Dr. G. Dick Miller, the psychologist used by the Ethan Couch's lawyers, defended his stance of sending the 16-year-old Texas teen responsible for killing four people to a treatement facility as a punishment on "Anderson Cooper 360".
Throughout the interview, which lasted close to an 30 minutes, Dr. Miller gave several un-clear explanations on how he managed to allow Couch, who stole alcohol from Walmart in June before the fatal drunk driving incident, to avoid jail time.
According to CNN, Cooper asked the doctor to explain the term affluenza. Miller said the word is not a medical diagnosis, but just a term he has used over the years to say "you have too much and you don't know how to distribute it."
Couch's attorney claim his affluenza "condition" stemmed from having wealthy, privileged parents who never set limits for him, CNN reported. Judge Jean Boyd agreed with the attorney's and gave Couch 10 years of probation with no jail time.
According to Suniya Luthar, a professor of psychology at Arizona State University, the term describes a situation usually found in upper-middle class families, where parents refuse to discipline their children. They also prevent school officials, law enforcement and the courts from disciplining the child too, CNN reported.
"There are families where very, very few limits are set at a time when they should be," she said, adding that by age 16, "the horse is out of the barn."
During the interview, Miller said he used his 30 years of experience to determine what he thought was best for Couch, and came up with the conclusion that his treatment facility in Newport Beach at $450,000 a year was the correct solution.
"Shouldnt justice and punishment play a role as well?" Cooper asked Miller during the interview.
"Anderson, I don't know," he said. "Every case is an individual case, and I don't have many cases where I think its in the best interest of the kid to be sent to the penitentiary."
When asked if he believes the sentencing is just, Miller said he does because Couch will have a "80 percent chance of becoming a full functioning citizen," instead of spending "two or three years in jail" even though prosecutors asked for a 20-year-prison sentence, according to CNN.
Atlanta psychologist Mary Gresham said youths who find themselves "suffering" from affluenza are actually suffering from impulse control problems, something she states is seen throughout all socioeconomic levels of families were limits are not set, CNN reported.
After Miller continues to state he and the Judge made the decision because they care about where the young teen ends up later on in life, Cooper points out Judge Boyd sentenced a 14-year-old African American boy who punched someone, causing them to hit the floor and die from a head injury, to jail for 10 years.
"Why should their be a separate system just because you have money?," Cooper insists, adding that the facility Couch is being sent to seems more like a vacation rather than any type of punishment facility.
"There is no punishment in this facility this is a top of the line rehab facility they have equine therapy, where he gets to ride horses, mixed martial arts, cooking classes," Cooper said. "I looked at his schedule every day of the week and its cooking classes, one on one nutritional counseling, mixed martial arts, gym equine therapy, he gets to ride horses, yoga, meditation, he could get beach and television access if hes on good behavior. How is that punishment in any form for killing four people?"
Miller insists the program is designed to keep teen boys away from everything they love, stating they will be "isolated from woman, xbx, TV, all the things that are important to them, not to us," adding that he is not interested in the amount of punishment Couch will receive.
"I'm interested in taking things that are important to him and replacing them with things in his best interest," Miller said.
Cooper tries again: "Your whole point is this young man has never had any consequences for his bad behavior. This doesn't seem to be any kind of a negative consequence for his killing four people."
Miller completely ignores the statement and begins to talk about the Judge's options for sentencing: juvenile detention or jail, to which Cooper chimes in and "Which is what happens to the vast majority of young people who kill other people."
"Shame on our Country for that," Miller said.
