Matt Cahill killed for profit, but bodybuilding.com still gives awards to his products

[muriel_volestrangler]

Sports supplement designer has history of risky products

Umm, USA Today, that ought to read "history of deadly products", if you had any idea of how to put the essentials of a story into the headline

Over the course of a nearly 12-year career, Cahill has continued to launch new and risky products, flourishing in the $30 billion dietary supplement industry as federal regulators struggled to keep up with his changing series of companies, a USA TODAY investigation has found. Some who took his steroid suffered liver damage while others who consumed the weight-loss pills ingested a chemical that had been banned for human use in the 1930s after users went blind.

Cahill's latest best seller, Craze, was named 2012's "New Supplement of the Year" by bodybuilding.com. The pre-workout powder promises "endless energy" and has come under increasing scrutiny over the past year. Lab tests by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, a government-affiliated lab in Sweden and industry competitors have detected undisclosed amphetamine-like compounds in samples of what's labeled as an all-natural supplement and sold in GNC stores and on a variety of websites, including Walmart's and Amazon's.
...
"It's sort of like he has a license to kill with impunity, to wreak havoc without any consequences," said Frank Hole, whose 17-year-old daughter, Leta, died in 2002 after taking an intentional overdose of weight-loss pills that actually contained a highly toxic chemical pesticide banned for human use. Federal investigators later determined she'd bought them from Cahill's Internet business at the time: designerlabs.com.

The pills Leta bought contained DNP, an industrial chemical used in explosives and as a pesticide. The compound gained brief popularity in the 1930s as a weight-loss drug that promised to safely melt fat away — until consumers started developing cataracts, going blind or dying. Up to 2,500 may have lost their sight from "dinitrophenol cataracts," according to one estimate cited in an FDA research paper.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/07/25/bodybuilding-supplement-designer-matt-cahill-usa-today-investigation/2568815/

[shenmue]

1. Glad I don't take any supps now

Just vitamins. None of the crazy stuff anymore.

[ceonupe]

2. Notice right off the bat

The girl in the story intentionally took an overdose in attempt to take her life. Does not look like dad will get much in a lawsuit

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. Kaching! This is about money to you too, huh?

Cahill put an insecticide, banned for human consumption, into his product. So what that she took an 'overdose'? Since it was an unregulated 'diet pill', there is no such this as an 'overdose', anyway. The existence of his product was an 'overdose', because he had deliberately put a poison into it, to sell it to gullible people. (the DNP capsules sold by Cahill's business "did not bear labeling containing adequate directions for use or adequate warnings against use." - well, adequate directions would have been a big POISON sign, and instructions for safe disposal).

Frank Hole, however, isn't asking for money, but trying to get this killer to stop, because he has some human decency:

Prosecutors forwarded letters from the girl's parents to the judge in the case, records show. Copies of the letters, shared by the Holes with USA TODAY, said that: "Any chance for survival that Leta might have had was eradicated by the defendants' failure to identify the DNP and dosage in the pills."
...
Leta Hole's parents said if they could deliver a message to Cahill, it would be to stop.

"Think about the pain you're causing," Frank Hole said. Bonnie Hole added: "Stop before you ruin somebody else's lives. It's not just us, and it's not just our family. It's affecting a lot of people."

The story establishes that Cahill is an immoral asshole who care for money above human life. I'm amazed at a reply that is about whether a father can get money for the death of his daughter 11 years ago.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

6. Contains DNP, a chemical compound used in...

That is not the same thing as putting pesticide in his product. Should this guy be stopped? In my view, yes. If they can find criminal activity and put him away, great.

Banning this stuff because it was used in a suicide is like banning razor blades because they're used in suicides.

[muriel_volestrangler]

7. No, the stuff *is* a pesticide. They stopped the pills in 1938 - up to 2,500 people went blind

The USA Today article says it is a pesticide; so does the EPA:

2,4-Dinitrophenol is used in the manufacture of dyes, wood preservatives, and as a pesticide. The acute (short-term) effects of 2,4-dinitrophenol in humans through oral exposure are nausea, vomiting, sweating, dizziness, headaches, and loss of weight. Chronic (long-term) oral exposure to 2,4-dinitrophenol in humans has resulted in the formation of cataracts and skin lesions, weight loss, and has caused effects on the bone marrow, central nervous system (CNS), and cardiovascular system.

http://www.epa.gov/ttnatw01/hlthef/dinitrop.html

It's used in explosives, according to the USA Today article.

Warning about 'fat-burner' substances containing DNP

Urgent advice has been issued by the Food Standards Agency to the public, and to people in the bodybuilding community in particular, following the deaths of two people believed to have taken a ‘fat-burner’ substance in tablet or powder form.

The substance contains DNP (2, 4-dinitrophenol), an industrial chemical known to have serious short-term and long-term effects, which can be extremely dangerous to human health.

