4th teen from same Palo Alto high school commits suicide

For the fourth time in less than six months, a student from one Palo Alto high school has committed suicide, authorities say. The boy stepped in front of a train at the same location where three other students have killed themselves since May.

CalTrain spokeswoman Tasha Bartholomew said the latest suicide of a student from high-performing Gunn High School occurred at 10:50 p.m. Monday. Another Gunn student, a boy, 17, killed himself the same way at the same spot at 8:20 a.m on May 5.

His death was followed by the suicide of a girl, 17, on the tracks at 9:59 p.m. on June 2. The third suicide occurred at the same location on Aug. 21 at 10:45 p.m.

Palo Alto police told the San Jose Mercury News that police are limiting publicity about the suicides for fear of a growing cluster.

"The research we're being told is that the more we talk about it and romanticize it, the easier it is that mentally ill or depressed people will make that leap,'' Sgt. Dan Ryan was quoted as saying. "We're taking a stand and not releasing more information."

Ryan was unavailable today, and another detective in the department's juvenile section did not return a telephone inquiry.

Suicide clusters are relatively rare, although they have existed since ancient times.

One study found that between 1% and 5% of all teen suicides in the U.S. occur in clusters, taking the lives of 100 to 200 teenagers a year. Suicide contagion has involved prison inmates, marines, religious sects and Native Americans, but in the U.S. teens and young adults make up most of the clusters, according to Suicide and Mental Health Assn. International.

Clusters have included friends or acquaintances from a single school or church and also teens who have never had any direct contact with one another, according to the organization. Some share an "environmental stressor," the association said.

The Centers for Disease Control reported that four teenagers in a New Jersey suburb committed suicide on March 11, 1987 by locking themselves in a garage with a car engine running. Six days later, a 17-year-old boy and a woman, 20, attempted suicide in the same garage by the same means, the centers reported. The garage door was later removed.

"Anecdotal evidence suggests that suicides early in a cluster may influence the persons who commit suicide later in the cluster," the centers reported. "There is also research evidence that exposure to a suicide that was not part of a cluster may lead certain persons to take their own lives."

--Maura Dolan

Comments

[nadia]

sounds like the japanese movie "the suicide club"

[Victor]

"We're taking a stand and not releasing more information."

What! what was needed to be told was told already.

[hunterr83]

Humans are a strange species.

[Elder]

Yes, insane people will take a step.
It is a part of the plan of reduction of population. Too many people are on the Planet Earth.
Real and normal and in the United S..ts of America.

[Patrick]

Well the fact that this made national news kind of let the cat out of the bag didn't Sgt. Ryan Dan.

[Sophia]

My heart goes out to the families of these children. What is it with this school? What kind of things are the youth there being taught? My prayer for the parents and family members of these teens is that God would comfort them in their time of heartache and mourning and that they would find rest for their souls!

[Christopher W.]

I'm not sure that I see a problem here. If these kids are so feeble minded as to think that suicide is their best/only recourse, then they're probably right. Makes room in the gene pool for people that DO have coping skills.

[Marlena]

What a horrible story. One would think they would limit access to the tracks, rather then the information

[TheBigPicture]

Are these kids Asian, White, Hisp or what...

Can you image killing yourself over nothing at such a young age...bizarre...they have no idea what they're throwing away...

At least they're not doing the murder-suicide thing...

[Kelley]

No Victor. Often, the things that influence teens are knowing the factors around why it happened or even the events the lead up to it happening. Stress factors can often prompt someone to feel the same way. So I'm sorry
but you are wrong. This is a lot like the teens in palm springs who over a year all killed themselves. It's very tragic.

[Monika Woolsey]

I used to work at the Palo Alto Medical Center as a nutritionist, which meant I had contact with teens who were referred for help with eating disorders. I was always blown away by the tremendous pressure those kids in that community were under. Before even graduating from high school they had resumes longer than mine and more achievements under their belts than I ever will...and I'm an Ivy League graduate with a master's degree! I always thought someone needed to intervene and advocate for these kids being allowed to just be kids, not be so programmed and channeled into activities that looked good on the college application instead of what fueled their passion.

It affected me so much that even though I live in a different city now I have become active with high schoolers on behalf of my alma mater and I use my time to encourage kids to be whole, not just the sum of their resume parts.

Perhaps this situation will finally nudge those who can do something about it to step up on behalf of teens whose parents may not always be doing so.

