Shots explode at a school in Oregon, a brokerage office in Atlanta, or a church in Fort Worth, and the nation is witness to another sudden, seemingly random violent rampage. Before the ambulances leave, the news crews arrive. The killers' neighbors, friends or families submit to interviews, and inevitably, they say something like this: "He just snapped."
But the killers do not just snap. An examination by The New York Times of 100 rampage murders found that most of the killers spiraled down a long slow slide, mentally and emotionally. Most of them left a road map of red flags, spending months plotting their attacks and accumulating weapons, talking openly of their plans for bloodshed. Many showed signs of serious mental health problems.But in case after case, the Times review found, the warning signs were missed: by a tattered mental health care system; by families unable to face the evidence of serious mental turmoil in their children or siblings; by employers, teachers and principals who failed to take the threats seriously; by the police who, when alerted to the danger by frightened relatives, neighbors or friends, were incapable of intervening before the violence erupted.
James Davis, whose co-workers had nicknamed him Psycho, warned his colleagues at a tool warehouse in Asheville, N.C., "If they ever decide to fire me, I'll take two or three of them with me." His employers did fire him, and feared he would respond with violence, but despite his threats, they failed to protect his co-workers when Davis returned to take his revenge.
In 34 of the 100 cases, however, families or friends of the killers desperately did try to find help for a person they feared was a ticking time bomb, but were rebuffed by police, school administrators or mental health workers.
Sylvia Seegrist caromed in and out of mental institutions 12 times in 10 years, while her parents searched for a residential program where she could stay in treatment. They knew she was dangerous. She had stabbed a psychologist, tried to strangle her mother, and had hidden a gun in her apartment. But each time, she was released from the hospital when she seemed to improve.
"We were always fearful that maybe some tragedy would happen," said Ruth S. Seegrist, Sylvia's mother. "She threatened it: 'Someday before I kill myself, I'll bring some people down with me."' Sylvia opened fire in a suburban Philadelphia shopping mall in 1985, killing three people and wounding seven.
In response to the recent spate of rampage-style mass shootings in schools, workplaces, stores and other public places, The New York Times re-examined 100 such violent incidents that occurred in the United States over the last 50 years. The Times gathered extensive information on all 100, and looked closely at more than 25 of the cases, a surprising number of which attracted little but local attention.
The examination included reviews of court cases, news coverage and mental health records, and interviews with families and friends, psychologists and victims, in an effort to glean what the people closest to each tragedy had learned. In some cases, reporters questioned the killers themselves.
Based on this information, The Times found that in 63 of the 100 cases (which involve 102 killers), the killers made general threats of violence to others in advance. Fifty-five of the 100 cases involved killers who regularly expressed explosive anger or frustration, and 35 killers had a history of violent behavior and assaults. They were so noticeably unstable that even in their very separate circles they had been awarded similar nicknames: "Crazy Pat," "Crazy John," "Crazy Joe."
And in 40 cases, family members and others said they noticed sudden changes in behavior in the period before the rampage.
"The more you find out about each of these cases, the more it makes sense," said Dewey G. Cornell, a clinical psychologist at the University of Virginia and director of the Virginia Youth Violence Project, which studies school safety and violence prevention. "This notion that someone just snaps is based on ignorance and denial," Cornell said. "People don't just snap. Pressures build up."
Many psychologists caution that it is impossible to predict violent behavior, and that most people who threaten violence never follow through. Often, it is only in retrospect that each killer's life appears to be a coherent chilling narrative foretelling obvious danger. Looking back, it is easy to marvel that people who knew the murderer could have failed to see it coming? In particular, how could so many psychiatric workers, and even police, have missed the warning signs?
In many cases, there was no single person in the potential killer's life to put together the lethal clues. Colleagues, friends, family members, mental health professionals, teachers and the police may have independently sensed something disturbing, but they did not communicate with one another. Frightened neighbors or co-workers decided it was safest to keep their distance. Friends laughed off homicidal talk. Parents did not know where to turn, or just hoped the irrational fury was merely a phase.
"It's like looking at the night sky," said Dr. Robert Granacher Jr., a psychiatrist in Lexington, Ky., who has examined the records of several rampage murderers. "If you only see one or two stars, you may not see the whole constellation. It's the same with these fragmentary bits of information; no one has the whole picture."
In the end, the review of these cases suggests that if people understood more about mental illness and connected the clues, many of these rampage killings could be prevented.