Friday, April 20, 2007

Virginia Tech Killer Was Autistic.

According to his aunt, he was diagnosed in 1992 when they arrived in the US.

CNN had it on their site originally - that’s where I got the original link - but they removed the word “autism” in a paragraph near the bottom and replaced it with “mentally ill”.....

Someone sent me this screen shot of CNN’s home page where they mentioned the autism under a photo - click on the photo to see the full scan…

The article is here in this Korean newspaper, here, and also here.

Well....there is no documentation available (yet) to confirm this.  But I just knew something was going on.  I can smell ‘em a mile away. The monotone, the speech, and what his roommate said last night on HardBlah about the social issues and eye contact - all those things plus his obsession and lack of ability to pick up on social cues with the young women he supposedly stalked....and of course, there were other issues outside of the autism - it wasn’t the autism that made him kill those students.

This whole thing is just so incredibly sad.

AutismLink put out this statement.... Now, they obviously got the info from CNN.  That was the first place the story was posted, and where I got the link to the story above.  And I could understand it if it were MSNBC - because I could understand the Wrights maybe trying to keep it quiet.  But CNN????  Why else would AutismLink post a statement?  Duh??  The Mirror’s post was from Today…

Note: (Update) Here is the statement from Autism Speaks. ABC has an article up and so does FoxNews.com. we’re wise to them all now - and I made a screen shot of their sites, so if they disappear, please tell me and I’ll post them.

Here’s part of AutismLink’s statement....

“While the entire autism community in Pittsburgh and across the nation are devastated by the recent events at Virginia Tech, we would like to
caution the public not to stigmatize children or individuals with autism.  Cho likely did not receive the help and support that he needed early on—that is why early intervention is so important, and that is why places like the Autism Center of Pittsburgh exist. The act of one individual should not reflect upon the entire autistic population.

It is unfair to blame Cho’s actions on autism when he was clearly psychologically impaired and likely had another disorder in addition to his autism. His psychological evaluations apparently revealed a dark history that concluded that he was an imminent danger to himself and others and was also depressed.

This is a wake up call that stresses the importance of early intervention, research, and appropriate treatment strategies. Many strides have been made in autism spectrum disorders and research has consistently shown that when children receive the help that they need early on they are more likely to become more adept at social and communication skills.

Autism affects 1 in 150 children and is now the most commonly diagnosed developmental disability in the world. It is time to recognize autism for the epidemic it is.”

(Update: I realize this post was originally longer with extended text....I just decided that it didn’t work as well, so I put it in the one previous to this.)

Posted by Moi ;) at 12:25 AM | Link
in Autism/SpecialEd