Latest / History Dark / The Childhood of the Sandy Hook Shooter
Transcript
- 0:02Speaker 1: They are some of the world's most notorious serial killers.
- 0:05Speaker 2: He was like a god when he had a corpse
- 0:07Speaker 2: at his plaything.
- 0:08Speaker 1: But were these psychopaths born evil, or did their mothers
- 0:12Speaker 1: make them into monsters? I'm Donald McIntyre, and I'm on
- 0:17Speaker 1: a quest to explore how some of history's most horrific
- 0:20Speaker 1: murderers were molded by their dysfunctional relationships with their mothers.
- 0:25Speaker 1: When it comes to people who are pathological, psychopathic, the
- 0:28Speaker 1: influence of the mother is absolutely dominant. I'll be piecing
- 0:32Speaker 1: together events in their childhoods and talking to criminologists and
- 0:36Speaker 1: psychologists to try to understand what motivated their monstrous crimes.
- 0:41Speaker 1: We had never come across a serial killer who'd killed
- 0:43Speaker 1: that many people. In this program, Adam Lanza, the lone
- 0:47Speaker 1: gunman from the Sandy Hook Massacre. In 2012, he shot
- 0:52Speaker 1: his mother four times in the head before storming a
- 0:55Speaker 1: Connecticut elementary school where he gunned down six adults and
- 0:59Speaker 1: 20 innocent young children. Was it his first victim, his mother,
- 1:03Speaker 1: who paved his path to murder?
- 1:06Speaker 3: She was the one person in his life who did
- 1:08Speaker 3: the most harm to him in not getting him the
- 1:11Speaker 3: help he needed.
- 1:12Speaker 4: He wanted to be number one, the number one mass shooter.
- 1:16Speaker 4: He wanted people to remember him.
- 1:47Speaker 1: Armed and merciless, spree killers become infamous by turning their
- 1:51Speaker 1: anger and resentment into deadly rampage. How could anyone open
- 1:56Speaker 1: fire on a group of 20 young schoolchildren? Ultimately, what
- 1:59Speaker 1: caused Adam Lanza to commit one of the most senseless
- 2:02Speaker 1: massacres in American criminal history? On the 14th of December 2012,
- 2:10Speaker 1: Adam Lanza committed one of the world's most shocking spree
- 2:14Speaker 1: shootings ever. at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.
- 2:20Speaker 3: Police have said that they thought the Sandy Hook shooting
- 2:23Speaker 3: was a well-planned attack by Adam Lanza. He pulled up
- 2:27Speaker 3: to the school, dressed in his military gear, heavily armed.
- 2:31Speaker 3: He blasted his way into the school, and within minutes,
- 2:35Speaker 3: he was going through classrooms and gunning down children.
- 2:43Speaker 1: Within 11 minutes of entering the school, Lanza had taken
- 2:46Speaker 1: the lives of six teaching staff and 20 first graders.
- 2:50Speaker 5: He walked past the older children to the younger children.
- 2:55Speaker 6: Why?
- 2:55Speaker 1: Because they're totally defenseless. After discharging 152 bullets, Lanza took
- 3:02Speaker 1: his own life. When police raided his home, they found
- 3:07Speaker 1: that he had killed his mother as she slept, shooting
- 3:10Speaker 1: her four times in the head.
- 3:15Speaker 6: Adam Lanza was the Hurricane Sandy of terrible tragedy.
- 3:21Speaker 4: He was this isolated kid who no one really paid
- 3:24Speaker 4: much attention to until December 14th.
- 3:28Speaker 7: He had a dark obsession and he wanted to do
- 3:30Speaker 7: what he did, but he also wanted a way out.
- 3:35Speaker 7: He took 27 other innocent people with him, which, you know,
- 3:40Speaker 7: is absolutely unspeakable.
- 3:45Speaker 1: What was the spark that ignited this terrible, fatal frenzy
- 3:48Speaker 1: on that morning of December 14th, 2012? And who's to
- 3:53Speaker 1: blame for the creation of Adam Lanza, one of America's
- 3:56Speaker 1: most shocking spree shooters? To find out, we have to
- 4:04Speaker 1: look back to his early childhood. Adam was born in
- 4:08Speaker 1: 1992 to father Peter and mother Nancy in New Hampshire.
- 4:14Speaker 1: The Lanza household was a loving one, and Nancy's focus
- 4:17Speaker 1: was firmly set on her two sons, Ryan and Adam.
- 4:23Speaker 8: Those two kids were her first priority in life, and
- 4:26Speaker 8: she's absolutely one of the best moms I ever knew.
- 4:30Speaker 1: But Nancy had a very particular approach to life.
- 4:34Speaker 8: Nancy was a perfectionist. Everything Nancy did, she did perfectly right.
- 4:39Speaker 8: Whenever she wrote me e-mails... Everything, the syntax, spelling was
- 4:43Speaker 8: always right on. If I screwed up and misspelled something,
- 4:46Speaker 8: she'd call me on it. So, don't you know how
- 4:48Speaker 8: to spell Mississippi? You know, so.
- 4:54Speaker 1: But not all was perfect with Adam.
- 4:58Speaker 3: As early as three years old, Adam was diagnosed with
- 5:01Speaker 3: developmental issues. He wasn't communicating with his peers. He wasn't
- 5:06Speaker 3: communicating well with his family. One of the people he
- 5:09Speaker 3: was having trouble communicating with was his mother. He didn't
- 5:12Speaker 3: show her affection. He rarely smiled. He didn't give her kisses.
- 5:17Speaker 3: He didn't give her hugs. And that was troubling to Nancy.
- 5:20Speaker 1: As with all children at this age, Adam was professionally
- 5:24Speaker 1: assessed to check on his progress.
- 5:27Speaker 3: It was in this birth to three program that the
- 5:29Speaker 3: flags were raised that there were issues involving his progress.
- 5:34Speaker 3: And they assessed him. They found that he had anxiety.
- 5:38Speaker 6: Adam didn't seem to not meet motor milestones like walking
- 5:44Speaker 6: and being toilet trained. But when language should have been
- 5:47Speaker 6: put in place, expressive and receptive language, there were problems.
- 5:53Speaker 3: He had developed his own language. When he was being
- 5:56Speaker 3: tested by clinicians early on, his mother was the one
- 6:00Speaker 3: who was trying to interpret his language.
- 6:03Speaker 1: Adam was also exhibiting some physical symptoms that indicated he
- 6:07Speaker 1: may have some issues.
- 6:10Speaker 3: He was banging his head against the wall and against desks,
- 6:16Speaker 3: and he was showing signs of frustration.
- 6:19Speaker 1: But was this a sign of serious problems?
- 6:23Speaker 5: Head banging is not that uncommon. Temper tantrums is not
- 6:26Speaker 5: that uncommon. Having behavioral problems early on in preschool and
- 6:33Speaker 5: in elementary school is really not that uncommon.
