A Washington state psychiatrist concluded that a steroid-induced psychosis was responsible for the “roid rage” that caused a 250-lb former arena football player to violently force his way through airport security at the Tri-Cities Airport and run onto the tarmac to chase a departing Horizon Air flight 2103 to Seattle. Michael Rayfield Hodges proclaimed to be God during the airport security breach when he assaulted a female Transportation Security Administration and punched Port of Pasco Officer Jim Rohman. The former Arena Football League player for the Tri-Cities Fever was charged with first degree assault and two counts of third-degree assault (”Psychiatrist says ex-Fever player now competent to stand trial,” January 17).
His first trial is set Feb. 25 for a jail scuffle in November when Hodges is accused of biting off the fingertip of a corrections officer and repeatedly punching another officer in the face.
The second trial is March 11 for allegedly forcing his way into the Tri-Cities Airport’s secured boarding area four days earlier and hitting a Port of Pasco officer in the process.
State psychiatrist Dr. William H. Grant wrote in a report that Michael Hodges was an experienced anabolic steroid user who had used several cycles while playing in the Arena Football League and as a standout player at Idaho State University. Anabolic steroids never caused psychosis during his previous history of cycling steroids. But apparently, Hodges used a new, unfamiliar steroid for the first time and “did not anticipate its adverse effects.”
The so-called steroid-induced psychosis was so severe that it required treatment with anti-psychotic medications while institutionalized for six weeks at the Eastern State Hospital, a state psychiatric hospital in Medical Lake, Washington. Read more
