Country music star Naomi Judd died of self-inflicted gunshot wound, Ashley Judd reveals

Naomi Judd, matriarch of the country music duo the Judds, died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound a day before being inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame, her family said on Thursday.

Judd, 76, suffered from mental illness, a disease that tells victims “you are not loved, you are not enough, that you are not worthy,” her daughter Ashley Judd said in an interview aired on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”

“Our mother couldn’t hang on until she was inducted into the Hall of Fame by her peers. That was the level of disaster that was going on inside of her,” Ashley Judd, a 54-year-old actor, said.

“She used a weapon. Mother used a firearm,” she said of the death, which was announced on April 30.

Ashley Judd said she was disclosing the cause of death in a televised interview to maintain “control” over the information before it became public, possibly through leaks about Judd’s autopsy.

The family’s revelation followed news that the rate of United States gun deaths surged during the pandemic to the highest point since 1994. Gun suicides, the leading cause of gun deaths, totaled 24,245 in 2020, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a report published on Tuesday.

Naomi and her daughter Wynonna Judd, 57, made up The Judds, the singing, guitar-playing duo inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame on May 1.

It was Ashley Judd who found her mother’s body, just a few minutes after they had embraced during a visit at her mother’s Tennessee home. Ashley Judd said she stepped outside to meet a friend and when she came back inside she found her mother upstairs.

“I have both grief and trauma” from discovering the body, Ashley Judd said.

The family urged anyone having suicidal thoughts to reach out for help by calling the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255 (in the U.S.).

-reuters

Canada court rules doctors can help ill patients die

TORONTO — Canada's highest court unanimously struck down a ban on doctor-assisted suicide for mentally competent patients with terminal illnesses, declaring on Friday that "an individual's response to a grievous and irremediable medical condition is a matter critical to their dignity and autonomy."

The Supreme Court's decision reverses its own decision two decades ago and gives Parliament a year to draft new legislation that recognizes the right of consenting adults who are enduring intolerable suffering to seek medical help ending their lives. The current ban on doctor-assisted suicide stands until then.

The judgment said the ban infringes on the life, liberty and security of individuals under Canada's constitution. It had been illegal in Canada to counsel, aid or abet a suicide, an offense carrying a maximum prison sentence of 14 years

"The law allows people in this situation to request palliative sedation, refuse artificial nutrition and hydration, or request the removal of life-sustaining medical equipment, but denies the right to request a physician's assistance in dying," the ruling noted.

Assisted suicide is legal in Switzerland, Germany, Albania, Colombia, Japan and in the U.S. states of Washington, Oregon, Vermont, New Mexico and Montana. Euthanasia is currently legal in the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg.

Friday's decision reverses a Canadian Supreme Court ruling in 1993. At the time, the justices were primarily concerned that vulnerable people could not be properly protected under physician-assisted suicide.

"For seriously and incurably ill Canadians, the brave people who worked side by side with us for so many years on this case — this decision will mean everything to them," said a visibly overjoyed Grace Pastine, the litigation director for the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association.

The pressure will now be on Parliament to act in an election year, as the court says no exemptions may be granted for those seeking to end their lives during the 12-month suspension of the judgment.

Friday's decision was spurred by the families of two now-dead British Columbia women, supported by Pastine's organization.

Gloria Taylor was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's disease, a degenerative neurological illness. Kay Carter was diagnosed with a degenerative spinal cord condition. At age 89, Carter travelled to Switzerland, where assisted suicide is allowed.

Taylor had won a constitutional exemption at a lower court for a medically assisted death in 2012, but that decision was overturned in subsequent appeals. She died of an infection later the same year.

It has been more than 20 years since the case of another patient with Lou Gehrig's disease, Sue Rodriguez, gripped Canada as she fought for the right to assisted suicide. She lost her appeal but took her own life with the help of an anonymous doctor in 1994, at the age of 44.

source: philstar.com

Girl aged 12 commits suicide after cyber bullying

WASHINGTON - A 12-year-old Florida girl who suffered months of ruthless cyberbullying from other girls committed suicide this week, authorities say.