- 6:39Speaker 1: Adam's symptoms did perhaps suggest that he had some early
- 6:42Speaker 1: developmental issues, but it wasn't until he was a little
- 6:45Speaker 1: bit older that they became more obvious and extreme.
- 6:50Speaker 6: By the time Adam lands his five, his deficits are
- 6:54Speaker 6: becoming much more noticeable.
- 6:55Speaker 8: Adam didn't like to be touched. You know, you don't
- 6:59Speaker 8: shake his hand, you don't tussle his hair, you don't
- 7:03Speaker 8: pat his back and say, Atta boy.
- 7:05Speaker 6: His parents want answers. So they take him for an independent,
- 7:10Speaker 6: private neurological assessment. He was diagnosed with expressive problems, obsessive-compulsive disorder.
- 7:17Speaker 1: But what effect did this diagnosis have on the young Adam?
- 7:23Speaker 6: Adam was being pulled out of his regular class. And
- 7:26Speaker 6: we all know that children who are put into special
- 7:29Speaker 6: ed are stigmatized.
- 7:32Speaker 2: So here is Adam.
- 7:33Speaker 6: He's got deficits in his competency. He's also socially withdrawn,
- 7:38Speaker 6: and now he's being socially isolated.
- 7:43Speaker 1: But there was one social activity that Adam seemed to enjoy.
- 7:47Speaker 1: He attended Cub Scouts with his mother, Nancy, and it
- 7:50Speaker 1: was here where he first came into contact with firearms.
- 7:56Speaker 1: We would go shooting.
- 7:57Speaker 8: At the Cub Scout weekend, kids learned how to shoot.
- 7:59Speaker 6: 22s.
- 7:59Speaker 8: It wasn't just the 7-year-olds shooting.
- 8:02Speaker 6: 22s.
- 8:02Speaker 8: Now the 3- or 4-year-olds were there too, and so
- 8:06Speaker 8: I had an air rifle for them. I didn't feel
- 8:08Speaker 8: comfortable putting a. 22 in a four-year-old's hand.
- 8:10Speaker 3: There are a lot of people that have opinions about
- 8:12Speaker 3: children having firearms, but in some of the rural areas,
- 8:16Speaker 3: it's sort of a way of life, and it's sort
- 8:18Speaker 3: of seen as sport.
- 8:19Speaker 8: In my family, shooting, target shooting was considered a normal thing.
- 8:24Speaker 8: I did that regularly with my kids.
- 8:27Speaker 1: For Adam, target practice with his mom, Nancy, would become
- 8:30Speaker 1: a favorite hobby.
- 8:32Speaker 8: Adam loved shooting with us. His mother was there. He
- 8:36Speaker 8: felt safe, and it was fun. He was such a
- 8:39Speaker 8: little boy that he had a hard time holding the rifle.
- 8:41Speaker 8: But after a few tries, he got the hang of it,
- 8:44Speaker 8: and I thought, this kid's a natural.
- 8:51Speaker 1: Were Lanza's communication problems really a cause for concern? And
- 8:55Speaker 1: did his early introduction to firearms contribute to the terrible
- 8:59Speaker 1: events that were to come? Liz, if we're looking at
- 9:08Speaker 1: Adam Lanza as a young child, his early years, there's
- 9:11Speaker 1: some concern about some behaviours.
- 9:14Speaker 2: It's kind of.
- 9:14Speaker 9: Flagged up at this point that he's having issues communicating.
- 9:18Speaker 9: So his mum's having to kind of translate for him.
- 9:21Speaker 9: The evaluator can't really understand what he's saying, but that's
- 9:23Speaker 9: nothing unusual in itself. Lots of of children of that
- 9:26Speaker 9: age make up words and noises and that kind of thing.
- 9:29Speaker 1: No, I've had that with my own children, their own language,
- 9:32Speaker 1: and it's just kind of normal behaviour.
- 9:33Speaker 9: I think what stands out as significant for me is
- 9:36Speaker 9: the role of his mum in sort of constructing some
- 9:39Speaker 9: of these ideas about him. So she's the one that's
- 9:42Speaker 9: speaking for him, she's his advocate, and I think that's
- 9:45Speaker 9: a pattern that she follows throughout his childhood.
- 9:48Speaker 1: She's complaining that he's repeatedly banging his head at home,
- 9:51Speaker 1: he doesn't touch, but in school the teachers report him
- 9:55Speaker 1: an observer to be friendly and bright, with good social
- 9:57Speaker 1: language ability and a good sense of humour. These seem
- 10:00Speaker 1: like two different people, but this is one independently observed
- 10:03Speaker 1: by the teachers and the other reported by mother.
- 10:07Speaker 9: There's a real contrast there, isn't there? And I think
- 10:09Speaker 9: that becomes quite interesting.
- 10:11Speaker 2: In the years to come.
- 10:12Speaker 1: So he's introduced to firearms extraordinarily for anybody in this
- 10:16Speaker 1: side of the pond, you know, at the Cub Scouts.
- 10:18Speaker 1: But that's their normal. What troubles you about her fostering
- 10:22Speaker 1: such a strong interest in guns at this stage?
- 10:24Speaker 9: She's essentially sort of setting up an idea of what
- 10:27Speaker 9: it is to be a normal boy, to be a
- 10:29Speaker 9: normal man. That's very much come from Nancy's background of
- 10:32Speaker 9: living in that state and growing up with those cultural
- 10:35Speaker 9: beliefs around firearms.
- 10:37Speaker 2: It's a young lad.
- 10:37Speaker 9: Who's engaging in an activity that lots of families in
- 10:40Speaker 9: that part of the US engage in, So there's no
- 10:42Speaker 9: real warning signs at the moment.
- 10:46Speaker 1: Coming up, Nancy Lanza tells friends and family that she's
- 10:49Speaker 1: got a terminal illness and doesn't have long to live.
- 10:52Speaker 1: But this claim appears to be completely fabricated.
- 10:56Speaker 6: She was making up stories to help her get the
- 11:00Speaker 6: kind of emotional support she wanted.
- 11:03Speaker 1: On Friday morning, December 14th, 2012, Adam Lanza shot four
- 11:08Speaker 1: bullets into his mother's head as she lay in her bed.
- 11:11Speaker 1: By 9.30, he was at Sandy Hook Elementary School with
- 11:15Speaker 1: just one inexplicable goal on his mind, to kill as
- 11:19Speaker 1: many innocent and helpless adults and young schoolchildren as possible.
- 11:24Speaker 1: What drove this 20-year-old to commit one of America's most
- 11:27Speaker 1: heinous spree shootings? And was there anything in his childhood
- 11:30Speaker 1: that warned of the terrible events to follow? In 1998,
- 11:34Speaker 1: Adam's father, Peter, took a high-powered job meant the family
- 11:42Speaker 1: had to move to Newtown in Connecticut. Did dealing with
- 11:47Speaker 1: Adam's condition take a backseat as a result of the move?
