BILLIE HOLIDAY: 1915-1959

Jazz queen Billie Holiday turned to heroin. In 1946, she tried to kick her habit with the "help" of psychiatrists, paying $2000—a huge sum at that time—for a 3-week stay in a mental health sanatorium. Psychiatry’s "treatment" failed her. Within a year she was arrested on drug charges and her cabaret card, needed to perform in New York, was cancelled. She died while under house arrest in a city hospital.

BRIAN WILSON

Brian Wilson’s songwriting genius and the music of the Beach Boys captured the world in the 1960s with hits like "California Girls," "Good Vibrations" and "Surfin’ USA." At 23, Wilson took LSD, heavily promoted by psychiatrists and psychologists to the entertainment industry, which changed his life for the worse. Clinical psychologist Eugene Landy, who was contracted to help Wilson, demanded that he have "total therapeutic authority over Wilson and his environment"—at a cost of $400,000 a year. Two years later, when Landy demanded even more money, a desperate Carl Wilson gave away 25% of Brian’s royalties to cover the cost of continuing the program. Wilson was prescribed addictive tranquilizers. When a long-time friend of Wilson alerted the authorities to Landy’s treatment and extortion methods, the California Board of Medical Quality Assurance charged Landy with ethical and license code violations. Landy gave up his license to practice. Brian Wilson beat the odds and returned to writing and recording.

BUD POWELL: 1924-1966

Born in Harlem, Powell made his first recordings at age 19. In 1945, he was beaten up and admitted to Bellevue psychiatric facility in New York. On the admission form he wrote under occupation: "Pianist and composer of over 1,000 songs." The psychiatrist diagnosed this as "delusions of grandeur" and put him in a straitjacket. Subsequently, he spent years in and out of institutions where he was drugged and electroshocked. His health deteriorated rapidly. He died from a combination of liver failure, tuberculosis (TB) and malnutrition. Five thousand people lined the streets of Harlem to honor him at his funeral.

CHARLIE “BIRD” PARKER: 1920-1955

By the age of 15, Charlie "Bird" Parker was a working musician, bringing innovative ideas to jazz and later, helping to create bebop. In 1946, "Bird" was arrested in Los Angeles for drug possession and incarcerated in Camarillo psychiatric institution. He narrowly escaped being given electroshock after a medical doctor said, "It could permanently impair Parker’s reflexes, reduce him to a…very average musician." Instead, however, he was prescribed powerful psychotropic drugs. On March 12, 1955, "Bird" died of a heart attack caused by a drug and alcohol related condition.

DEL SHANNON: 1934-1990

Del Shannon was an American rock legend of the 1960s. At 27, he wrote "Runaway," a number one hit in 21 countries. More than 200 artists recorded versions of it, including Elvis Presley and Bonnie Raitt. In the 1980s, Shannon recorded the album "Drop Down and Get Me," produced by Tom Petty. In 1990, he was scheduling a European tour and consulted a psychiatrist for stress. He was prescribed Prozac. His wife Lee Anne said, "I watched him turn into somebody who was agitated, pacing, had trembling hands, insomnia and couldn’t function." Fifteen days later, Shannon shot and killed himself.

DON SIMPSON: 1944-1996

Don Simpson, one of Hollywood’s most renowned producers (Top Gun, Flashdance, Beverly Hills Cop and The Rock) was a tragic example of psychiatric irresponsibility. He was prescribed psychiatric drugs to withdraw him from his illicit drug use—one addictive chemical simply replaced by another. On January 19, 1996, Simpson was found dead of a drug overdose. Police found 80 bottles of prescription drugs in his house. An autopsy determined that a cocktail of cocaine and prescribed stimulants, antidepressants, sedatives and tranquilizers had caused heart failure and death.

