A ticking bomb

Fetal alcohol legacy: mayhem and murder

FAS called common on death row

VOICES

"What really surprised us was that the people with the higher IQs actually have more problems. Sometimes they look normal, so they don't fit into any of the traditional categories. They sometimes aren't diagnosed easily, and people call them lazy. They get into a lot of trouble."
_{- Pam Phipps, research manager of Fetal Alcohol and Drug Unit at the University of Washington, which has followed hundreds of people with FAS and FAE for as long as 25 years.}

"These kids hit adolescence and begin to have conduct problems. They may become oppositional or defiant. They're treated differently by teachers, parents and police. We need to educate the police and other professionals on how they need to be handled."
_{- Kris Kaemingk , clinical neuropsychologist who works with children with FAS and FAE.}

"As a child I lived in an apartment building in Poland. The apartment building's concierge lived in the basement with his two children. You couldn't play with them. They'd grab toys and throw them. They would throw my doll against a wall and break the furniture in my doll house. I would get pushed around. They had horrible tempers and were out of control. When I saw the article in the paper in the early '70s about FAS and saw the faces of victims, I thought, 'This is them.'"
_{- Dr. Anna Binkiewicz, University Medical Center pediatrician.}

FAS and FAE sufferers 'consciously do the wrong thing'

Alcohol-related brain damage prevents some from forming well-developed consciences.

John Eastlack's grin at his murder trial may have been indicative of his fetal alcohol syndrome.

For some who start life drunk, the only future is a prison cell.
Among the problems associated with fetal alcohol syndrome, the most costly may be the impact on the criminal justice system.
Seventy-five percent of men with fetal alcohol effects get in trouble with the law, as do 55 percent of men with FAS, according to a study released last year.
For women, the rates are nearly as high.
For some, the crime is shoplifting.
For others, it is murder.
In what appears to be the first ruling of its kind, the death sentence of convicted Tucson killer John Patrick Eastlack was reversed by a Tucson judge this year, based in part on Eastlack's FAS. Eastlack, whose FAS wasn't diagnosed until this spring, will spend the rest of his life in prison.
Debbie Cohen, director of the New Jersey Office for Prevention of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities, said alcohol-related brain damage prevents some people from forming well-developed consciences.
"There's a real, real difference in ethical issues with kids with FAS and FAE," Cohen said. "In my experience, people with FAS and FAE consciously do the wrong thing."
Cohen is a guardian for a child with FAE who has lived with her for two years.
"They are unable to really assess the consequences of their actions,'' she said.
People with FAS and FAE often cannot control their impulses, and have poor judgment. Mixed with poor self-esteem, the combination can mean trouble.
Patricia Tanner Halverson, a Tucson psychologist who evaluates delinquent children at Pima County Juvenile Court, believes as many as half of all delinquent children may have been exposed to alcohol prenatally.
And she believes an even higher percentage of adult criminals have prenatal alcohol damage.
Many are repeatedly in the criminal justice system.
"Their brain damage prevents them from learning from their past experiences," Tanner Halverson said. "They simply don't learn from their mistakes.
"Judges ask me, 'Why does this kid keep doing this over and over again?' Parents ask me, 'What's wrong with my child?' What this child has is the behavior of a person who's had too much to drink. And they don't ever have a chance to sober up."
Tanner Halverson said the lack of judgment and impulse control caused by prenatal alcohol damage also makes many of these children and adults easy victims.
"They have a very hard time making friends, so they tend to fall in with a crowd that accepts them and uses them," she said. "In a crime, they are often the fall guy, the patsy. When a group wants to steal a six-pack of beer, he's the guy they send in. He runs in, gets caught, and the others get away."

John Eastlack was a quiet baby and his FAS symptoms went undiagnosed until after his double murder.

Another problem she sees is a lack of remorse. "I see some FAS kids who are very unsympathetic. It just escapes them."
Tanner Halverson said those who work in the criminal justice system must educate themselves on the impact of alcohol-related birth defects.
But, she added, in cases involving violence, perpetrators must be held accountable.
"If you're going to hurt or kill or maim or rape, we have a duty to protect society, even if it's not the fault of the person that has FAS," Tanner Halverson said.
She is opposed to executing murderers with FAS.

Tanner Halverson said many of the alcohol-damaged children she evaluates have sexual problems. They often victimize, or are victimized.
"They don't understand what is an appropriate touch," Tanner Halverson said. "They're full of all this sexual energy and don't comprehend their boundaries."
About 45 percent of people with FAS and FAE engage in inappropriate sexual behavior, according to a study released last year by the University of Washington.
Tucsonan John Kellerman, 20, has fetal alcohol syndrome. His sexual urges have gotten him in trouble at school and elsewhere in the community.
"Sometimes he makes phone calls and says things he shouldn't," said his mother, Theresa Kellerman. "He makes inappropriate sexual remarks. I worry about what's going to happen to him when I'm not around to take care of him. My biggest fear is that he'll do something that will get him locked up. He'd be lost in the corrections system. Even an overnight stay in jail would be devastating."
Seventy-five percent of men with FAE have a history of confinement - either in prison, a mental health institution or drug and alcohol inpatient treatment. Most often, they end up behind bars.

Undated family photo of John Eastlack.

Pima County Juvenile Court Judge Nanette Warner believes some of the children she sees may have prenatal alcohol damage, but their handicaps are hidden.
"The undiagnosed are a big problem," she said. "We're missing a lot of these kids, the ones without the dramatic physical characteristics. I think it's a huge problem."
She said being placed in a healthy adoptive or foster family isn't always enough to overcome the overwhelming disabilities.
"They have a real dysfunctional way of approaching life that has a biological basis," Warner said. "Environment can overcome that to a certain degree. You can take a child with problems, and a real good environment can affect biology. But this is definite brain damage. They're not wired the same."
Warner doesn't believe prison is the best alternative for people with prenatal alcohol damage.
"But you have to balance societal protection and rehabilitation," she said. "To the victim, it doesn't make a difference if someone died because of a psychopath or because of FAS."

warner Warner said people who work in the criminal justice system are not trained to look for FAS or FAE.
"It's not a standard screening question here," Warner said. "It should be part of every psychological and physical evaluation. It should be part of the family history that probation officers take."
Some end up in the criminal justice system after years of floundering through life.
"Their self-esteem is so damaged," she said. "When you have bad self-esteem, you tend to make bad choices."
Warner said when she sees pregnant girls in court, she warns them of the dangers of drinking.
She told of a pregnant 16-year-old who had been a passenger in a car that was stopped. The girl, who was six months pregnant, had a blood alcohol level of 0.089. In adults, a level of 0.10 is considered legally drunk.
"Part of her probation was to learn about FAS and FAE," Warner said.
She believes society is just beginning to understand the impact of FAS and FAE on the criminal justice system.
"It may be like ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) was 10 years ago," she said. "We're just starting to see what kind of an impact it has."