- 11:52Speaker 5: The Lanza family were a middle class people. They were intelligent.
- 11:56Speaker 5: His father had a substantial job. You would think that
- 11:59Speaker 5: they would be aware of all of the resources.
- 12:02Speaker 3: The problem was that when he went from New Hampshire
- 12:05Speaker 3: to Connecticut, those records were never transferred over to Connecticut.
- 12:09Speaker 3: So when school officials were dealing with Adam in Connecticut,
- 12:13Speaker 3: they didn't really understand what he had gone through in
- 12:16Speaker 3: New Hampshire. So there was no way to tell whether
- 12:19Speaker 3: he was improving or getting worse.
- 12:22Speaker 1: By not actively pursuing treatment for Adam, was Nancy turning
- 12:26Speaker 1: a blind eye to her son's problems?
- 12:30Speaker 5: Many, many parents don't want to see their kids as
- 12:33Speaker 5: psychologically disturbed. They want to see it as just an
- 12:36Speaker 5: aberration or he has this problem or that problem. but
- 12:39Speaker 5: he's very bright and he'll outgrow it.
- 12:42Speaker 1: And so on. Was Nancy in denial of her son's
- 12:45Speaker 1: condition or was she simply distracted by other factors in
- 12:49Speaker 1: her life?
- 12:51Speaker 3: Peter Lonza in his new job was working many hours
- 12:54Speaker 3: and Nancy, who was no longer working, was home with
- 12:57Speaker 3: the children and it strained their relationship.
- 13:02Speaker 8: I maintained contact with her through e-mails. Peter was kind
- 13:06Speaker 8: of married to his job. He was kind of an alcoholic.
- 13:08Speaker 8: So she ended up being a single parent even when
- 13:11Speaker 8: she was married, I think.
- 13:14Speaker 6: Nancy has her own emotional issues and anxieties, and Nancy
- 13:18Speaker 6: wants to hear more than anything on earth that her
- 13:21Speaker 6: son has outgrown these issues and that he's fine.
- 13:26Speaker 1: With her marriage on the rocks, Nancy was beginning to
- 13:28Speaker 1: exhibit behavior that suggests she had serious issues of her own.
- 13:33Speaker 3: Nancy Lonza had been telling friends that she had a
- 13:36Speaker 3: terminal illness. She was telling them that she only had
- 13:40Speaker 3: a certain amount of time to live.
- 13:43Speaker 6: Nancy was obviously feeling a lot of anxiety, but instead
- 13:47Speaker 6: of getting help for what were real issues or emotional
- 13:50Speaker 6: issues going on for her, she conceptualized it as MS.
- 13:55Speaker 6: She had an awful lot going on for her. People
- 13:59Speaker 6: like that have a tendency to externalize their problems by
- 14:04Speaker 6: acting them out in physical symptoms.
- 14:08Speaker 1: The question was, were these claims of serious illness a
- 14:11Speaker 1: cry for help, or was Nancy just seeking sympathy and attention?
- 14:16Speaker 3: Investigators looked into that, and it was never determined that
- 14:20Speaker 3: Nancy Lonza actually did suffer from any sort of terminal illness.
- 14:24Speaker 6: She was making up stories to help her get the
- 14:28Speaker 6: kind of emotional support she wanted. I get a sense
- 14:31Speaker 6: that she was also very isolated, that there was a dyad.
- 14:35Speaker 6: It was Nancy and it was her son. And it
- 14:39Speaker 6: seemed to get more and more enmeshed and more and
- 14:43Speaker 6: more encapsulated as the years went on.
- 14:50Speaker 9: Nancy has various email exchanges with her old friends in
- 14:53Speaker 9: New Hampshire, saying that Peter's working incredibly long hours, the
- 14:56Speaker 9: job's very demanding, the burden of looking after the kids
- 14:59Speaker 9: is very much falling on me.
- 15:01Speaker 1: She's presenting herself as a victim. Now, Peter is perhaps
- 15:05Speaker 1: on a salary close to a million dollars a year.
- 15:07Speaker 1: This is not an underprivileged family. She can get all
- 15:09Speaker 1: the help she wants. But Adam's mood, when she gets unhappy,
- 15:14Speaker 1: Adam gets unhappy.
- 15:15Speaker 9: At this point in time, when Peter's working long hours,
- 15:18Speaker 9: when the relationship appears to be breaking down, the relationship
- 15:22Speaker 9: between Adam and his mum becomes quite intense at this point.
- 15:26Speaker 9: Adam becomes incredibly dependent upon her.
- 15:29Speaker 1: What does this say about Nancy Lanza, that she keeps
- 15:30Speaker 1: making these claims of a potentially phantom illness?
- 15:35Speaker 2: Well, when we look at.
- 15:36Speaker 9: People who are basically fabricating illnesses in themselves, we've got
- 15:40Speaker 9: to think about what are they trying to achieve by
- 15:43Speaker 9: doing this? Well, By telling somebody something like this, it's
- 15:46Speaker 9: very powerful. You're placing yourself in the role of a
- 15:49Speaker 9: victim and you're getting an awful lot of attention and
- 15:52Speaker 9: concern and sympathy towards your predicament or your supposed predicament.
- 15:57Speaker 9: I think Nancy's somebody who does have to very much
- 15:59Speaker 9: be at the centre of other people's attention, other people's concerns.
- 16:04Speaker 1: She is quite a character, Nancy, here. She's manipulating people,
- 16:08Speaker 1: it seems, all around her.
- 16:10Speaker 2: She knows everything.
- 16:11Speaker 9: The right things to say to the right people at
- 16:13Speaker 9: the right time.
- 16:14Speaker 2: But she's also very good.
- 16:15Speaker 9: At keeping people at bay and keeping people away. So
- 16:18Speaker 9: that's something that we continue to see as well.
- 16:24Speaker 1: By 2002, Nancy and Peter's marriage had struck a new
- 16:28Speaker 1: low and the couple decided to separate.
- 16:32Speaker 8: I think things started to crumble after that. She started
- 16:35Speaker 8: to lose hold of what she wanted to do most, just.
- 16:37Speaker 1: Be a good mother.
- 16:39Speaker 3: In essence, Nancy was raising her two sons in that
- 16:43Speaker 3: house alone. And that's a challenge for any parent. But
- 16:47Speaker 3: then she had this child who had serious special needs.
- 16:52Speaker 8: She was very private. She kept those things to herself.
- 16:56Speaker 8: I think that was an issue with her because when
- 16:58Speaker 8: the trouble started later, she didn't reach out to people
- 17:02Speaker 8: because that would have been admitting that there was trouble
- 17:04Speaker 8: that she couldn't handle.
