with other people to be happy, to feel good about ourself.

And this kid couldn`t understand he had a deficit there and instead went to the lottery. He was preoccupied with winning millions of dollar, he went to "the secret," the power of positive thinking, and extremely primitive toxic philosophy that has nothing to do with a mature outlook on life, just wish it so and it becomes so. He went to video games, he went to violent movies, he went to pornography -- all the things that can make him only sicker.

Now, we`re going to bring in next a man who is mentioned in Elliot Rodger`s manifesto, he`s here.

And we`re back after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FAMILY FRIEND: The child was diagnosed at an earlier age of being a highly functional Asperger`s syndrome child.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It had been implied over the years he suffered from Asperger`s but there was no official diagnosis.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Asperger`s is a whole other kind of developmental disorder, and I`m not saying he doesn`t have that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This isn`t Asperger`s. This is a selfish life choice of somebody who wants attention, who may or may not have a psychiatric condition.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PINSKY: Back with Sam and the behavior bureau, Evy, Judy and Wendy.

And the most tweeted about story of the day, of course, is this.

SCHACHER: And a lot of reaction on twitter actually right now, too, Dr. Drew.

PINSKY: On Twitter? Twitter`s on fire?

SCHACHER: Yes, it is on fire.

PINSKY: Well, keep sending it. We`re reading it. Sam`s monitoring it.

And as you saw in that tape, people are doubting the clinical explanation. We`re saying there is a clinical explanation for what troubled Elliot Rodger.

Now, Asperger`s syndrome has been floated. It`s a form of autism. It was floated as a possible diagnosis. We discussed it in the last block as something we are unconvinced he had.

Wendy, you have personal experience with this.

WALSH: That`s right. I have a 10-year-old daughter who`s been diagnosed with high functioning Asperger`s and the research I`ve done on the developmental disorder is that it is no way connected to aggression. That`s its own separate bailiwick of stuff.

So I think the fact he may have another personality disorder might have been missed, but the real news you can use, Dr. Drew, is what can people do when they see these YouTube videos, when they see these tweets, besides calling 911, how -- I hate to blame the parents because, you know, we do two things with parents.

PINSKY: We got another victim.

WALSH: One is don`t give them any power once the kid`s 18, first of all.

PINSKY: Yes.

WALSH: So, I hate to blame any parents. This was an adult who was on his own.

And secondly, the best they can do is order a 72-hour lockdown.

Now, the police went to his house, interviewed him, here are the police doing their best to prevent crime, but they are not the thought police. They don`t know how to tell if he`s going to commit a crime. They interview him for 15 minutes, and go he`s probably OK.

PINSKY: That`s -- first, before we get into that topic, I do intend to have that conversation, but first I want to put the autism issue to rest. So, I brought in an expert.

Her name is Elizabeth Laugeson. She`s an autism expert and assistant clinical professor here at UCLA.

Dr. Laugeson, please tell us what you think about this issue as it pertains to Asperger`s in this case.

DR. ELIZABETH LAUGESON, UCLA (via telephone): You know, as you discussed, Dr. Drew, Asperger`s, which is a high functioning form of autism, it is a diagnosis characterized as difficulty with social communication and developing and maintaining meaningful relationships with people, but it`s not characterized by aggressive behavior.

Now, that`s not to say people with Asperger`s don`t engage in violent behavior, it`s just not part of the diagnosis.

PINSKY: And you mentioned, I read somewhere where you said there`s a bullying component. You had two different ways you can look at their social interaction. Describe that to us.

LAUGESON: Well, without knowing the complete background of this young man`s mental history, if you listen to his YouTube videos or you read his manifesto, you get the strong sense that this is a person who feels extremely rejected by women and by his peers.

But what`s interesting is that when you hear firsthand accounts from people who actually knew him and interacted with him, they describe a person who didn`t speak unless spoken to, who was seen as quiet and withdrawn. He didn`t appear interested in the people around him.

Now, he was certainly isolated. He was socially isolated, but he seems to have chosen to isolate himself, yet at the same time, he was very angry about this isolation and seemed to feel as though it was forced upon him. When in reality, he actually may have been forcing this upon himself. This might have been of his own making.

PINSKY: Absolutely. I believe -- that`s the point he -- that`s his blind spot, that it was about him, not about other people.

Now, do you feel that could have been treated?

LAUGESON: I do believe that could be treated.

PINSKY: Me too.

