Power to Harm

By John Cornwell

Book Overview

On September 14, 1989, Joseph Wesbecker entered a Louisville, Kentucky printing plant and shot twenty people with an automatic rifle before turning the gun on himself. Wesbecker had been severely... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0670867675
• ISBN13: 9780670867677
• Release Date: October 1996
• Publisher: Viking Books
• Length: 321 Pages
• Weight: 1.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.3" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

complicated case well told

The author makes a complicated tale understandable and very very interesting. You couldn't ask for a better introduction to issues like the psychological drug approval process, 'the drug made me do it' thinking, and free will vs. brain chemistry determinism vs. community, company and co-worker responsibility. Very well written and very fair-minded!

Had to read for Psych class-informative,better than textbook

Every book you are forced to read tends to give you a negative outlook but all in all I learned a different side to Prozac

A legal thriller that happens to be true.

With the lawsuit mania that exists today, it's not unusual to find big corporations dragged into lawsuits for no other reason than their deep pockets. Lawyers go to extreme lengths to assign fault for even the most tangential involvement. A casual observer to the lawsuit covered in "The Power to Harm" might perceive it as just another baseless attempt of going after the guy with the most money. After all, how could anyone blame a drug for causing someone to shoot twenty coworkers? If you read this book, you'll know the answer. John Cornwell covers the behind-the-scene details of the trial with great skill and frugality. Nothing is wasted. The facts concerning the drug Prozac are fascinating. I'm truly amazed that the drug ever received FDA approval. Prozac is currently being sold in over seventy countries. If you are taking this drug or are considering taking it, please read this book.This is a first rate legal thriller where the story and characters are real, and so too are the victims.

A must for HR managers, bureaucrats, medicos, lawyers.

Cornwell leads the reader through an incredible series of events. He holds a mirror to bosses who don't notice or are too self possessed to care. He shows bureaucrats that fail to act responsibly. Describes a chemical company that is apparently without a conscience and medicos that are hindered by a system. Lawyers cut a deal, that in popular parlance is intended to deliver a win-win solution to the chagrin of the trial judge. And the families who grieve, a son that's pilloried and the reader left to wonder about mass killers and what really gets them started. A must for HR managers, bureaucrats, medicos and lawyers and anyone who cares about others