American Notes Pennsylvania

Sylvia Seegrist, 25, is a diagnosed schizophrenic with a history of violence that includes stabbing a mental health worker. Sent repeatedly to mental institutions in suburban Philadelphia, she kept getting sprung, thanks in part to various courts' strict interpretations of Pennsylvania's involuntary- commitment law. A year ago, she was committed for 20 days after trying to choke her mother but, against the recommendation of her psychiatrist, was released yet again. Last week Seegrist's mother Ruth tried to persuade her daughter to commit herself to a hospital for treatment. "She said I had no business telling her what to do and that I couldn't make her do anything," the mother said. The same day Seegrist donned Army combat fatigues, drove to a Springfield, Pa., mall and began firing at shoppers with a .22-cal. carbine. Before being disarmed by a graduate student who thought she was firing blanks, she shot ten people, killing a 2 1/2-year-old boy and a 64-year-old man. At her arraignment on murder charges, Seegrist was as defiant as she had been with her mother. "I hope you starve," she told the judge. "Hurry up, man. You know I'm guilty. Kill me on the spot."