Lawyer to examine medications of U.S. soldier

The attorney for the U.S. soldier charged with killing 17 Afghan civilians on March 11, John Henry Browne, recently said that he was interested to know what medications his client, Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, was taking at the time of the shootings.

"We have to order his medical records, and they haven't given them to us yet," he said. "He was taking medications, but we don't know whether it was aspirin, heart medicines. We don't know what it was."

Investigators discovered suspected steroids were hidden in Bales' living quarters according to an internal Pentagon document.

From Pbs.org:

Browne said that in some previous legal cases, he has cited the side effects of a prescribed drug in a client's defense.

"There are a lot of medicines that can backfire," Browne said. He pointed, in particular, to recent reports about Lariam, an anti-malarial medication.

NewsHour viewers have their suspicions as well. "I can tell you that I personally ruined my life because of that substance in July 2011 and I have no memory of my actions," one viewer said of the sleeping medication Ambien in an email to the NewsHour.

"After any unexpected violent act, we search for rational explanations. Sometimes the best explanation is that reason was turned off and primitive, predatory parts of the brain took over," said Dr. Frank Ochberg, a clinical professor of psychiatry at Michigan State University.