Rebecca Ann Sedwick of the town of Lakeland in central Florida jumped from a platform at an abandoned cement plant near her home on Monday, according to the Polk County sheriff's office.

Her death is the latest in an apparently growing phenomenon of youths driven to taking their own lives after suffering cruel treatment online via text and photo messaging applications.

More than a dozen girls have been identified as possibly involved in the bullying of Sedwick, Polk County sheriff Grady Judd said at a news conference Thursday.

The bullying apparently started with a dispute over a boy that Sedwick had dated for a while, the New York Times reported.

According to her mother Tricia Norman, Sedwick received text messages that said things like "You're ugly", "Why are you still alive?" and "Go kill yourself."

Judd, the sheriff, said the girl was "absolutely terrorized on social media."

At one point, the mother had pulled her daughter out of school and transferred her to another, closed down the girl's Facebook page and took away her cellphone.

Things seems to be getting better and Rebecca's spirits seemed to be lifting at her new school.

But she also secretly signed on to new apps such as a cellphone message application called Kik Messenger and the bullying resumed, the Times said.

In Kik Messenger, Sedwick had changed her user name to "That Dead Girl," the Times said.

source: interaksyon.com

Michael Jackson’s teen daughter attempts suicide, says mother

LOS ANGELES – Paris Jackson, the 15-year-old daughter of late pop star Michael Jackson, was rushed to a Los Angeles-area hospital on Wednesday after an apparent suicide attempt, her mother said, but her family later reported she is “physically fine.”

“Paris is physically fine and is getting appropriate medical attention,” Perry Sanders, an attorney for Paris’ grandmother and guardian, Katherine Jackson, said in a statement.

“Being a sensitive 15-year-old is difficult no matter who you are,” the statement added. “It is especially difficult when you lose the person closest to you.”

Pop singer Jackson died in 2009 at age 50 from a lethal dose of surgical anesthetic propofol while preparing for his “This Is It” series of concerts in London.

The Jackson family’s wrongful-death lawsuit against concert promoter AEG Live is currently at trial in Los Angeles and family attorneys have been expected to call Paris as a witness.

Paris’ mother, Debbie Rowe, told entertainment TV program “Entertainment Tonight” that her daughter attempted suicide and had “a lot going on (lately).”

“We appreciate everyone’s thoughts for Paris at this time and their respect for the family’s privacy,” an attorney for Rowe said in a statement.

Celebrity website TMZ.com, which first reported the suicide attempt, said Paris had been taken from her family’s home in Calabasas, California, by ambulance at about 2AM time, citing unnamed sources.

Los Angeles County Sheriff deputies responded to a medical situation in Calabasas at 1:27AM, sheriff spokesman Steve Whitmore said, declining to provide additional details because of privacy laws.

Jackson was married to Rowe from 1996 to 1999, and the couple had two children together, Prince Michael in 1997 and Paris in 1998. Jackson later had a third child, Prince Michael II, also known as Blanket.

Rowe turned over full custody of the children to Jackson as part of their divorce but she had recently rekindled her relationship with Paris.

Jackson’s children live under the custody of their 83-year-old grandmother, Katherine, and their cousin, T.J. Jackson.

source: interaksyon.com

Film planned on life of rocker Michael Hutchence

SYDNEY – A film is being planned about the life and times of Michael Hutchence, the frontman of Australian rock band INXS who committed suicide 15 years ago, a report said Friday.

Former Hollywood screenwriter Bobby Galinsky, best-known for his work on the 1990 Kiefer Sutherland thriller “Flatliners”, told ABC radio casting was expected in the new year.

“It is a big task, I’ve been a writer for 35 years and this is something I’ve wanted to do for over a decade and everything has now come together with it,” he said.

The movie will be called “Two Worlds Colliding”, based on the book “Just a Man — The Real Michael Hutchence” penned by the singer’s mother and sister, after Galinsky obtained the rights.

He said he planned it to be along the lines of “Ray”, the story of Ray Charles, or “Walk the Line” which focused on Johnny Cash, “about a life, not a chapter”.

