M ental I llness C oncerns A ll	At the time of the homicide St. was an adolescent, in social transition, living away from home. Gone where? This Inquiry reveals little or nothing about his day to day living. He supports himself on Social Security benefit money without regular abode or regular occupation. He is seventeen when the homicide happens. He has been brought up by his mother and a stepfather.There are two half siblings younger than him. He knows nothing of his own father or relatives on that side.The Inquiry Report says nothing about his mother's side of the family. His upbringing seems normal. At one stage he sees a school psychologist - it maybe because he is thought to be under-achieving by his parents. His schooling ends at General School Certificate level. He has left home - a runaway in his locality, at sixteen. At some stage he receivs a head injury and some say he changed after that. He steals, and completes Probation attendance for this, satisfactorily. He is admitted to a local mental hospital after being seen by a junior psychiatrist in training, at the general hospital, following a medication overdose. Something seems not right about his behaviour - especially a pressure of thought indicated by rambling but formed but not coherent speech. This continues to be noticed on the day of admission. The behaviour is not exemplfied but a drug induced psychosis is considered possible. Testing for street drugs is not done. Thereafter there is no particular record. In the mental health service admission ward he is noted as fearful and suspicious of a fellow patient and acknowledges an inner compulsive thought that he should stab his stepfather. For this apprehension he is given an injection of a neuroleptic which induces dystonic after effects. He has related a story against his stepfather which after conviction for the eventual manslaughter he agrees has been concocted. After a week in the mental health hospital service he is discharged without a defining diagnosis as to what has happened. He has no abode, no family doctor, and no aftercare contact so that he is lost to the mental health services when he does not keep to a referral to a day centre. He has refused the services any contact with his family, and they know nothing of his circumstance until the final offence. He has tied a stranger to a tree and stabbed him. The Inquiry report covers the two months of February and March 1995 - the extent of his contact with the mental health services. The Inquiry gives no further detail of the context of the offence - surely relevant to a possible diagnosis. Not even its date. What happens after his NHS mental health services contact is not described. The trial is in July 1996. He is examined for the Court and no psychiatric illness is reported ; nor does it appear that any illness surfaces during his stay after sentence in juvenile detention.	E-mail reaction is welcome mica@didgy.freeserve.co.uk

Reviewed