Stop.
Response to State's Motion RE Neuropsychological and Psychiatric
....and changes shower curtains frequently.....
Putting a pin in that.
P. 7
Yeah, such a very specific symptom that can be used to explain why his shower curtain was missing when he went home for break.
Can't wait to hear how he couldn't have possibly murdered 4 people because of contamination issues.
1) I don't think he intended to kill 4 people when he went in
2) people with OCD are often able to overcome/deal with one of their obsessions/compulsions if they have another obsession/compulsion or desire/need that is stronger in the moment. They then just end up needing to over perform their soothing ritual that is their coping strategy for the obsession that they just had to cope with. I have two older teen/young adult children who have had OCD their entire lives, so I've seen this in action and even seen it with some of the same OCD issues AT is saying BK has.
oversimplified example of this: person with OCD has issues around contamination (for example, in regards to urine). Their phone falls in the unflushed toilet. Now, when my kids were younger, they would not have been able to get the phone out if there was no one home to help them. But by the time they were early teens, they valued their phones so much that they would grab dishwashing gloves or a pair of kitchen tongs and use that to retrieve their phones. And then they'd likely spend the next 20 minutes washing their hands after throwing away the gloves and then consult me or the internet on how to decontaminate their phone once it had dried out.
There are indeed some people with such crippling levels of contamination OCD that they would not be able to retrieve the phone if there was no one else there to help them. But people with that level of OCD about a specific thing would be noticeable to their friends and acquaintances.
Not to mention, by the time you are BK's age you have usually gained enough coping strategies from therapy that you can deal with the issue in the moment or not have as severe of an aversion (such as my young adult who had a major contamination issue regarding the dishwasher now having that issue reduced enough that he unload it when needed...he just did this five minutes ago and then went and washed his hands).
3) Contamination issues don't usually encompass ALL substances considered to be icky. When my kids had urine contamination issues, they didn't freak out if they hurt themselves and were bleeding. The dishwasher aversion kid can work
a dog walker and pick up doggy doo. It varies per person, but the definition of what is contaminating is specific to the person and is generally not all encompassing.
*sigh* If the defense team want to make these broad generalizations then they better be prepared to back it up with therapy/doctor records from his childhood/teenage time/young adult time that document the specific details and timing of his OCD symptoms....and had better be able to show that an OCD issue that was severe and present at a younger age was still that severe and unable to reduced using CBT and/or exposure therapy. I want to see records showing psych meds that help OCD.
A broad label diagnosis isn't irrefutable proof against a specific situation and time in a person's life, nor can symptoms and severity be assumed to be static.
