A former NFL player who fatally shot six people before taking his own life in South Carolina this year had «unusually severe» stage 2 CTE, a brain disease linked to head injuries, a Boston University neuropathologist said.
During a Tuesday news conference, Dr. Ann McKee said Phillip Adams,32, had an extraordinary amount of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) pathology in both frontal lobes of the brain. The disease is characterized by an unusual buildup of a protein called tau. Severity of the disease is categorized in four stages based on the amount and location of the tau buildup in the brain. Stage 4 is the most severe. McKee stated that Adams’ pathology was similar to that of former NFL player Aaron Hernandez, who died by suicide while in prison for murder. McKee had evaluated Hernandez’s brain for the disease. «Mr. Adams’ CTE pathology was different, however, from other young NFL players with CTE. It was different in that it was unusually severe in both frontal lobes,» she said. In its frontal lobe predominance, Adams’ CTE pathology was similar to that of Hernandez,27. The disease can only be diagnosed after death. According to McKee’s analysis released in 2017, Hernandez was found to have Stage 3 CTE, which is commonly associated with cognitive and memory loss, as well as behavioral changes and impaired judgment.