[the rev]

Sounds like they need a visit from rev. jackson. straighten these iranians right out.

[chad]

stupid kids, stupid teachers, stupid parents, and especially stupid law enforcement (should of watch that place)just plain stupid! god bless their soul!

[Jim Thirlweel]

I agree...we need this kind of thing to strengthen the gene pool and weed out the ranks of emo losers.

[A.B.]

Between the delusions of the writer of the prayer post who invokes the man in the sky and the meanness of the cleaning up the gene pool one, lies the cold hard truth: our children are killing themselves.

They need the truth: what they want to do is kill the pain. If the pain could go, they would choose life.

Let's get that message out: share your burden and we will be there for you until the pain, not you, is gone. We can help, but you have to let us in that the pain is there. I'm sorry you have to put up with delusional do-gooders who do you no favor invoking myths which serve to validate that no one understands and mean spirited people calling you names.

You are worthy of all the integrity, reason and compassion the adults in your world have.

[william ledbetter]

This is moderated? You have some jerk applauding the suicides of teenagers and you approve that? You know you don't have to allow that, don't you?

[Think]

Parents need to teach there children about Christianity, then the kids will know where they go when the commit suicided. When people die there is only two places they can go

[Mel]

Is it possible that the "high performing" high school pressures these kids too much. They are all high school seniors who are suppose to go Ivy league...

It is Palo Alto.

[Peg]

It's really selfish and nasty to jump in front of a train and traumatize the driver and passengers and passersby. Did they ever hear of drugs?

[Anti-Emo]

Get involved with your kids, listen to them, kiss them as often as you can, be aware who their friends are(insist you meet them and their parents). Depression is a disease not a style! They might dislike you for being involved in their lives right now, but they will live to realize how petty and insignificant some High School experiences are. They will grow up and mature into beautiful people!

[cassandra colston]

that pretty freaky? did they know each other maybe it's some kind of pack? i really fell said for thier families

[Miriam Rosser]

Bless and soothe the hearts and minds of those whose children died by suicide over the past recent months in Palo Alto, California. I grew up not far from Palo Alto, in Los Altos, so I am familiar with the superb reputation of Gunn High School, and with the fact that this school attracts high-achievers and is very selective about the students it accepts. I have no statistics at hand, but living in the South Bay for twenty years acquainted me with the public opinion concerning Gunn and its exceptional students.

It is loathsome not to mention grossly insensitive to label the students as deficient in any way, and therefore dispensable, as one comment I read here did. I am a big believer in freedom of speech, but the ugliness of that comment, its sheer hatefulness, should have caught the editor's eye and, in the interest of families and friends and others of us who are grieving the unspeakable loss of these young adults, the editor ought, in my opinion, to have withheld the comment, temporarily or perhaps permanently. What possible good could come from publishing it? The screaming spectacle of a twisted mind? The shock of reading filfth from a heartless individual? You will disallow any comment with a swear word in it, yet you allow a letter that in sum is far worse in its effect than any swear word I've ever heard in my life. Here! Here! for freedom of speech. But not when the speech in question constitutes a hate crime. Expunge it! I don't read comments to your articles expecting to read such totally psychopathic thoughts: for isn't that message exactly what Hitler himself held forth about. "Oh, well, those millions of humans weren't real men, didn't deserve to live because Jews are unworthy, homosexuals are unworthy, intellectuals are dangerous and therefore unworthy, poets and artists--other than the German art and poetry that has State-Approval--are "feeble" and dangerous, because we never know, do we? Those artist-types could be communicating subversive messages in code to undermine the God-given power of the Third Reich!

"I'm not sure that I see a problem here. If these kids are so feeble minded as to think that suicide is their best/only recourse, then they're probably right. Makes room in the gene pool for people that DO have coping skills."

This is the comment I'm talking about. How utterly lacking in compassion the writer of this comment is. Maybe this writer should just do away with himself/herself to "make room in the gene pool" for people that have loving, nonjudgmental, and compassionate hearts. And, no, I don't wish for any such thing. But I do hope the editors will take better care in the future. It was already upsetting enough to read the news about the suicides without hearing his tripe.

[Let It Be]

"Makes room in the gene pool "

Dude, they're kids, trying to cope. Is it so long ago that you don't remeber what it was like. One quick impulse based on pain, anger and lonlieness, we've all done stupid stupid things as kids.

[Tony M.]