ELLIOT SMITH: 1969-2003

In 1997, singer and songwriter Elliott Smith was an Oscar nominee for best original song, "Miss Misery," which was featured in the movie Good Will Hunting. He produced two more CDs and was working on another when he was found dead on October 21, 2003, from a self-inflicted stab wound to the chest. A Los Angeles psychiatrist had been treating Smith for alcohol and drug use. The coroner found "prescribed levels of antidepressant and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder medications in his system, including clonazepam, mirtazapine, atomozetine and amphetamine…."

ERIC DOUGLAS: 1960-2004

On July 6, 2004, Kirk Douglas’ son, Eric, died of "acute intoxication" from prescription tranquilizers and painkillers combined with alcohol. Ruled an "accidental overdose," the actor and stand-up comedian’s story is another example of failed psychiatric rehab programs. An article revealed, "Court and medical board records indicate that Douglas’ final, fatal descent may have stemmed from treatment by a psychiatrist who has since had his license revoked by the Medical Board of California." A suit against the psychiatrist, William O. Leader, showed Leader had prescribed near lethal doses of psychiatric drugs that so incapacitated Douglas he nearly died twice. The lawsuit was settled in May 2004.

ERNEST HEMINGWAY: 1899-1961

Nobel Prize-winning author Ernest Hemingway was tricked into admitting himself to a psychiatric institution. He was given more than 20 electroshock treatments. The result devastated him. Shortly afterwards, he told a friend, "Well, what is the sense of ruining my head and erasing my memory, which is my capital, and putting me out of business? It was a brilliant cure but we lost the patient...." In July 1961, days after being released from the Mayo psychiatric clinic, Hemingway committed suicide.

FRANCES FARMER: 1913-1970

Frances Farmer was a successful screen and stage actress in Hollywood and Broadway in the 1930s and 1940s. Jessica Lange later portrayed her story in the movie, Frances. Upset over a string of failed relationships, Farmer was involuntarily committed in 1943. For seven years, she was subjected to 90 insulin shocks and electroshocks, and was sold by psychiatric workers to drunken sailors who repeatedly raped her. She told of being "raped by orderlies, gnawed on by rats, poisoned by tainted food, chained in padded cells, strapped in strait jackets and half drowned in ice baths." Her last "treatment" was a lobotomy by Walter Freeman. Farmer never regained her abilities and died, destitute.

JUDY GARLAND: 1922-1969

In 1939, Judy Garland starred in The Wizard of Oz and recorded her signature song, "Over the Rainbow." An international star at 17, she was recognized in the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Her contract stipulated that her physical appearance not change, so Garland was prescribed amphetamines to "control" her weight and barbiturates to sleep. Addicted to the drugs, which caused hallucinations and suicidal tendencies, her behavior became erratic and disruptive. In 1949, she was electroshocked. Her drug-induced health problems worsened, her liver and spleen massively swollen. In 1969, Garland died of a psychiatric drug overdose in a London hotel.

KURT COBAIN: 1967-1994

A talented and creative child, Cobain was misdiagnosed as "hyperactive" and prescribed the cocaine-like and highly addictive Ritalin. Side effects include insomnia, nausea, abdominal pain, hallucinations and a predisposition to later cocaine use. Sedatives were prescribed to counter the insomnia. The progression to street drugs, including heroin, was a given. Compounding the Ritalin were untreated chronic medical conditions that affected him his entire life, including a "burning, nauseous" stomach, which Cobain said heroin "quenched." He enrolled in a Los Angeles psychiatric drug recovery center. Thirty-six hours after admission, he bolted and ended his life with a single shotgun blast to his head. Heroin and Valium were found in his blood stream.

MARILYN MONROE: 1926-1962

In 1955, an acting coach recommended that Monroe undergo psychoanalysis to tap into her "explosive energy." She started and eventually saw psychiatrist Marianne Kris, who prescribed the barbiturates the actress abused until her death. Of the psychoanalysis, Monroe said she felt "as if I were going around in circles. It was always…not where I was going but where had I been?" In 1960, Monroe saw psychiatrist Ralph Greenson, whose control over her was swift, severing all her close relationships. By 1962, she realized—too late—that she must "disconnect from Greenson." After spending six hours with him, she was found dead of a drug overdose. In the seven years prior to psychiatry’s influence, Monroe had made 23 movies. In the seven years of her psychiatric "care," she only made six films.

