Standard Gravure shooting
[1] The murders resulted in a high-profile lawsuit against Eli Lilly and Company, manufacturers of the antidepressant drug Prozac, which Wesbecker had begun taking during the month prior to his shooting rampage.
[2] On September 14, 1989, Wesbecker, who was nicknamed "Rocky" by his colleagues, parked his car in front of the main entrance of Standard Gravure and entered the plant at 8:38 a.m., carrying a Polytech AK-47S, (a Chinese-made semiautomatic AK-47 derivative), a SIG Sauer P226 9mm pistol, and a duffel bag containing two MAC-11s, a snubnosed .38 caliber Smith & Wesson Model 12 Airweight revolver, a bayonet, and several hundred rounds of ammunition.
[2] He took the elevator to the executive reception area on the third floor and, as soon as the doors opened, he fired at receptionists Sharon Needy, whom he killed, and Angela Bowman, who he paralyzed with a shot in the back.
Searching for Standard Gravure's President, Michael Shea, and other supervisors and managers of the plant, Wesbecker calmly walked through the hallways, deliberately shooting at people.
He killed James Husband and injured Forrest Conrad, Paula Warman and John Stein, a bindery supervisor whom he shot in the head and abdomen.
Wesbecker then headed down the stairs to the pressroom, where he killed Paul Sallee and wounded Stanley Hatfield and David Sadenfaden, two electricians from Marine Electric who were working on a broken machine.
[2] Leaving his duffel bag under a stairwell, Wesbecker walked down to the basement, where he encountered pressman John Tingle who, alerted by the loud noises, went to see what was going on.
Wesbecker then returned to the pressroom, where he pulled out his SIG Sauer, put it under his chin, and shot himself, ending a shooting spree that had lasted for about half an hour.
[4] As a consequence he became increasingly reclusive and suicidal, separated from most of his family members and lived an overall lonely life, in whose center his work remained.
His request was declined, and he grew increasingly hostile against the new management, became wary of conspiracies aimed to harass him, and began to complain about policy changes at the company.
[9] The hostility culminated in May 1987, when Wesbecker filed a complaint with the Jefferson County Human Relations Commission, charging that he was being harassed and discriminated against for his psychological state and being deliberately put under stressful conditions.
[6] In August 1988, Wesbecker stopped working and was finally put on a long-term disability leave in February 1989, though there was also an agreement to re-employ him as soon as he recovered sufficiently.
[7] Shortly before the shooting at Standard Gravure, where he showed up the last time on September 13, Wesbecker presumably received a letter from the company, announcing the cancellation of his disability income.
The wounded and the families of those killed filed a lawsuit against the drug's manufacturer, Eli Lilly and Company, claiming that Wesbecker's use of Prozac contributed to his actions.
One of Eli Lilly's defences was that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had approved Prozac, to which the plaintiffs countered that Eli Lilly had failed to give the FDA accurate information about testing of the drug, including tests by the Federal Health Agency (BGA) in the Federal Republic of Germany.
Initially, trial judge excluded as irrelevant and unduly prejudicial evidence that Eli Lilly had in 1985 been found guilty of failing to report to the FDA adverse effects of Oraflex during testing, including deaths.
[17] Eli Lilly and its chief medical officer pled guilty to multiple criminal violations of various federal statutes and withholding evidence adverse to the drug, including 11 deaths in the US,[17] from the FDA.