- 17:07Speaker 1: As his parents' marriage disintegrated, Adam's problems, which had been
- 17:11Speaker 1: largely ignored by Nancy, seemed to be getting worse.
- 17:16Speaker 2: When he went into.
- 17:17Speaker 3: Middle school, he started to show signs of anxiety, depression.
- 17:21Speaker 3: He was obsessive-compulsive. He was washing his hands all the time.
- 17:26Speaker 5: He had to have his food presented in a certain way.
- 17:29Speaker 5: He had a germ-phobic type behavior and he couldn't touch things.
- 17:34Speaker 1: Were Adam's emerging problems in any way related to his
- 17:37Speaker 1: mother's issues?
- 17:39Speaker 8: Nancy told me once she felt guilty about some of
- 17:42Speaker 8: Adam's problems, she admitted to me that she had a
- 17:45Speaker 8: neurotic personality. And she said, I'm afraid that Adam inherited
- 17:49Speaker 8: this from me. He's a little bit neurotic like me.
- 17:54Speaker 1: But Adam's difficulties were much more serious, and Nancy was
- 17:58Speaker 1: finding it difficult to cope.
- 18:01Speaker 3: Nancy had to deal with those moments, those moments with
- 18:04Speaker 3: her child, and when she's dealing with him in that
- 18:09Speaker 3: moment of his anxiety. A person who might not be
- 18:12Speaker 3: as strong might just look to appease that person, to
- 18:16Speaker 3: just bring peace for that moment.
- 18:19Speaker 8: She was a perfectionist, and it wasn't allowable for her
- 18:22Speaker 8: to have a problem that way. Perfect parents don't have
- 18:26Speaker 8: problems with their kids.
- 18:29Speaker 1: But Adam did have problems, though Nancy was not prepared
- 18:33Speaker 1: to address them.
- 18:35Speaker 6: A child like Adam needs very clear and very strong limits.
- 18:42Speaker 6: But he's not going to like them. What child, normal
- 18:45Speaker 6: or otherwise, wants the law to be laid down to them?
- 18:48Speaker 6: So she has a child who's difficult to manage. She
- 18:52Speaker 6: finds out it's better to give in to him.
- 18:55Speaker 3: It's possible that Nancy didn't want to accept that Adam
- 18:59Speaker 3: had a mental health disorder. If he did have something
- 19:02Speaker 3: wrong mentally, perhaps it was she who was the driving
- 19:04Speaker 3: force behind that.
- 19:08Speaker 1: By now it's clear that Adam's mother's coping mechanisms were
- 19:12Speaker 1: not only perpetuating her son's issues, but were also creating
- 19:15Speaker 1: greater problems for Adam. In denial, Nancy was keen to
- 19:20Speaker 1: blame others.
- 19:23Speaker 3: One example is an email she sent to the school.
- 19:26Speaker 3: At the end of one of the school years, she said,
- 19:28Speaker 3: I'm hoping that next year Adam will be placed in
- 19:30Speaker 3: a classroom with a more casual feel to it. He
- 19:34Speaker 3: responds well to a nurturing environment, and I would like
- 19:37Speaker 3: his emphasis to be on learning rather than coping. He
- 19:41Speaker 3: focuses on his work, enjoys structure, and always adheres to
- 19:44Speaker 3: the rules, but a certain level of strictness seems to
- 19:47Speaker 3: bring an anxiety and depression.
- 19:50Speaker 5: She said he didn't like structure, he liked support, which
- 19:53Speaker 5: basically means leave him alone, because if you try to
- 19:56Speaker 5: instill some sort of structure or rules, he may get
- 19:58Speaker 5: explosive or may have a temper tantrum, and this is
- 20:01Speaker 5: one way to avoid that.
- 20:04Speaker 1: Nancy's desire to control every aspect of Adam's life kept
- 20:08Speaker 1: all professional help at bay.
- 20:11Speaker 6: There was ample evidence from the school that there were
- 20:14Speaker 6: problems with Adam, but every time they came up against
- 20:17Speaker 6: the mother, they really hit a brick wall.
- 20:23Speaker 1: How was Adam affected by his parents' separation? And how
- 20:27Speaker 1: did Nancy Lanza's approach to her son's issues cultivate more
- 20:31Speaker 1: problems at school? It appears at this stage, following the separation,
- 20:43Speaker 1: that Nancy begins to concentrate more on Adam's problems.
- 20:48Speaker 9: Yeah, she's going to the school and she's telling them
- 20:50Speaker 9: about the particular needs that he has. She's starting to
- 20:53Speaker 9: kind of give him a bit of a label at
- 20:55Speaker 9: this point as a child who needs special attention, who
- 20:58Speaker 9: needs kind of constant pandering to.
- 21:01Speaker 1: You know, if mother was overly concentrating or enjoying this
- 21:04Speaker 1: or magnifying this, to what extent would a kid like
- 21:07Speaker 1: Adam follow his mother's narrative?
- 21:10Speaker 9: Well, I think Adam's somebody who is basically trying to
- 21:13Speaker 9: please his mum at this point in time because there's
- 21:15Speaker 9: been this upset in the family unit. She's the one
- 21:18Speaker 9: kind of constant presence.
- 21:20Speaker 1: So at the moment, the school have really no choice
- 21:23Speaker 1: but to engage with the mother and she's a very
- 21:25Speaker 1: persuasive character. And she says he doesn't like being touched,
- 21:28Speaker 1: eye contact is difficult and he has, you know, strange
- 21:31Speaker 1: diets and has kind of some behavioural issues. And the
- 21:34Speaker 1: school can only take out a word.
- 21:35Speaker 2: Well, this is the thing.
- 21:37Speaker 9: We often do just take mother's word for it when
- 21:39Speaker 9: they report particular issues or.
- 21:41Speaker 2: Needs within their children.
- 21:43Speaker 9: And we've got to remember that Nancy Lanza is a white, middle-class,
- 21:46Speaker 9: wealthy woman. And she's incredibly assertive and she's incredibly domineering.
- 21:50Speaker 9: So coming up against somebody like that, even if you
- 21:53Speaker 9: did have your doubts as to what she was telling you,
- 21:56Speaker 9: it'd be very difficult to challenge her.
- 21:57Speaker 1: Nancy's email contact with the school really tells an awful
- 22:01Speaker 1: lot about her.
- 22:02Speaker 2: It does.
- 22:02Speaker 9: She says, well, Adam's done okay this year, but perhaps
- 22:06Speaker 9: you should have done this for him. He likes things
- 22:08Speaker 9: this way. He gets anxious if you don't do this,
- 22:11Speaker 9: that and the other. So she's been quite domineering again.
