Spencer Pearson, a former high school football star, was handed a life sentence last week for his 2023 violent and vicious stabbing attack of then 17-year-old Madison Schemitz in Ponte Vedra, Fla. It’s reported that Pearson “trembled and bowed his head in court” as the judge passed sentence.
Yes, as one would expect when one’s life is on the line, Pearson was contrite. And it’s important to note that Pearson’s attorney tried, unsuccessfully, to use the attackers “varied mental illnesses” as a mitigating defense. Of course, anyone would argue that someone who committed such a brutal attack must be suffering from mental illness. But is it that easy? Or is it possible that something else is at play?
For example, lots of young teenage boys’ experience getting dumped by girlfriends and don’t stalk them and then violently, repeatedly stab the former girlfriend, her mother and a stranger who stepped in to try and stop the rampage.
No. Something else is at play here and, based on other brutal attacks carried out by seemingly normal unassuming teenage boys, one cannot help but admit this attack has the odor of a life of mental health intervention.
Of course, it’s difficult to know for sure, but there are clues. According to one article in the Jacksonville Florida Times-Union “while in the third grade, a teacher made his parents aware that he suffered from anxiety.”
Did his parents act on that information and get their son mental health help to deal with his anxiety? Like so many other young boys, was third-grader Pearson “treated” with psychiatric mind-altering drugs at that time? That information has not been made public.
Hellbound and Down 