Mychal Bell Says Suicide Attempt Was Due To Being Distraught Over New Charges

Bell talked to CNN about his suicide attempt. I may try to get in contact with his lawyer early next week to see what he says about it, since he granted me an interview before.

Mychal bell suicide attempt
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/01/15/mychal.bell/index.html?eref=edition_us

MONROE, Louisiana (CNN) -- Mychal Bell says he felt pressure to be perfect after his part of 2006's "Jena 6" assault case was over. When police alleged last month that he wasn't, the Louisiana teen took his Christmas money and sought a gun to kill himself.

Distraught after being arrested on suspicion of shoplifting and battery, the 18-year-old Bell says, he pointed the gun at his head and pulled the trigger.

The gun misfired, and he aimed at his chest and tried again. The bullet ripped through his body, and he fell to the floor of his grandmother's home in Monroe on December 29.

"It just got to the point where I just couldn't take it anymore," Bell, who is recovering from the wound, said in an interview with CNN...

"I just wanted to show everybody that I really wasn't the type of kid that everybody was making me out to be," said Bell, who worked out with his school's team even though he couldn't play in games. "Nobody will ever be perfect, but it's like that's where my mind was. You need to be perfect."

Bell said he felt people were constantly watching him, hoping he'd fail: " 'Just mess up, just mess up.' There was a lot of pressure on me..."

In his CNN interview in Monroe, Bell -- who is back in school despite being in pain from his wound and subsequent surgery -- didn't comment on the shoplifting allegations because the case is pending.

But he said he "cried every day" after the arrest and "could never get back right."

I personally think we have someone here who is somewhat criminally inclined, attracted to bad boy behavior; and yet though has tried to do better and often times succeeds, he retreats back into familiar territory impulsively.

But witnessing his farther's foul, abbrassive, reckless, and dishonest behavior the last year and a half; I again say he didn't have much of chance to start with. Hopefully he starts to take responsibility to rise above what he comes from to be a better man. He's grown now, it's on him. Talk about a guy running out of second chances.