“We’d like to start in his childhood and what made the man, then the evolution of when he got into INXS and how that transformed him, and then of course his personal life,” said Galinsky.

“I want it to be what was behind the man, not just the guy you saw on stage, but who was Michael Hutchence, what drove him, what were his demons, what were his loves, not the persona that people saw on stage for a couple of hours.”

INXS were one of the world’s biggest acts throughout the late 1980s and early ’90s, fuelled by Hutchence’s charismatic performances, with the band having multiple hits around the world.

During his life, Hutchence had a string of love affairs with prominent actresses, models and singers, including Kylie Minogue.

But he was found dead in a Sydney hotel room in 1997, with the coroner ruling his death was suicide while the singer was depressed and under the influence of drugs and alcohol.

He left behind a daughter, Tiger Lily, from a relationship with British TV presenter Paula Yates, who died of a heroin overdose in 2000.

Tiger Lily now lives with her legal guardian, Yates’s former husband Bob Geldof.

Asked who he saw as his leading man, Galinsky replied: “I have been in conversation with couple of guys, there is an English gentleman, several Australians, but I would hate to pick someone out at the moment.”

INXS, which continued on without Hutchence, announced their retirement after 35 years earlier this month.

source: interaksyon.com

US student in gay webcam spying gets 30 days jail

NEW YORK - An Indian immigrant college student convicted of illegally filming his gay roommate on a webcam received a big break Monday when a judge sentenced him to just 30 days behind bars, not the possible 10 years.

Dharun Ravi, who shared the webcam footage with friends in his dormitory at Rutgers University in New Jersey, had also faced possible deportation, but the judge said he would not recommend this.

The case sparked a national debate over cyber bullying and gay bashing when the 18-year-old roommate, apparently distraught in part over the embarrassment of the broadcasting of his gay sexual encounter, committed suicide days later. Ravi, now 20, was not charged, E with the death.

Ahead of the light sentence, Judge Glenn Berman in New Brunswick, New Jersey, gave Ravi a severe dressing down.

Ravi showed "colossal insensitivity" when he filmed Tyler Clementi in September 2010, Berman said in comments carried live on TruTV.

"I heard this jury say ‘guilty' 288 times -- 24 questions, 12 jurors," Berman said. "I haven't heard you apologize once."

Berman said Ravi would never "expunge the conduct or the pain you caused."

The jury found Ravi guilty of invading privacy, on some charges of anti-gay bias, and trying to impede investigators by deleting or doctoring text messages and tweets that he'd sent.

His lawyer had argued that Ravi was guilty only of a prank gone wrong when he filmed roommate Clementi in a kiss with a man, then Tweeted friends about what he'd seen and invited them to watch a live webcam video.

Although prosecutors painted Ravi as a mean-spirited bully, Berman noted several times that the young immigrant was not accused of causing Clementi's death -- a tragedy that brought huge attention to what might otherwise have been a little-noticed case.

In a heart wrenching speech before sentencing on Monday, Ravi's mother recalled how they had arrived in the United States with just two suitcases and "a lot of hopes." Her son, she said, had been a dedicated student who "doesn't have any... or harbor hatred in his heart to anybody."

"What my son Dharun is going through there is no word for me to explain. The smile and the bright eyes are gone from his face," she said.

Addressing Clementi's family, she said, "It is so sad he chose to end his life early. My heart goes to his family."

When the unexpected sentence was passed, Ravi appeared not to react immediately, looking as stunned and near tears as he had throughout the hearing.

A New Jersey gay rights group, Garden State Equality, welcomed the judge's lenient approach, saying that the maximum sentence would "have been vengeance beyond punishment and beyond sending a message to the rest of society."

The month in jail and probation was correct, the group said, but added: "This was not a childhood prank gone awry. This was not a crime without bias."

article source: interaksyon.com

NFL: Seau death puts spotlight on concussions and depression

The death of former San Diego Chargers linebacker Junior Seau has again put the spotlight on the possibility of a link between concussions and depression so severe it drives professional athletes to take their lives.