MICHAEL HUTCHENCE: 1960- 1998

In 1998, Michael Hutchence, lead singer of the Australian rock band INXS, killed himself after combining alcohol and a suicide- and violence-inducing antidepressant. The coroner determined that Hutchence "hanged himself with his own belt and the buckle broke away and his body was found kneeling on the floor and facing the door." INXS guitarist Tim Farris told media, "I can’t be angry at Michael…I think the world [people] should be very careful about taking antidepressants…."

PETER GREEN

Peter Green, founder, hit songwriter and guitarist of Fleetwood Mac, helped sell more records in one year in the late 1960s than the Beatles and the Rolling Stones combined in that same year. However, after taking LSD, Green became withdrawn and lost interest in his music. Within four years, he was receiving legally enforced psychiatric treatment and was subjected to heavy psychiatric drugs and electroshock. Green stated: "I didn’t want [ECT]; I was scared of it. They take your mind away from you….There were some pretty scary people there….They gave me tranquilizers….It was a struggle just to stay awake. You don’t know what you are doing. You don’t feel alive." However, Green survived and resumed public performance—testimony to the power of the artistic spirit.

PHIL HARTMAN: 1948-1998

On May 28, 1998, Brynn Hartman murdered her husband, comic Phil Hartman—known for his work on such popular TV shows as Saturday Night Live, The Simpsons and News Radio—before killing herself. She had been taking a prescribed antidepressant that she mixed with alcohol and cocaine. A 1999 lawsuit alleged that Los Angeles psychiatrist Arthur Sorosky had given Mrs. Hartman samples of the antidepressant, which she told friends made her feel "…like she was going to jump out of her skin." She contacted the psychiatrist four days before the shooting-he suggested she cut the dosage in half.

ROBERT WALKER: 1918-1951

Robert Walker co-starred with Judy Garland in the 1944 film The Clock. After his separation from actress Jennifer Jones he drank heavily and was given an ultimatum by MGM: submit to treatment at the Menninger Psychiatric Clinic or be fired. After Walker was discharged, he began regular therapy with psychiatrist Frederick Hacker. On August 28, 1951, Walker died after being given a barbiturate while intoxicated. Analyst Alex Rogawski stated: "Hacker killed Robert Walker."

STEVIE NICKS

"My creativity went away. I became what I call the ‘whatever’ person. I didn’t care about anything anymore…." - Stevie Nicks, on tranquilizer addiction

Stevie Nicks, lead singer of Fleetwood Mac, went public about her 5-year absence from the music scene: she’d been addicted to a tranquilizer, Klonopin, prescribed to her by a psychiatrist for cocaine withdrawal: "I went to a psychiatrist. It was a bad decision….[he] put me on this medication that nearly destroyed my career, nearly destroyed me, nearly destroyed my parents—because they just lost me for those years…."

Nicks spoke of the intense difficulty she had withdrawing from Klonopin: "[It] was killing me…I was in there [drug rehab] sick for 45 days, really, really sick. And I watched generations of drug addicts come in and go out. You know, the heroin people, 12 days...and they’re gone. And I’m just still there."

VIVIEN LEIGH: 1913-1967

Vivien Leigh, the star of classic movies such as Gone with the Wind and A Street Car Named Desire, was repeatedly electroshocked, leaving burns on her temples. Husband Sir Lawrence Olivier was devastated by the changes in her personality: "She was now more of a stranger to me than I could ever have imagined possible." In actuality, Leigh suffered from tuberculosis (TB) and her prescribed medication for this—not her "mental illness"—caused mental confusion and toxic psychosis.

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