I taught at Gunn High School in the late 1980's. The pressure for students to achieve is truly intense. For example, I had a Freshman student in my office one day crying because in the third week of school he was receiving a "B+" in class. His brothers and sisters had all gone to "Ivy League" schools and now he wasn't going to get into Harvard with anything less than an "A". I can only imagine how much stress those students are under today, some twenty years later. My heart goes out to the family.

[gavric17]

Dear Sally, I'm depressed.
Signed, Felicity.

[Tiffany]

As a student at this school and someone who was friends with three of these teens, I'm more than frightened with what's been going on. I think it's good that the media isn't doing as many reports about this issue as it did earlier in the year.
And yet, this story is all over the place.
The last thing my school needs is to be on national television, having its students judged as "suicidal" and "feeble-minded" by an insensitive audience. And frankly, I'm quite sick of having people come up to me, telling me that there's something wrong with my school, that I should watch out for trains, and that I should check into a clinic so I can get a vaccine for the "suicide flu."

There is nothing wrong with my school. The only things being taught there are being taught at schools all over the nation and those subjects are being taught by wonderful, caring teachers.

The reason why these teens left is that they felt that it was the only way out. Things happen, and sometimes, it gets too much for a teen to handle. So, excuse me for being brash, but expecting a teen to be able to cope with issues as if they were nothing is quite stupid.
And just for the record, depression has nothing to do with genes. Everyone goes through it at some point in life.

[Former Gunn High School Student]

As a former Gunn High School student (graduated 2006), I wish to say that in my four years there not a single Gunn student committed suicide. This string of suicides is very unusual; nothing out-of-the-ordinary is being taught at this school.

That said, Gunn is an extremely high-performing public school, and many parents in the Palo Alto community apply immense pressure on their kids to succeed -- even starting in elementary school. The school should not change anything it is doing; but the parents should.

Parents should always drive their kids to work hard and excel, but they should also tell them that nothing -- nothing -- is worth taking your life. If you have to drop out of school for some time, then so be it. If you want to take time off before college, then so be it. If you can't scratch that A+, then so be it. I'm sure most parents would rather have their kids live with a C average than commit suicide for not meeting a higher standard.

So parents, talk to your kids. Please.

[Highschool Junior Girl]

My school has now been thru the same "cluster effect" we've had 4 deaths all by train in the past years. all senior boys from the same town. NONE of these kids were "emo" or depressed, they have all been scholars or athletes. Happy smiling boys. as a kid in a town where this happens, its awful. The effect it has on a community is so deep. It hurts everyone. Even if you didn't know them, like me, you still hurt because others are hurting. As of now, the only thing we can do is help each other make it thru this awful time and become more vigilant so this doesn't happen again. Please if this is happening to you, stay strong and help those who need it.

[dionna white]

Hello, my name is Dionna White and I am currently a senior at Valley View High School, I was wondering if I could use this article for my senior project which is a documentary on teenage deaths which includes suicides, homicides, car accidents, drug overdose, etc.
for more questions contact me at whitedionna@yahoo.com

[Bryce]

>>Yes, insane people will take a step. // It is a part of the plan of reduction of population. Too many people are on the Planet Earth. // Real and normal and in the United S..ts of America.
>>I'm not sure that I see a problem here. If these kids are so feeble minded as to think that suicide is their best/only recourse, then they're probably right. Makes room in the gene pool for people that DO have coping skills.

...say two people who don't seem to know that much about neuroscience, evolutionary biology or demographics.

Clearly, the high-achieving students who are dealing with the (transient) emotional impact of loss - something that is naturally amplified during adolescence - are the ones who should remove themselves from the gene pool.

Very smart. Consider doing a little more reading and a little less sharing.

[Realist]

"Are these kids Asian, White, Hisp or what..."

You can probably guess white... it usually is when race isn't mentioned... plus it is in an affluent community... and they're trying to keep it a secret...

[Karen Stone]

COPING SKILLS have to be learned! As a parent of a truly brilliant child who attempted suicide I know that depression makes them into a completely different individual. I never understood real depression or "Perfectionism" until it struck our family. These children might not even be as pressured by their parents as you might leap to conclude. Our child was self motivated (siblings get B's) and couldn't handle the pressure of too many advanced classes combined with athletics. Now he has a psychologist that is teaching coping skills for the very type of students Gunn High School has. Those kids are the future and have the kind of minds that might cure cancer or save the world.