- 22:15Speaker 9: She's saying, these are the needs that my son has
- 22:18Speaker 9: and you should be attending to them. But at the
- 22:21Speaker 9: same time, she's not really doing much outside of.
- 22:24Speaker 2: That, is she?
- 22:25Speaker 1: Normal parents would be kind of seeking support in the community.
- 22:28Speaker 1: She could afford extra private health support or.
- 22:32Speaker 9: What's interesting for me at this point in time is
- 22:35Speaker 9: what's missing from this picture. There's quite a lot of
- 22:38Speaker 9: local support groups, but she really goes out of her
- 22:40Speaker 9: way to avoid these groups.
- 22:42Speaker 2: And I'm wondering why she's doing that. Is it denial?
- 22:45Speaker 2: Is it ignorance? Or is it something else altogether?
- 22:50Speaker 1: Coming up, 10-year-old Adam writes a storybook about a granny
- 22:53Speaker 1: and her son who go on a killing spree.
- 22:57Speaker 3: It was this first big revelation that Adam had. had
- 23:00Speaker 3: these violent tendencies and had these violent thoughts.
- 23:04Speaker 1: On the 14th of December 2012, Adam Lanza committed one
- 23:07Speaker 1: of the world's most shocking spree shootings. Heavily armed and
- 23:11Speaker 1: dressed in army fatigues, he shot his way into Sandy
- 23:14Speaker 1: Hook Elementary School. By 9.40 a.m., he had murdered 20
- 23:18Speaker 1: innocent young schoolchildren and seven adults, including his own mother.
- 23:23Speaker 1: Could anything have been done to prevent this fatal rampage?
- 23:27Speaker 1: And were there any red flags missed in the build-up
- 23:30Speaker 1: to this terrible crime. By the time Adam was 10
- 23:36Speaker 1: years of age, his schoolwork was already revealing a darker side.
- 23:43Speaker 6: Adam, by the time he gets into junior high school,
- 23:46Speaker 6: his thoughts and his fantasies are starting to take on
- 23:51Speaker 6: a very violent, a very angry, a very paranoid flavor.
- 23:56Speaker 1: And there was one particular piece of homework that should
- 23:59Speaker 1: have set alarm bells ringing.
- 24:03Speaker 3: The Big Book of Granny was about this homicidal elderly
- 24:07Speaker 3: woman and her son, and they would go around and
- 24:11Speaker 3: commit shootings.
- 24:12Speaker 2: And in one case, the victims were young children.
- 24:17Speaker 1: Towards the end of Adam's violent storybook, the character Granny
- 24:20Speaker 1: is killed by her son.
- 24:23Speaker 6: Granny is the nurturer who is being killed. by the
- 24:28Speaker 6: person she's nurturing. That's like a chilling rehearsal for what
- 24:32Speaker 6: he ultimately did in shooting his mother.
- 24:36Speaker 3: It was this first big revelation that may have showed
- 24:39Speaker 3: us our first signs that Adam had these violent tendencies
- 24:43Speaker 3: and had these violent thoughts.
- 24:45Speaker 1: But the shocking content of Adam's story was overlooked by
- 24:48Speaker 1: his teachers and his mother.
- 24:51Speaker 5: At age 10, if you write stories about killing people
- 24:54Speaker 5: and shooting people and all the rest, it should not
- 24:57Speaker 5: be rationalized or explained away as creative genius. A normal,
- 25:03Speaker 5: well-functioning 10-year-old should not be obsessed with violence, killing, and guns.
- 25:08Speaker 1: Should not be.
- 25:09Speaker 5: And if they are, that's disturbed.
- 25:13Speaker 6: Even in a normal child that is going through some stress,
- 25:17Speaker 6: you have an opening to be able to ask that.
- 25:20Speaker 2: Person, Why are you writing this?
- 25:22Speaker 6: What's going on for you?
- 25:23Speaker 2: What are you thinking?
- 25:25Speaker 1: Could Adam's killing spree have been predicted and prevented if
- 25:28Speaker 1: more attention had been paid to his violent stories?
- 25:33Speaker 6: We can't look at just one thing to say that
- 25:37Speaker 6: that's the ultimate red flag. But the book of Granny
- 25:42Speaker 6: was a really, really chilling precursor of where Adam Lanza's
- 25:49Speaker 6: mind and imagination was.
- 25:50Speaker 1: Going One of Adam's interests that featured heavily in The
- 25:57Speaker 1: Big Book of Granny was his clear obsession with firearms.
- 26:00Speaker 1: He and his mother Nancy had shot together since he
- 26:03Speaker 1: was a small boy, and the hobby had become an
- 26:06Speaker 1: integral part of their relationship.
- 26:10Speaker 3: Going to the shooting range was something that Nancy did
- 26:13Speaker 3: with Adam as a way to bond with him. It
- 26:15Speaker 3: was something that they could do where they could actually
- 26:19Speaker 3: spend some time together that was positive.
- 26:22Speaker 5: Perhaps the mother was so desperate to see some happiness
- 26:27Speaker 5: in Lanza that she did anything just to connect with
- 26:31Speaker 5: him at some level.
- 26:33Speaker 6: The appealing thing about shooting a firearm, you're not having
- 26:38Speaker 6: to interact with anybody. It's not like playing team sports
- 26:41Speaker 6: where you have to consult with your team players. It's
- 26:45Speaker 6: you and that gun and the target.
- 26:49Speaker 1: But why did Nancy support Adam's unhealthy An obsessive infatuation
- 26:54Speaker 1: with guns and shooting.
- 26:56Speaker 6: Understanding where a parent is coming from when they have
- 26:59Speaker 6: a disabled child.
- 27:01Speaker 2: They're frustrated. They're fearful.
- 27:04Speaker 6: She probably launched onto this herself as something that could
- 27:08Speaker 6: give Adam a sense of competence. A sense of being effective.
- 27:14Speaker 3: When you have a child who has these obsessive disorders,
- 27:18Speaker 3: that's what I think that raised so many red flags,
- 27:21Speaker 3: is that here's Adam Lanza, he has all of these issues,
- 27:24Speaker 3: and he's also being exposed to guns.
- 27:27Speaker 6: Nancy Lanza's enabling of her son's unhealthy interest in guns
- 27:34Speaker 6: and violence was one of many fatal errors that Nancy
- 27:39Speaker 6: Lanza was culpable of.
- 27:43Speaker 1: Liz, it seems to me that there is one big
- 27:46Speaker 1: red flag here, the book of Granny.
- 27:48Speaker 9: There's death within these stories, there's violence within these stories,
- 27:52Speaker 9: but it's not the kind of violence that you see
- 27:55Speaker 9: kids this age writing about.
- 27:57Speaker 1: For example, Dora says, I like hurting people, especially children.
- 28:03Speaker 2: It's quite disturbing, isn't it?