LAUGESON: I think that he had to be willing.

PINSKY: Or he had to be leveraged into it.

I`m going to let you go, Dr. Laugeson. Hopefully, we`ll have you back to discuss this, because I want to get into that issue with my panel.

Judy, what about the people around him leveraging? He was given medication. He was sent to therapy, didn`t do it. Why not using -- take the BMW away, take the sunglasses away, take the apartment away, tons of leverage for this kid, none of it used.

HO: Absolutely, and this is a situation where he has actually managed to manipulate his family and hold them at a standstill. I see this all the time in my practice, Dr. Drew, where parents are afraid to put the consequences on because they are afraid of the meltdowns, afraid the child is going to go to pieces and it`s not true. If you put --

PINSKY: Or afraid of affecting the relationship with the child, which is the most ridiculous thing. That`s not being a parent.

Evy, what do you say?

POMPOURAS: I tend to agree with a lot of it. I agree with the fact that he was looking externally at everything around him as being the problem. He never once looked internally at himself.

When you hear his manifesto, when you hear his videos, he talked about how everybody else is at a fault but never once looks internally.

PINSKY: Well --

(CROSSTALK)

POMPOURAS: -- should be put -- hang on, I do think some of the onus should be put on the parents. Again, we don`t know all of it, but they should have had a much more active role in his -- you know, what was going on with him.

The other thing I noticed is, again, to just be careful, but he grew up in this environment with Hollywood, fame, his father was in an industry where all these external things, money, cars, women, everything made you popular and that`s what he needed.

So, I also tend to wonder what kind of values were instilled in him to think these were the things he needed to have to fulfill himself.

PINSKY: Well taken. Wendy, the very nature of somebody insisting that it`s the world that`s the problem and is not themselves is, in its nature, what we call a personality disorder.

WALSH: It is a personality disorder, but even within the frame of Asperger`s syndrome, this lack of insight is very, very common, and this idea that like the bad mother, the environment is doing things to them, but the key is, early interventions. Yes, at the age of 22, there`s not a whole lot the parents can do except take away the BMW, but with my daughter, for instance, we were up at UCLA by the age of 6 doing social skills training. So, she uses different visual cues to tell when, you know, she learns to use facial expressions. She learns how when she can move in to a game to play, and she`s done so well that she`s totally mainstreamed.

PINSKY: Well, that`s the important thing, they can be effectively treated.

SCHACHER: Right.

PINSKY: Sam.

SCHACHER: And yeah. I want your take on some several posts that we found. I have them right here about his frustration, of course, over women, but that had really disturbing overtones of racism. So, for example, on bodybuilding.com, he insulted an Indian guy with a hot blonde girl in his car, on his -- and then, also on a different forum, a phony pick-up technique forum, he wrote about seeing a black guy, quote, chilling with four hot white girls and then he said that this made him rage induced.

PINSKY: He was raged, because -- not because of the racism. There`s misogyny and racism throughout. That`s the nature of hate. Hate has to go somewhere, and he`s -- what he`s ultimately angry with is that they are happy and in relationships. It`s envy. Envy is the most destructive emotion a human can have because it goes to, I must aggress and destroy those that have in its worst form and that`s what this kid had. Of course, the hatred then spews through misogyny, and racism, and classism, it just goes every which way. It`s all hate and envy. I did not get to the phone call of, I mean, Lucky Radley (ph) who is mentioned in the manifesto, I`m bringing him back. I got to take a break. We`re also going to talk about how should mental issues be addressed by the police, by the doctors, by the families. We`ll get our panel together to discuss some of that and more.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: Any capable psychiatrist or physician evaluating this man would have known this is a guy probably shouldn`t have a gun, but we have no resource, because we`re so (inaudible), we can`t judge anymore. The individual rights supersede everybody else`s.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What information about someone`s mental health are we willing to allow law enforcement agencies to have?

DR. JODI GOLD, ADOLESCENT & YOUNG ADULT PSYCHIATRIST: It was appropriate for the cops to come and assess the (inaudible) risk. I think at that point you needed a mental health professional.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My kid died because nobody responded to what occurred at Sandy Hook. Why wasn`t something done?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: I love that man. And I think we all need to listen to him and we need to take it to heart! I`m back with Sam. We are gathering together our professionals to talk about the mass killing at Santa Barbara Friday night. When`s the next one, will there be another one, or we`re going to listen to that poor father who`s lost his son and do something this time or are we gonna let another one come and go? Danine is still with us. Joining us, Segun Oduolowu, social commentator, Anahita Sedaghatfar, form Anahita live.com, Segun, I`ll hear for you first.

