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when i received the news for the army about my son supposedly committed suicide in north or kimmel live to receive a lot of protocol for the for a friend was a stay in the same days in the same group and the guns them. i know who is my son i know how to proceed sure you never commit suicide but they are mean is yes.

i think hundred percent in in my personnel of all the friends family in general you know people real who who is my son he was made. with in the army they covered up the other thirty four my personal opinion some more and killed most of he said to face americans who could raise him by graham afghanistan. on july twelfth two thousand and four army reservist john chores was found dead of a gunshot wound to the head his body was discovered in a latrine and bag room air field in afghanistan where you've been deployed for nearly a year. twenty five years old an eight year veteran of the army reserves john called

his mother and girlfriend on saturday july tenth to tell them is unit replacements arrived and he would be home until weeks three days later his mother was notified of his death the military provided little information about john's death in the days leading up to his funeral his parents only learned his death was to be classified a suicide by reaching out to soldiers from his reserve unit where we kept frightening out trying to find out what soldiers just came back or coming back or who came back early from his from his. platoon i guess and i got a number through elizabeth who was another woman and i feel a woman i can't remember her name but she had a husband also in the military and she was saying oh i just found out that john died from my husband and she's the one who also made told me that that.

her husband. nor france was would tell you this but she was very afraid that his last movie when co heard this from ocean but that he killed himself i heard the first couple. i think one thing happening now i heard was there was an injury. on the releases and nobody knows anything more we can say anything more then we found out there was a conscious. thing knowing. that after that you know. he did it and then i got a call from c. id asking some people some questions if i said anything or written a letter then they asked me a bunch questions and we find that was. members of john's unit were told he committed suicide after receiving a dear john letter from elizabeth it was alleged that the letter of been found with his body. i think me personally handling. one more thing while

i wouldn't ever proven there for him or anything would happen as and i'm right you're right i don't think i would ever do that rumors continued to reach the family from soldiers returning from afghanistan in the weeks following john's funeral talk of a dear john letter gave way to speculation that he may have been killed for speaking out about here when you said bag room john had told his father months before that heroin was everywhere on base and the two members of his unit had been sent home for using the drug war the ploy after his death the family learned he was openly critical of the army's lack of response to the heroin issue bolstering john's accusations was an article by investigative journalist seymour hersh in april of two thousand and four person reported that retired military and cia officials had told them there were increasing reports of heroin use by american military personnel in afghanistan with the us being highest among the reserve units

according to one of her sources pentagon leadership was taking your head in the sand approach to the issue and had no desire to expose the problem or get law enforcement involved. other than the market was not that such. as weeks turned to months with no answers forthcoming from the military john's father took every opportunity to protest the son's death becoming a regular anti-war demonstrations throughout the country. so you also get your act yes but i'm not going to study so if i harness all the vital he's going to kenya many tell you it was worth noting this terrible here is a lot of drive not a problem play so nice guy inside a base. after

the fall of the taliban there was an explosion in poppy cultivation throughout the country packing plants produce a latex is the source of opium which is used to produce heroin afghanistan currently produces ninety percent of the world's heroin with poppy cultivation in the drug production accounting for over fifty percent of the country's g.d.p. . afghan hero one unlike the black tar variety produced elsewhere in the world is a powder and can be smoked in snorted as well as injected. just outside bagger merrifield's main gate is the backroom bazaar a series of dilapidated shops known by locals as

a place to go to find american goods good stolen from base or trade of the locals by soldiers looking for liquor drugs and other contraband. sometimes. when they want to buy something for example if they want to fight. and some things if they if there is. exist inside the base so they come out of the base and drive from these shops or they give many for those afghans who are working inside for them and tell them to bring that stuff inside the base for them. to spend significant time in and around the shops over several trips to afghanistan on one trip and april of two thousand and seven i contacted the bases public affairs officer and asked for comment on the issue of heroin a bag room i was told there was nothing to comment on as the base do not have a drug problem after i mention that i spent the previous week in the bazaar outside

the bases main gate i was provided with a written statement. our military police received very few reports of alcohol or drug issues here we expect that with a large mixed population composed of u.s. military forces civilian contractors department of defense civilians coalition military forces and afghan workers here on bag remembering day they would find a small amount of alcohol or drugs because of rigorous search procedures at our gates attempts to bring any contraband items through the gates are largely unsuccessful since january we have had about twenty attempts to bring you legal drugs through the gated bag or mayor feel all committed by either local national or third country national truck drivers. when we intercept these individuals they are investigated and banned from entering back room again personnel leaving back room are also subject to search. when they give money for an afghan friend to bring them

here in so the afghan would buy from somewhere the hearing and then waiting in front of the gate for him and he's coming out of the gate getting that hearing by himself because if the afghan caught with healing it's of a crime and he was he would face you know. one of the methods he said before this because the soldiers are changing time by time so there were some group of soldiers before that they were using a lot these did the hearing and the machination these things. in the end john's claims of heroin use on base were true but no point between the drug and his death could be found to the family continued on with their investigation. actually but. are you not bothered yet.