- 28:05Speaker 1: Granny falls out of the boat and Granny's son throws
- 28:07Speaker 1: her a cement flotation device. which forces her to sink
- 28:12Speaker 1: to the bottom of the lake.
- 28:15Speaker 9: And when we look at stories that children are writing
- 28:18Speaker 9: about this age, there is going to be violence in
- 28:21Speaker 9: some of them.
- 28:21Speaker 2: You know, it's inevitable.
- 28:23Speaker 9: But often it's a kind of righteous violence. It's a
- 28:26Speaker 9: story of good over evil. But this is something altogether different.
- 28:29Speaker 9: And it's incredibly dark.
- 28:31Speaker 1: This was actually binded. This is a parent had read
- 28:34Speaker 1: this and had put this together and sent Adam into
- 28:37Speaker 1: school with this book. So Nancy was fully aware of this.
- 28:40Speaker 9: There's obviously been some adult involvement in putting the text together,
- 28:44Speaker 9: in putting the cover on it.
- 28:46Speaker 1: Is Granny Nancy in this world? Is this the beginning
- 28:49Speaker 1: where we see this love-hate relationship between himself and his
- 28:52Speaker 1: own mother?
- 28:52Speaker 9: If we look at both of these situations, the book
- 28:56Speaker 9: and the kind of things he's doing outside school, there
- 28:58Speaker 9: is that link. So He's writing about guns. He's going
- 29:01Speaker 9: to shooting ranges with his mother. And his mum has
- 29:04Speaker 9: very much socialised him into that gun culture. Nancy is
- 29:08Speaker 9: really very much at the centre of Adam's world at
- 29:11Speaker 9: this point in time.
- 29:18Speaker 1: In September 2005, Nancy took the 13-year-old Adam to the
- 29:23Speaker 1: emergency room at Danbury Hospital in Connecticut in an attempt
- 29:27Speaker 1: to have him signed off schools. She reported he was
- 29:32Speaker 1: suffering increased levels of anxiety, an unusual complaint for Eeyore. Regardless,
- 29:39Speaker 1: the medical staff present attended to Adam.
- 29:43Speaker 6: The nurses and all the personnel on duty were noticing
- 29:46Speaker 6: that there was something very, very wrong, very aberrant in
- 29:49Speaker 6: this young man's behavior and perhaps in the dynamic with
- 29:52Speaker 6: his mother. And this was definitely a situation that required
- 29:56Speaker 6: more psychiatric assessment.
- 30:00Speaker 3: The medical professionals decided that Adam needed some help. They
- 30:04Speaker 3: felt that he needed to receive further counseling. They wanted
- 30:09Speaker 3: him to go on some medication.
- 30:12Speaker 1: But apparently, Nancy only wanted a sick note. She didn't
- 30:16Speaker 1: want to accept that her son needed urgent psychological help.
- 30:21Speaker 3: Nancy didn't even want to keep him at the hospital.
- 30:24Speaker 3: At one point in the visit, she felt that the
- 30:26Speaker 3: visit was making him more anxious. So instead of keeping
- 30:29Speaker 3: him at the hospital, they actually left.
- 30:33Speaker 1: Was this another missed opportunity to help her son? Reluctant
- 30:41Speaker 1: to hand Adam over to the health care system, Nancy
- 30:43Speaker 1: agreed to take him to a community psychiatrist.
- 30:49Speaker 3: Nancy's belief that she could help Adam more than the
- 30:53Speaker 3: clinicians was bolstered by one psychiatrist who she relied heavily on,
- 30:58Speaker 3: for Adam's treatment. But the question has always been, was
- 31:01Speaker 3: that psychiatrist placating Nancy and telling Nancy what she wanted
- 31:06Speaker 3: to hear about Adam?
- 31:11Speaker 1: But Adam's father, Peter, was not satisfied with the opinion
- 31:14Speaker 1: of the community psychiatrist. He sent Adam to be diagnosed
- 31:19Speaker 1: by leading professionals at Yale University's Child Study Center.
- 31:26Speaker 6: He was assessed at Yale, and they really hit the target.
- 31:31Speaker 6: And they raised a lot of red flags, and they
- 31:34Speaker 6: came in with a recommendation for a very comprehensive treatment program.
- 31:40Speaker 3: That visit was a pivotal moment in Adam's life where
- 31:44Speaker 3: this is going to be it. This is the moment
- 31:46Speaker 3: where he's going to get the help he needs.
- 31:48Speaker 2: He's got an.
- 31:48Speaker 3: Audience of doctors here that see this child as someone
- 31:52Speaker 3: who really needs help.
- 31:54Speaker 1: But tragically, Nancy refused to follow doctor's orders.
- 31:59Speaker 3: She was so busy trying to make him happy that
- 32:02Speaker 3: she couldn't listen clearly to the people that really could
- 32:05Speaker 3: get him to be happy.
- 32:08Speaker 6: That is some of the saddest part of the story
- 32:10Speaker 6: because I firmly believe that there would be a good
- 32:14Speaker 6: chance that we would not be talking about Adam Lanza
- 32:17Speaker 6: and his tragedy now if that comprehensive treatment plan had
- 32:21Speaker 6: been followed.
- 32:23Speaker 1: By the time Adam was 14, Nancy had put a
- 32:26Speaker 1: stop to all prescribed medical treatment and therapies. Not only that,
- 32:31Speaker 1: she also took the decision to isolate Adam from the
- 32:34Speaker 1: education system.
- 32:35Speaker 3: So by eighth grade, she had withdrawn him from school
- 32:39Speaker 3: and he became homeschooled.
- 32:42Speaker 7: She felt he would be calmer and in a better
- 32:45Speaker 7: environment at home where he could feel more in control
- 32:48Speaker 7: and maybe she could, you know, control the environment as well.
- 32:53Speaker 3: Back at home, isolated from the people he should be with.
- 32:56Speaker 2: As a teen.
- 32:57Speaker 3: He's just in the world that involves Nancy and Adam.
- 33:02Speaker 6: Nancy Lanza, she was an intelligent woman. She'd been dealing
- 33:06Speaker 6: with his behavior all his life. I believe deep down,
- 33:11Speaker 6: she had an absolute terror that something was drastically wrong,
- 33:16Speaker 6: but she couldn't face it.
- 33:21Speaker 1: With Nancy's refusal to pursue therapy or medical treatment for Adam,
- 33:25Speaker 1: was he now completely isolated? What's the significance of this
- 33:36Speaker 1: visit to ER? I mean, she had problems with Adam,
- 33:39Speaker 1: but why take him to ER?
- 33:40Speaker 9: She says he's been suffering with anxiety. He's been washing
- 33:43Speaker 9: his hands a lot. Look at him, he's hyperventilating. And
- 33:47Speaker 9: the doctors take her incredibly seriously. And I don't think
- 33:50Speaker 9: she'd anticipated, actually, that the help that would be offered
- 33:54Speaker 9: up at that particular point in time. They offered to
- 33:57Speaker 9: put all of these things in place for her.