SEGUN ODUOLOWU, SOCIAL COMMENTATOR: Well, Dr. Drew, I agree with you on that gentleman, who is talking about the loss of his kid. Finally, someone feels enough rage, especially outrage, that nothing was done, but what I think, and you know America has this love of guns and we don`t want to get into gun, you know, gun laws or whatever, what I will say is mental health, if you are diagnosed as bipolar, schizophrenic, I don`t have a problem with your records being public knowledge. We make sex offenders register in neighbourhoods. A mentally patient or a mentally ill person off his medication is as dangerous as a rabid dog off its leash.

PINSKY: We have an attorney shaking her head. But Anahita, Anahita, privacy -- I`ll qualify it even, maybe bad for your health. How much worse could the outcome be for this kid? The privacy killed him.

ANAHITA SEDAGHATFAR, ANAHITA LIVE.COM: Dr. Drew, I don`t think it would have made a damn bit of difference in this case, because, Segun, is right with one thing he said, and that this is not a gun issue. He was a mentally ill individual who was hell bent on killing people, on going on a rampage. He stabbed three of his victims, Dr. Drew. So, we can discuss the gun debate, the poor man that was speaking who lost his son, I understand his pain, but the issue should be on mental health. There is something that is severely failing in our society the way we`re dealing with mental health issues. This man.

(CROSSTALK)

ODUOLOWU: I agree. Anahita, I don`t think you understand -- I don`t think you understand his pain.

SEDAGHATFAR: I understand, Segun.

ODUOLOWU: The loss of a child.

(CROSSTALK)

SEDAGHATFAR: I can never understand the loss of a child, but this is not a gun issue! Segun, he is going to kill people.

ODUOLOWU: I know. I agree, but the lack of privacy, I still think mentally ill patients should have to register when they are diagnosed.

PINSKY: How about doctors should have the power to report it to people and talk about it and be a little more open. So, we don`t stigmatize the illness so much.

SEDAGHATFAR: How do you do that, Dr. Drew, because here`s the thing, is every doctor or therapist going to report everyone that comes in even if it`s one visit, two visits, are you going to want to discourage people from coming in and seeing you when they feel they need to speak to a therapist? It`s impractical.

SCHACHER: Hold on, Segun, I agree you.

PINSKY: Hold on. Sam.

SCHACHER: When somebody is diagnosed with a mental illness, there needs to be something that pops up in their background check when they are trying to get a license for a gun because no red flags popped up for him, because he never had a criminal record. Elliot never had been treated or institutionalized, so there needs to be reform of guns. There needs to be reform for mental health.

SEDAGHATFAR: Where`s the line drawn, Dr. Drew? The patient.

(CROSSTALK)

PINSKY: I`ve got a great idea, how about at the point at which a mental health professional decides you have a potentially, even remotely potentially dangerous behavioural problem, you don`t get to enrol in school unless you followed up and followed through on your mental health with a written report from your psychiatrist saying you are free and clear and they are following up, and every you three months, you file a new report, just they are doing fine, they`re doing what they are supposed to do. And if they are not, guess what, you don`t get to be in this institution. You don`t get to be a part of our community.

ODUOLOWU: Absolutely, Dr. Drew.

SEDAGHATFAR: That`s a school issue. I agree when it comes to the school issue, Dr. Drew, but when it comes to reporting individuals that may have even the slightest mental illness, not only is that impractical, but you do have to balance an individual right to.

(CROSSTALK)

PINSKY: Hold on, everybody. Everybody quiet, poor, Danine, has been sitting there quietly. Danine, I believe you wanted to go back to something, Wendy, have said. Maybe you have more you want to talk about after this conversation.

DANINE MANETTE, CRIMINAL INVESTIGATOR: And I do believe there are too many guns in this country, but this is not a gun issue, and I do want to go back to a tweet you showed in the (inaudible) and Wendy`s comments about the parents. I know he was an adult. I`m not saying that the parents can control him, I`m just saying that we keep saying see something, say something. As a parent or a family member, you are closer to that individual than any of the rest of us, than the police, than his roommates, than anybody. You know when something`s going on with that person. You know when they are acting strange. The police should have showed up with the mother right there. He looked at the police and he gave them a story and they believed it. The mother would have seen right through that if she had been standing there with them. As a parent, they need to be.