The Food Standards Agency is therefore advising consumers not to take any product containing DNP at any level. This chemical is not suitable for human consumption.

http://www.food.gov.uk/news-updates/news/2012/nov/dnp-warning#.UfPhOm2tyBp

Why are you in favour of poisons for human consumption? Seriously, I know that sounds like "why do you hate America?", but it really does seem to be the message of your "like banning razor blades". This stuff is poisonous at any concentration. Since one of the first effects is weight loss (which is, primarily, a bad symptom for any ingested substance), an unscrupulous fraudster like Cahill can put it in 'weight loss pills'.

[The Magistrate]

5. Damn, Fella, You Are Just Everywhere There Is A Chance To Sound Like A Jerk....

[BlueToTheBone]

4. When will he do the perp walk? n/t

[flvegan]

8. Oh, brother.

I won't comment on the suicide, because I won't stoop to that, but it shows what the author will stoop to.

I'm a "natural" bodybuilder. See those quotes? That means I won't touch gear, but I'll use pre/post workout and other supplements to give me an edge, all legal, but knowing that a chemical is doing it (semantics, anyone?). However, I wouldn't touch anything within a certain amount of time before a contest because the nannies that test those competitions pick up everything. I'm shocked and amazed someone ingesting meat/dairy hasn't tested positive for growth hormone yet. How is creatine not banned yet, anyway? Therefore, it almost pains me to see someone in the article whining about failing a test after taking one.

Lets see, someone whining about Superdrol. Really? If you took Superdrol, you knew what it was. I never touched that shit because I won't touch gear. Nobody, NOBODY buys anything they read about in a bodybuilding mag that's $1/pill expecting it's not a prohormone/steroid precursor. But I don't know, maybe someone didn't have Google. Or the internet at all for that matter. And accidentally picked up a bottle of Superdrol and took 4 of them thinking they were BCAAs. Methyl 1-T, that's cough syrup, right? Sigh.

Regulate the industry? Yeah, a little more would be good. Don't put big pharma in charge of it or they'll just ban everything that works and they aren't getting a piece of *cough* ma huang *cough* Excuse me. Even more so, Lord above people, study shit before you put it in your body. If you're taking chances, don't bitch when it goes wrong.

Oh, fuck it. We can't possibly be trusted to knowingly maintain ourselves. Ban alcohol, smoking, fast food, pork (bye bye, bacon!), dairy, eggs, sugar, coffee...nevermind, the list is too long. Here's what you can all have, you foolish lot. Enjoy a diet of only high potency blue green algae slurry with hemp protein shakes. Live it up!

Yeah, Cahill is a dick. I won't deny that, but the article is about something much bigger than that one idiot. Know what you're putting in your body, folks, and if you're going to use supplements for physical advantage, know who is behind it.

[muriel_volestrangler]

9. You think saying Cahill sold a poisonous substance, having lied to obtain it, is 'stooping'?

It goes right to the heart of why Cahill is not just a 'dick', but a continuing danger to the public, and anyone who enables him, such as bodybuilding.com, are not just 'dicks', but are putting their readers at risk. To have not described her death would have been a cover-up.

Cahill has a record of lying about the contents of his products, and of those products poisoning the consumers - death through hyperthermia, liver failure. In the original case, he knew it was a substance banned in 1938 for causing blindness, and he used a false name and a cover story to obtain it. This was not just carelessness - he went to great lengths to obtain poison, and then sell it for human consumption. No, the article is about Cahill; but he's not an 'idiot' - he's a man that has caused great illness, and did so purely for money, knowing he was dealing with a dangerous substance in one case, and not caring at all in the subsequent ones.

" If you took Superdrol, you knew what it was"

In 2005? Everyone knew that it caused liver failure then, a year after Cahill put it on the market? You think that pointing out your liver failure is 'whining'?

I have to say, "study shit before you put it in your body" is a remarkably libertarian attitude. Do you really expect people to be doing their own animal experiments to work out what might make them, go blind, or cause liver failure? And that the guy who made hundreds of thousands from this shit is just a 'dick' and 'idiot'?

[flvegan]

10. I'm saying

that leveraging someone's suicide to bolster your point that a supplement "killed someone" is pretty low. But feel free to rearrange my words to meet your sentiment any time.

Yes, if you bought/took Superdrol then you knew what it was. Methasteron was just the next tweak in designer "steroids" that worked much the same as the real stuff, so to speak. Same risks, and anyone that knows steroids, knows that the orals are tougher on the body. Lastly, the label had plenty of warnings. I'd be interested in hearing the cycle/doses that were being used. They seem to always fail to mention that.

As for any "remarkably libertainian attitude" I'll consider the eye of the beholder on that. I expect people to read a label and not just willy-nilly ingest shit they find at GNC or on some website. If you really don't know any better, ask your doctor...like the label suggests. Research the ingredients at least. Know the company that is making the product. Normally, stories like this aim higher than at the most recently caught-red-handed shithead and go after the industry (and bodybuilding.com, et al).

Put Cahill in jail if he's done as alleged. I'd be happy to see it. "Anyone who enables him" I don't know about that. That's a pretty slippery slope if we mean to apply that across the board and not just selectively.