- 33:59Speaker 2: And she turns around to them and says, no, it's OK.
- 34:02Speaker 2: All I need you to do is to just sign
- 34:04Speaker 2: him off school.
- 34:05Speaker 1: She doesn't want the specialist help. She's renouncing it. And
- 34:08Speaker 1: this is a pattern we've seen with Nancy is when
- 34:10Speaker 1: she's given opportunity to get experts in, she kind of
- 34:12Speaker 1: renounces them or only takes them in. when she can
- 34:15Speaker 1: manage the situation.
- 34:16Speaker 9: Yeah, I think this has got a little bit out
- 34:18Speaker 9: of control for Nancy Lanza at this point in time.
- 34:21Speaker 9: She's been offered an awful lot of help, which could
- 34:23Speaker 9: be incredibly intrusive. And she's saying, it's OK, I don't
- 34:26Speaker 9: want it, all I need is a note.
- 34:28Speaker 1: If she had taken that intervention, then it may have
- 34:31Speaker 1: gone down an entirely different path.
- 34:33Speaker 9: It may well have done, but I don't think she
- 34:35Speaker 9: wanted to invite that level of scrutiny into Adam's life
- 34:38Speaker 9: at that point in time.
- 34:39Speaker 1: It's quite significant with Nancy that she goes to get
- 34:42Speaker 1: the answers that she wants to get.
- 34:44Speaker 9: She does find a community psychiatrist who does agree to
- 34:48Speaker 9: sign Adam off school for the rest of that academic year.
- 34:50Speaker 9: She's now removed him from school and that's what she
- 34:53Speaker 9: wanted to happen here.
- 34:54Speaker 1: The greatest significance is that age 14, this is the
- 34:58Speaker 1: end of all significant therapy. medication and intervention for Adam Lanza.
- 35:03Speaker 9: Yeah, this is the end of the road, isn't it?
- 35:05Speaker 9: I think any kind of options for further medical treatment
- 35:08Speaker 9: have been firmly closed off by his mum.
- 35:13Speaker 1: Coming up, Adam cuts off all contact from those around him,
- 35:16Speaker 1: including his own mother, and the virtual world he inhabits
- 35:20Speaker 1: becomes increasingly sinister.
- 35:23Speaker 4: He wanted to be number one, the number one mass shooter.
- 35:26Speaker 4: He wanted people to remember him.
- 35:28Speaker 1: On the 14th of December, 2012, Adam Lanza murdered his
- 35:31Speaker 1: mother and 26 other people, including 20 young children at
- 35:36Speaker 1: the Sandy Hook Elementary School. What drove this socially inept
- 35:40Speaker 1: 20-year-old to commit one of America's most shocking school massacres?
- 35:44Speaker 1: And is there anything his mother could have done to
- 35:47Speaker 1: stop him in his murderous tracks? Now in his mid-teens,
- 35:53Speaker 1: Adam was being homeschooled by his mother, Nancy. But had
- 35:57Speaker 1: she made the right choice in isolating him from his
- 36:00Speaker 1: peers and the outside world?
- 36:03Speaker 6: Nancy Lanza believed that she could protect her son. I
- 36:08Speaker 6: think she saw him as this sweet, fragile genius that
- 36:13Speaker 6: needed to be saved from the outside world.
- 36:17Speaker 7: She typically did not have a lot of visitors, probably
- 36:20Speaker 7: because of Adam. He liked to keep to himself, and
- 36:24Speaker 7: I think With that, she tried to accommodate that aspect
- 36:28Speaker 7: of him and didn't have too many people.
- 36:31Speaker 1: In the home.
- 36:33Speaker 6: Mental illness is the last frontier of medical science. It's
- 36:38Speaker 6: the last frontier of prejudice and stigma.
- 36:43Speaker 1: By now, Adam's family was completely fractured.
- 36:47Speaker 4: Didn't talk to his father, hadn't talked to his father
- 36:49Speaker 4: for a couple of years. His father was pretty much
- 36:52Speaker 4: out of the picture other than financially He didn't talk
- 36:54Speaker 4: to his brother. Ryan had moved on. He was working
- 36:58Speaker 4: in New York. Really came home.
- 37:01Speaker 1: Nancy had completely isolated her son.
- 37:04Speaker 6: There was now no hope that Adam was going to
- 37:09Speaker 6: remain attached to people. She was really putting Adam in
- 37:14Speaker 6: this seclusion, in this bubble where his crazy world became.
- 37:20Speaker 4: The only world.
- 37:24Speaker 1: Completely blocked off from the outside world, Adam is now
- 37:27Speaker 1: spending all of his time in his bedroom playing violent
- 37:30Speaker 1: video games behind blacked out windows. Despite living in the
- 37:34Speaker 1: same house, he and his mother are now only communicating
- 37:37Speaker 1: by email.
- 37:40Speaker 3: He was involved in these violent games and that's all
- 37:42Speaker 3: he saw. He saw these games that led to the
- 37:46Speaker 3: highest number of shots and the biggest number of kills
- 37:49Speaker 3: and how he could become sort of the master of
- 37:51Speaker 3: the killed.
- 37:52Speaker 1: He took his interest in killing very seriously and spent
- 37:56Speaker 1: a great deal of time researching mass murderers and spree
- 37:59Speaker 1: shooters online.
- 38:01Speaker 3: Editing mass killer entries on Wikipedia, he would take great
- 38:06Speaker 3: pains to describe the firearms that these killers used.
- 38:10Speaker 4: How many they killed and when their shootings were and
- 38:12Speaker 4: what kind of guns they used.
- 38:14Speaker 3: If some of the entries didn't depict the actual weapon
- 38:19Speaker 3: as it was in accuracy or if it didn't have
- 38:21Speaker 3: the correct ammunition tied to the weapon, he edited those
- 38:25Speaker 3: entries and he wanted it to be absolutely accurate.
- 38:31Speaker 6: Adam Lanza's isolated more and more from the normal general community,
- 38:36Speaker 6: but he's now found another community. He's found a community
- 38:41Speaker 6: of like-minded spree killer enthusiasts. So now he can tell himself,
- 38:47Speaker 6: I'm normal. This is what all these people believe in.
- 38:52Speaker 1: But this was far from normal.
- 38:55Speaker 6: It's placing him square in the middle of a really
- 38:58Speaker 6: horrible and dangerous reality, which is becoming more real to
- 39:02Speaker 6: him than what's outside.
- 39:05Speaker 3: Adam was isolated in his room, door locked, windows blocked
- 39:11Speaker 3: with black plastic bags.
- 39:15Speaker 6: Nancy Lanz's denial, in my opinion, has tipped over to
- 39:20Speaker 6: the point of being Abuse.