the reason whipped up by i guess. in march of two thousand and five john's mother susanna received a call from special agent steve hudson special agent hudson was an investigator from the army's criminal investigation division also known as the c. id. your daughter or somebody claiming to be your daughter. posted something to. the internet this is she was murdered because he was approached by officers lol that's what we hear too so there's a lot of probably here and i know for sure he did and he was assaulted later i know about for sure so i know there's something else and that's what we want to find out . well based on. what i've found you know you're right and i want to

help so why post i'm not sure because he never talked to me about that because he said mom you worry too much so he never told me anything that. i don't know he told who he could talk to i didn't know that was new for me. well i would be interested if your daughter has information i mean i would love to look into that but what we do ok. if you can tell him that i'd be more than happy to look at ok yeah we have all the names for lettuce a person you talk to this first of this lawyer to see if i'm going to be able to you need help. i destroy you know i don't care who gets in trouble me. you tell us unless you're doing something well but they're so scary i mean it's all just to talk to me first if they want seen and then they're scared about you know. what i guess i should ask what have you been told ok i just want to know what happened what happened to my time because. they're telling me without being played

and i'm not i mean there's no way. no way. did you know you were kind of medication he would take it any. medication was you a taken thousand for his own luck so far in fact i'm for that you break. anything else. no it's ok with them. a medication he was taking. was now our family member call me to let him tell me anything and a bad. place here about bad luck and keep. him. happy my culture and i don't know if it you know i don't want it and want to guess but i have a pretty good idea where it was he was taking ok. very. far as i prodded or a lot of back the anti-malaria drug referred to by agent hudson is

mefloquine network when was developed by the us army and is distributed by roche pharmaceuticals under the brand name larry and larry it was the focus of intense media scrutiny in two thousand and two after three soldiers from fort bragg killed their wives and ultimately committed suicide after returning from afghanistan all three were reported to have taken lariam while the ploy and two thousand and three there was also reports of an increase in suicide among troops taking their him in iraq. part of every military mission is giving the troops the protection they need including medicines to prevent disease including malaria which kills at least seven hundred thousand people around the world each year thousands of u.s. troops in iraq received one of these drugs a drug called lariam and it may have prevented many soldiers from getting sick the question tonight is whether or not soldiers were adequately warned about its rare

side effects serious life changing side effects in collaboration with u.p.i. investigative reporter mark benjamin c.n.n.'s investigative unit has been working on this story. first gun law the lariam issue in two thousand and two working with my partner dan almost at the wire service u.p.i. and dan i had some friends who had taken lariam and had incredibly horrible reactions to drug hallucinations suicidal thoughts and tendencies. including one person who never really recovered who has problems to this day and we'd never seen anything like that in reaction to a drug that ended up starting just our curiosity. started two years of work then in two thousand and two dan and i obtained about fifteen hundred pages of documents internal safety documents from roche pharmaceuticals were sponsored it

was the company that manufactures lariam these internal safety documents showed the company quietly tracking reports of suicidal behavior among people who were taking a drug really really frightening stuff myal and stuff. and their company was clearly quietly paying very close attention to people who were taking this drug and then inexplicably hurting themselves or other people and that's when we knew we were really on to something. and two thousand and two the f.t. required gross to revise their packaging insert for lariam the new revised label warned methyl could make cause psychiatric symptoms in a number of patients ranging from exile paranoia and depression to hallucinations and psychotic behavior it also warned that on occasions the symptoms have been reported to continue long after mefloquine has been stopped where cases of suicidal ideation and suicide have been reported to no relationship to drug administration

has been confirmed. but then roche says. some patients taking lariam think about killing themselves so this is not a statement that some patients taking lariam have been reported to think about killing themselves or bits hypothesize that lariam may cause a patient to think about killing themselves roche is saying and this course has to be approved by the at the a. before this is allowed to be distributed by roche. some patients taking lariam think about killing themselves so this is a statement by roche that patients can a suicidal thought on lariam it doesn't impact they then go on to say then there have been reports of suicide it is not known whether lariam were responsible for these suicides well that's where i take. a difference with roche now i think it's

