On Thursday, news that former NFL player Phillip Adams killed five people before committing suicide shocked sports fans across the country. His father says football is to blame.
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Dr. Robert Lesslie, his wife, Barbara, two of their grandchildren, and a man who had been working in their home, James Lewis, were all found shot to death after police responded to 911 calls about a shooting in Rock Hill, South Carolina on Wednesday afternoon. A sixth man, Robert Shook, was shot multiple times and is currently in the hospital.
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Adams eventually turned his gun on himself and was dead by the time police reached him early Thursday morning.
There are still many unknown and unconfirmed details of the shooting and the events that led to it, but there are reports that Adams was a patient of Lesslie’s, and that the doctor had stopped prescribing him medication prior to the shooting.
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Adams played in the NFL from 2010 to 2015 and sustained multiple concussions during that time — not uncommon for football players.
“I can say he’s a good kid,” Adams’ father, Alonzo, told WCNC. “I think the football messed him up.”
Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy can be caused by repeated blows to the head, including concussions, and can result in behavioral problems. A recent study found this condition present in 80-99% of autopsied brains of professional football players, but currently, there is no way to determine whether someone has this disease while they are still alive.
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Whether Adams’ killing spree was related to injuries suffered on the field or not does nothing to alleviate the pain the families of those he killed are going through, and obviously there are scores of athletes who suffer concussions and never go on to harm anyone. But folks are still hoping that investigating a potential link between football, CTE, and violent behavior could prevent future tragedies.
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there are no excuses for what phillip adams did. but i sincerely hope such a tragedy can open a dialogue about what neurologically damaging lifelong effects football concussions have on an individual, all for the sake of sports entertainment.
—
lass lauren
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It is not immediately clear whether an autopsy will be performed on Adams’ brain in search of signs of CTE.
*First Published: April 9, 2021, 6:49 am
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