(CROSSTALK)

PINSKY: I totally agree with you, Danine, even if it`s parents of an adult child. I`ll add two things with that.

MANETTE: They know their kid better than I know them.

PINSKY: We have new tools. We have social media. Social media, that`s material that the cops should use as fact, as fact, as part of their investigation, number one, and number two, do not forget that parents can - - we have examples of parents having the courage to get up and gets conservatorship, we have Britney Spears family. We have Amanda Bynes family, those women are well today, because they`re metal ill -- they lacked the insight to understand they needed the treatment, their family stepped in, they got it, and guess what, their lives were enhanced by it. Their lives are better, because those parents cared enough to risk the relationship and listened to the professionals in this. Anahita, are you OK with that?

SEDAGHATFAR: I`m OK with that. I`m OK with the conservative -- yeah, I`m totally OK with that and I agree with you. The thing I`m not OK with, though, is I think we go down a very dangerous, slippery slope when we start requiring people to be reported any time that any therapist or doctor thinks they have.

(CROSSTALK)

ODUOLOWU: We didn`t say that, Anahita, that`s not fair. We said paranoid, schizophrenic, bipolar.

PINSKY: I don`t like even using the diagnostic labels. I`m just saying, let`s trust the judgment of a mental health professional or doctor who says there`s a possibility of trouble here and that should be enough for real serious attention that brought to bare, maybe the cops have some added sort of protocol they go through, not more paperwork, not more bureaucratic structure, just more judgment. A little judgement for the people or more power in the people who have the judgment to push things through the direction that`s good for the people we`re trying to protect, the patient and the community. We`re back with more after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The deputies contacted him directly at his residence and they determined that he did not meet the criteria for an involuntary mental health hold. He was, as I said, courteous, and polite. He appeared timid and shy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: I`m back with Sam, bringing back Janine, Michelle -- Danine, rather, Segun, and Evy. And yes of course, he was not holdable, as they say, a 72-hour hold, but he was talking about killing people in diatribes online, maybe motivate you to go look through his (inaudible), but whose crack the door open and look at his car. Evy, you wanted to add something about this, go ahead.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yeah. I know there`s been a lot of talk as far as law enforcement of what they could have done, what they didn`t do. So, again, I`m a little bit concerned in some way how they handled the case. Again, you have limited information. They went to the house to do this welfare check. Now, they could have asked for consent. I did some research and it looks like they never asked him, hey, do you mind if we come in and take a look around. In that regard, I do think they dropped the ball. You should always ask for that, doesn`t hurt. Let him say no. You can`t do.

PINSKY: By the way, delusional guy says no, and you go back to the family, they might go, hey, you better get in there then.

EVY POUMPOURAS, ON-AIR SECURITY AND INVESTIGATIVE ANALYST: Right. And then you can get a search warrant, whatever. Now, with the one thing as far as the Youtube video, it`s my understanding the law enforcement did not know about that. Nobody at that time articulated to them that these Youtube.

(CROSSTALK)

SCHACHER: Parents should have been. This alarming of a video, how did the parents not tell the police? The POLICE would have seen that video and then hopefully searched the apartment.

POUMPOURAS: Correct, correct.

PINSKY: Here`s one thing we all learned, if somebody is in trouble, look online. Look in their social media. See if there are signs there. Police should be doing that, as well as family and friends. In this manifesto, this 150-page thing, he talked about seeing porn for the first time in an internet cafe when he was 13 and said, quote, the site was shocking, traumatizing, and arousing, all these feelings mixed together took a great toll on me. I walked home and cried by myself for a bit. I feel too guilty about what I saw to talk to my parents about it. Again, it`s porn, it`s a secret, it`s the lottery, it`s all the things that really are not well in our society. Michelle and this kid is being affected by all that.

FIELDS: Well, I think this all has to go back to the parents. I mean, yes, the police dropped the ball on this, but where were the parents, when the parents saw this video, why didn`t they go rush to the house and see what`s going on with my kid, what are they doing? What are they up to, looking through the Facebook accounts, I mean, that`s what a parent does with their child when they are worried about them. It seems these parents just sort of checked out, sent them to the doctors, said, hey, get on some pills, and that`s it, we`re done.

PINSKY: You`re responding, as well, to this.