Seau's death on Wednesday (Thursday, PHL time) from a gunshot wound to the chest in an apparent suicide will sound all too familiar to shaken fans of the NFL.

Last month, former Atlanta defensive back Ray Easterling, a plaintiff in concussion-related lawsuits against the NFL, died of an apparent suicide as did Chicago safety Dave Duerson, who shot himself in the chest last year and left a note asking his family to donate his brain to the NFL brain bank for study.

Even the NHL and their fans have wrestled with similar tragedies as tough guys Rick Rypien, Derek Boogaard and Wade Belak all died last offseason.

On the surface, their three deaths appear eerily similar as they all made a living on the unforgiving fringes of the sport, NHL enforcers who earned pay checks by dispensing punishment on opposing players.

The three deaths in four months brought uncomfortable questions as to whether the events were a tragic coincidence or a sign of a deadly problem.

Now the NFL, the players and their lawyers are asking the same tough questions.

Alarm bells have been ringing in the NFL for several years as battered players stepped forward with tales of dementia and memory loss they believe to be the result of repeated blows to their heads during long careers.

According to NFLConcussionLitigation.com, 61 concussion-related lawsuits have been filed against the league by dozens of players, who allege the league negligently misled them about the dangers of concussions and other head injuries.

Brain disease

A report by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that as many as 3.8 million athletes suffer a concussion each year in the United States.

"Depression & suicide are serious matters and we as current and former NFL players should demand better treatment. Lack of info ... no more!!!," former Dallas Cowboys Hall of Fame running back Emmitt Smith said on his Twitter account.

"And for you current players who think this issue doesn't effect u. Get your head out of your but. Where u r 2day was his [Seau's] yesterday."

Seau spent 20 seasons in the NFL terrorizing running backs and receivers but there is, so far, no proof that his death can be linked to chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a degenerative brain disease caused by repeated blows to the head which can only be diagnosed after death.

There is, however, mounting evidence that many professional football and hockey players suffered from CTE in their careers.

Duerson's brain, examined by Boston University's Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy found "indisputable" evidence of CTE in the tissue.

"NFL players often experience post-concussion syndrome," said James Johnston Jr., M.D., assistant professor of Neurosurgery at the University of Alabama at Birmingham in a statement. "They have a higher rate of depression, substance abuse, and dementia compared to the general population - it's thought this is connected to head impacts." - Reuters

source: gmanetwork.com

Man’s bloody suicide witnessed by girlfriend via video call

A woman from Berkshire, England could only watch in horror as his 53-year-old boyfriend who was on a business trip in India slashed his wrists, throat and stomach while on a video call with her through Skype.

According to a report by the UK-based newspaper Mirror, Julie Zalinski was on the call with Adrian Rowland when the incident happened. Rowland was reportedly in a “complete state” during the call, “was sweating profusely” with eyes staring.

“He said there were people in the room that weren’t there. I just kept reassuring him that nobody was there. I told him I’d get help,” Zalinski told the Mirror.

“He walked into the kitchen, grabbed a glass and smashed it on the table then stuck it straight into his neck. He was holding his bloodied wrist out to the screen,” she added.

“He kept saying, ‘they are going to get me, they are going to get me’.”

The woman immediately called help from the UK police to contact authorities in India, but even as Indian emergency services managed to reach Rowland’s apartment, Indian law prevented them from breaking down his door.

“Agonizingly, [Rowland] slowly bled to death as [Zalinski] continued to beg him to accept help,” the report said, adding that he was found dead 10 hours after the first Skype call.

The coroner in the UK said Rowland was “going through a mental crisis,” as Zalinski shared how he had been acting strangely just a day before, saying he had been entertaining guests at dinner even as the Skype video didn’t show anyone with the 53-year-old in the room.

Rowland had reportedly gone to India as a consultant in the automotive industry, and had been emotional before he left.

“He didn’t like being away from the UK and me,” she said,” Zalinski told the inquest that followed.

source: interaksyon.com