Military sniper links his string of armed robberies to PTSD

Military sniper links his string of armed robberies to PTSD
After serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, Gabriel Brown came home to an emptier life in Florida.
At his sentencing for a two-week crime spree, he pleaded for clemency.
LA Times
David Zucchino
February 3, 2014

Gabriel Brown, who served as an Army sniper in
Iraq and Afghanistan, pleaded guilty in Florida
to a string of robberies and cite
 post-traumatic stress disorder.

TAMPA, Fla. — As an Army sniper in Iraq and Afghanistan, Gabriel Brown craved danger. Combat satisfied what he called his "adrenaline addiction."

When he returned home to Florida, nothing in civilian life provided the sense of invincibility that made combat so alluring and vital. The sniper was now a nursing student. There was a hole in his life, but he found a way to fill it: robbing banks.

He robbed with a military flair. On Feb. 5, 2013, Brown whipped out a gun and tossed an M83 military smoke grenade during a robbery of a TD Bank branch in Auburndale, Fla., that netted $19,000. It was his final crime in a two-week string of robberies that targeted banks, a cellphone store and an insurance company.

Brown was arrested the next day on federal charges that carry a mandatory minimum sentence of 32 years to life. He quickly confessed.

"It was extremely hard for me to find a way to go from being in highly threatening situations, risking my life every day, to sitting at home watching TV alone," he wrote later. "The adrenaline I got from committing robberies was some kind of weird addiction I so desperately needed to get myself out of this depressive state I was in."

Like thousands of other combat veterans, Brown was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. And like thousands of PTSD veterans seeking reduced sentences for crimes, he blamed the condition, in part, for his actions.

Increasingly, veterans across the U.S. have cited stress related to their combat experience as the reason for civilian misdeeds, a tactic that often reduces or even eliminates sentences for minor crimes, especially in special veterans' courts.

"It's a growing trend, with the stigma of PTSD largely eliminated and the condition more widely understood," said David Frakt, a law professor and Air Force Reserve military legal officer.
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