MANETTE: I am. And you know, I hate to beat a dead horse, but his mother, the apartment was in her name, this was her apartment, she`s the one that could have given consent for the search. They don`t even need his consent. It`s her apartment. So -- and he had a good relationship with his mother, so there`s no excuse for them not having more open communication. See, he reached out.

PINSKY: I see, Segun, having a reaction, but I`m tight on time. Here`s what I want to do, keep the panel together, gonna take a break. Sam, you`re going to tell us about a hash tag that`s trending on Twitter, when we get back. We`re gonna continue the conversation. Reminder, you can find us any time on Instagram @drdrewhln. Reminder, we have a special guest tomorrow night, another person who was inside this case, and we also have the gentleman who was mentioned in the manifesto back on the phone, hopefully he`ll be there after the break. Be right back. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LENNY SHAW, KNEW SANTA BARBARA KILLER: Our mutual friends were people about his age I met. These were former students of mine, who are now adults.

PINSKY: Were they concerned about him?

SHAW: They were always concerned about him.

PINSKY: And, Lenny, in my understanding is that when you heard this happened at Isla Vista, you knew immediately it was him.

SHAW: Yes, yes, I knew immediately it was him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: Scary, back with Sam, Erica, Judy, Anahita, Evy. And Sam, there`s a hash tag trending on Twitter, tell us about it.

SCHACHER: Yeah. Yes to all woman, very powerful hash tag that was initially created in response to Elliot Rodger`s misogynistic views, and this is for women to have a voice, to talk about being either being abused, or raped, or just feeling inferior, and some of them not even feeling comfortable talking about what happened to them, but now that they can and it is trending all over Twitter.

PINSKY: But let`s remind ourselves, misogyny was a symptom of what this guy have, not a cause, but a reasonable opportunity to have -- to elevate the conversation on misogyny. We`ve definitely is pervasive in our society. I want to bring in Lucky Radley, whose childhood friend of Elliot Rodger`s, and was named in the manifesto, first as an elementary school friend, who became the object of jealousy, then 15 pages later, he got to 7th grade, and then he became the object of hatred by Elliot because girls liked this kid, Lucky. First -- now, Lucky, when you first heard you were mentioned in the manifesto, what was your reaction?

LUCKY RADLEY, NAMED IN MANIFESTO KNEW KILLER: Man, I was shocked. I didn`t know what to think. I read it about 20 times, over and over, and just that excerpt. I was just confused, shocked, and.

PINSKY: Lucky, what are your memories of this kid?

RADLEY: I just remember a kid that was quiet, didn`t say much, and he was a smaller kid, but he was just -- he didn`t say anything, actually. He was really -- he didn`t say anything. He would reply really with head nods and, you know, one-word answers like yes or no, but really light voice. He really didn`t say anything.

PINSKY: Judy -- thank you, Lucky. Judy, I want to get at the fact that poor lucky had to read about what he did in third grade, and seventh grade. Again, that`s part of this extreme narcissism that this guy lays out a manifesto about his childhood, where every moment is of humongous significant to the world because it`s him.

JUDY HO, PH.D.: That`s right, Dr. Drew. And he has an informational bias in terms of the fact that he processes information that confirms these hypotheses about how people are trying to wrong him, and now people are difficult with him, and he remembers them, etches it in his memory for years and decades at a time and we certainly see this with people with similar profiles as Elliot.

PINSKY: Sam.

SCHACHER: Lucky -- is lucky still on the phone?

PINSKY: Lucky, you still there?

RADLEY: Yeah.

PINSKY: You have less than a minute.

SCHACHER: OK. Did you get to know his parents at all? Did you know what his family structure was like?

RADLEY: Yeah, I met his dad once or twice. He wasn`t really -- he was just there, but his mom was extremely nice. She was very outgoing and she was an awesome person. She was the one that kind of got us engaged. She would go out of her way to try to get her -- try to get Elliot to talk to people. That`s kind of how she got me to come over to her house so many times.

PINSKY: But ultimately -- listen, this is not saying that she`s a bad person, but it`s denial that has us as parents, all of us to some extent, we don`t want to see anything, any defects in our children, but when we have a child with mental illness and you want to insist they live a normal life, that can go badly. That can just go badly. Be right back after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PINSKY: Thank you Erica, Judy, Anahita, Evy, and all our guests for helping make sense of this terrible tragedy. DVR us right now, then you can share this conversation and help prevent this from happening. Forensic Files is next.

END