a disingenuous statement because it's really quite clear from a number of sources that lariam. can cause suicidal thoughts and suicides in february of two thousand and four then army surgeon general james peake testified before a house armed services subcommittee that no link had been found between lariam an army suicides john would be found dead less than four months later. i know i'm. right. fifteen months after john's funeral the family finally received a copy of the army's investigation into his death the report was over five hundred pages long and contained a copy of the alleged suicide note. i'm sorry that i had to do this i've been in so much pain in the past year that i can't take it anymore the stomach and

chest pains have been getting worse and no doctors been able to help me the doctors here refused to help me. please know that i'll finally be at peace and with no more pain i wish i could have had a wife with elizabeth always pictured her being my wife and mother to my kids i love you all. the letter concludes see you all in heaven when your time comes i'm going to meet jesus christ. for the family the suicide note was proof the army was lying they were certainly john had not written the note they did not sound like him or look like his writing they also question why john would have killed himself over stomach and chest pain when he was said to return to houston in only a few weeks john was a successful accountant in civilian life and had good health insurance and substantial savings he could have sought out the best medical treatment available once home. also missing from the sea id report provided to the family was

an explanation of what may have been causing john's stomach ingesting and how this pain could have led to such a drastic response like suicide the only reference to what may have triggered his actions is found on page four sixty eight. m l ten hundred twenty three juno five the undersigned obtained in reviewed a mental health evaluation pertaining to specialist torres which was conducted by major psychologist two fifty fourth medical detachment camp lacey bagger merrifield a review of the documents showed major league special store suffering zion he and unresolved sematic pain which contributed to specialist tours committing suicide see mental health evaluation twenty three juno five for further details. of the mental health evaluation was missing from the coffee of the cia the report provided to the family and there was no further explanation of what john was actually suffering from. the statement

yes i see but practice. whatever arctic official that's what if you can't hope to say i guess i don't know what happened what happened to my son because. they're telling me what about the plague and i'm not paid back i mean there's no way yeah no way. to tell you what kind of medication he was taking is going to have a medication right he was taken after pakistan lack of celebrity. the thing of. it they were very medication he would take. our now our family doctor can mean he didn't tell me anything of that. but i care about that and nothing came. about michael jackson i don't want it but you know i don't want it i don't want to guess but i

have a pretty good idea where it was he was taking ok. theory. that i parted or about back. despite special agent hudson's interest in what the family knew about the answer malaria drugs i was taking lariam was only mentioned once in the report provided to the family and a statement to investigators jones' first lieutenant indicated everyone in the platoon was taking an anti malaria pill once a week which he thought was lariam fact you you mentioned they're required to take it they are they're ordered to take it in the beginning you would have times where friends on every monday soldiers without formation would be required to take it so literally the soldiers would line up at formation the platoon sergeant would hand out the layering pills and everybody in formation with us after p.t. would take a pill use it and they would document everyone took the pill so it was required it wasn't something you had an option not to do. as

a result there is no recourse and they would describe sometimes when they would take these pills like on mondays they would describe it as manic mondays and so they all knew there was reactions to what they all had the experience seeing some people experienced it less than others and others and some people had a very terrible reaction to it we're having a problem with lariam and it happens from differently for different people the biggest problem for most people happened right around the third pillar three an hour probably will often have a right around the third pill don't ask me why that just happens to be for people that i've interviewed where the real problems show up. well you know you are really having a lariam problem one two things happen at the same time you have psychological side effects which can be extreme depression loosen ations panic attacks and then those come come along with a constellation of physical symptoms that also exhibit themselves at same time so

you've got the these panic attacks these hallucinations suicidal tendencies you get a rational have stomach problems you'll have some people complain of chest pain all these things happen all the same time we have this is a cool reaction and this mental reaction happening at the exact same time as somebody who previously and perfectly healthy it all happens right around the third pill something's going on. for the first year and even after the first year you don't refuse to give you answers was it this refusal to give you were really made you think they were covering up the murder oh years though not a cold really truly in your mini when you colleen or saw their military never give you thought they were really up into a thought thought their year you know would offer any information of this is the the resume personally. taken would fly to of gun firm in the very very dangerous area. looking for the investigator person investigator one

hundred maybe. some tom and sam it. happened to you so. much you're running. soon. culture is that so much involvement taxpayers money maintains a shiny need to spot people at various a time finally come when we should value public aid of measurements of wellbeing over industries such as g.d.p. and other governments to. there hasn't been anything good on t.v. . it is to get the maximum political impact of.

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