DRUGS FOR UNRULY KIDS ATTACKED

A parade of experts appeared before a group of legislators
Tuesday to point accusatory fingers at psychotropic medications, such
as Ritalin and Luvox, claiming a connection between the drugs and an
epidemic of school shootings.

Tuesday's hearing coincides with a drive before the state Board of
Education to pass a resolution forbidding schools from making parents
put disruptive children on Ritalin. The board will hear additional
testimony today and is expected to vote on the resolution Thursday.

Several speakers Tuesday hinted at a sinister alliance of
pharmaceutical companies and health professionals to prescribe the
drugs for unruly school kids. Some said attention deficit/hyperactivity
disorder, for which the drugs often are prescribed, was an illness
made up by the psychiatric profession.

Countering the well-orchestrated blitz of out-of-town experts were
local mental health advocates who said much of the information was
skewed and out of context.

Children and Adults with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, or
CHADD, is planning a Nov. 17 news conference in Washington, D.C., to
present scientific information supporting the medical diagnosis of
Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, a spokesman for the group
said.

The group of legislators that met Tuesday, chaired by Rep. Penn
Pfiffner, RLakewood, has no power to pass or recommend
legislation.

The group met to explore a possible link between the drugs and school
violence because suicidal Columbine killer Eric Harris had been on
Luvox, and schoolyard killers elsewhere supposedly took similar
medications. Leading off at the hearing was Bruce Wiseman of
California, national president of the Citizens Commission on Human
Rights, which he said is a watchdog group.

Pfiffner confirmed that the commission is linked to the Church of
Scientology.

Wiseman called medicating children "one of the most dangerous and
insidious'' issues facing the nation and blamed increased violence on
giving 5 million children "mind-altering drugs'' for "a mental
disorder that has no basis in fact.''

The drugs, Wiseman said, make students more violent, cause suicide and
create "kid killers.''

Wiseman said such drugs were linked to killings, including the May
1997 murder of a 7-year-old girl in a Las Vegas casino restroom by
Jeremy Strohmeyer, and school killings in Pearl, Miss., West Paducah,
Ky., Jonesboro, Ark., and Springfield, Ore.

Dr. Peter Breggin, an M.D. and psychiatrist, flew in from London to
testify that Ritalin reduces difficult behavior for about five or six
weeks but there's "no evidence that Ritalin improves long-term behavior.''

Breggin said he had obtained data that showed Harris was taking Luvox,
which he said has a "cocaine-like effect'' that can cause violent behavior.

Breggin said the "scietific evidence is irrefutable'' that Luvox
causes "psychotic mania'' in about 4 percent of the young people who
take it.

On the other side, Dr. Marshall Thomas, associate professor of
psychiatry at the University of Colorado Medical School, speaking on
behalf of the Colorado Behavioral Health Care, told Pfiffner he was
concerned about violence in children but hoped the committee's inquiry
would be balanced and "not politicized.''

The quality of some information presented, Thomas said, was "somewhat
suspect, . . . not balanced'' and the "presentations were very skewed.''

Thomas said sometimes a child diagnosed as depressed is really
suffering from bipolar disorder and treating the depression "brings
out the manic side.'' The medications, he noted, don't create the
manic behavior.

During questioning by Sen. Jim Congrove, R-Arvada, Thomas said that
although one Columbine killer was on Luvox, "the other (Dylan Klebold)
wasn't. Why was the other one involved?''

"You don't know that he wasn't,'' Congrove said.

But Jefferson County sheriff's spokesman Steve Davis told The Denver
Post, "As far as I know, Klebold had no drugs in him. I'm very sure of
that. I never heard anything about him being prescribed anything.''

The national center for Children and Adults with
Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity
Disorder, based in Landover, Md., sent a letter last week to the
Colorado Board of Education.

The letter expresses the agency's "outrage'' and "strong opposition''
to any proposal that would ban the use of psychotropic drugs among
public school students.

The center estimates 3 percent to 5 percent of the student population
nationwide has been diagnosed with some form of attention
deficit/hyperactivity disorder.

"Medication should not be precluded'' as a form of treatment, said
Stephen Spector, director of government relations for Children and
Adults with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. But other forms
of intervention should also be used, he said.

Evan Dreyer contributed to this report.