- 39:23Speaker 2: Abuse of her son.
- 39:24Speaker 6: If you love your child, I could see you having
- 39:27Speaker 6: difficulty accepting his disabilities. But on the other hand, how
- 39:32Speaker 6: do you allow him to live in this self-imposed dungeon?
- 39:37Speaker 1: Perhaps Nancy had become frightened of Adam's mental state. His
- 39:43Speaker 1: online posts did indicate he was experiencing dark, disturbing thoughts.
- 39:48Speaker 3: In referencing mass shootings at one point, he did say,
- 39:51Speaker 3: I don't question why there are mass shootings. I question
- 39:56Speaker 3: why there aren't more mass shootings.
- 40:00Speaker 6: In Adam Lanz's really tortured and twisted mind at that point,
- 40:05Speaker 6: the more he thought about it, the more he obsessed
- 40:07Speaker 6: about it, the more he was going to have to
- 40:10Speaker 6: do it.
- 40:13Speaker 1: Now completely lost in a world of isolation that his
- 40:17Speaker 1: mother helped create, Adam was on the edge. Suddenly, Nancy
- 40:23Speaker 1: announced she intended to move with Adam to Seattle.
- 40:29Speaker 7: She thought it would be a good move for Adam,
- 40:33Speaker 7: perhaps even for herself, to get something new, a fresh start.
- 40:38Speaker 6: Adam Lanza could not do change. Mentally disturbed, autism spectrum
- 40:43Speaker 6: people cannot do change.
- 40:44Speaker 2: They can't adapt.
- 40:46Speaker 6: She didn't discuss this with Adam. He had a cocoon
- 40:50Speaker 6: around him, his own little world. And now she was
- 40:54Speaker 6: saying to him, adapt, move. That would be a lot
- 40:59Speaker 6: for any young person. Adam saw this as cataclysmic. This
- 41:03Speaker 6: was something he could not deal with.
- 41:12Speaker 1: On the morning of the 14th of December, 2012, 20-year-old
- 41:17Speaker 1: Adam Lanza finally reached breaking point.
- 41:22Speaker 3: He fatally shot his mother while she was in her bedroom.
- 41:27Speaker 3: Then he got in the car and he drove to
- 41:30Speaker 3: Sandy Hook Elementary School wearing military gear, earplugs, and heavily armed.
- 41:36Speaker 4: The school had a doorway that had to be buzzed in,
- 41:40Speaker 4: and so he just shot out the window right next
- 41:43Speaker 4: to it and walked in that way.
- 41:46Speaker 1: The first person he encountered was the school principal.
- 41:50Speaker 3: He gunned her down as well as others and proceeded
- 41:54Speaker 3: to go through the classrooms.
- 41:57Speaker 4: He systematically went into the classrooms that he could get
- 41:59Speaker 4: into and just fired as many shots as he could.
- 42:03Speaker 5: He wanted to kill as many people as he possibly could,
- 42:07Speaker 5: as many children as he possibly could.
- 42:09Speaker 1: He shot 152 bullets and then he killed himself.
- 42:12Speaker 4: 911, state police, can I help you?
- 42:18Speaker 8: There's a shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.
- 42:21Speaker 4: What school, ma'am?
- 42:23Speaker 3: Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown.
- 42:25Speaker 4: Turbate all eight cars.
- 42:28Speaker 2: Turbate all eight cars.
- 42:29Speaker 6: Be advised, Newtown has an active shooter.
- 42:32Speaker 4: We knew fairly quickly that something bad had happened.
- 42:38Speaker 1: With police units now on the scene at Sandy Hook,
- 42:41Speaker 1: the magnitude of what had just occurred began to sink in.
- 42:45Speaker 4: One of our reporters, his daughter was a teacher who
- 42:48Speaker 4: was killed. Substitute teacher who was killed.
- 42:56Speaker 1: Police quickly sent units to the Lanza family home.
- 43:00Speaker 4: The doors were locked. No one answered. They actually sent
- 43:03Speaker 4: a robot into the house in case it was wired
- 43:06Speaker 4: for explosives. And that's when they discovered that Nancy was
- 43:10Speaker 4: dead in her bed. She had been shot with a.
- 43:13Speaker 4: 22 rifle that they found on the ground near her bed.
- 43:19Speaker 1: What caused Adam Lanza to commit such an unspeakable crime?
- 43:24Speaker 1: And how much blame can we attribute to his mother, Nancy?
- 43:35Speaker 9: I think Nancy Lanza played an absolutely central role in
- 43:38Speaker 9: creating the monster that Adam Lanza would.
- 43:41Speaker 2: Come to be.
- 43:42Speaker 9: I think she erected this barrier around him from a
- 43:45Speaker 9: very young age.
- 43:45Speaker 2: So even when there.
- 43:46Speaker 9: Was the opportunity for other people to intervene and to
- 43:49Speaker 9: make things better, they.
- 43:50Speaker 2: Weren't allowed in.
- 43:52Speaker 1: Nancy's proposing to move, which was kind of a sense
- 43:55Speaker 1: of destabilising Adam's life. At the same time, she seems
- 43:58Speaker 1: to be retreating from Adam's world, from the monstrous creation
- 44:03Speaker 1: that she has moulded.
- 44:05Speaker 9: She's gone from being very much attached to Adam and
- 44:09Speaker 9: enmeshed with Adam to wanting to really remove herself from
- 44:12Speaker 9: that situation. So I think she's getting tired of playing
- 44:15Speaker 9: that role as a mother manager, as the person who
- 44:19Speaker 9: is looking after this very troubled teenager. She doesn't want
- 44:22Speaker 9: to be that person anymore. So she starts looking for
- 44:26Speaker 9: an exit plan.
- 44:27Speaker 1: On that day, he decides to go and commit murder. Mm-hmm.
- 44:33Speaker 9: And the fact that his mother is his first victim,
- 44:36Speaker 9: I think, is incredibly significant.
- 44:38Speaker 1: I wonder, now, why wasn't killing his mother sufficient?
- 44:42Speaker 9: I think what's happened here is, in killing his mother,
- 44:45Speaker 9: you know, Adam has kind of entered this different reality.
- 44:49Speaker 9: This is somebody for whom the line between fantasy and
- 44:51Speaker 9: reality is becoming increasingly blurred. And I think when Adam
- 44:55Speaker 9: is looking for control, he retreats into that fantasy world.
- 44:59Speaker 9: Some of the reports of his behaviour during the shooting
- 45:02Speaker 9: spree say that he was behaving in a way.
- 45:04Speaker 2: Similar to a shooter in a violent video game.
- 45:07Speaker 9: He was reloading his weapon when he didn't need to
- 45:09Speaker 9: reload it because there were bullets already in there. He
- 45:11Speaker 9: was quite mechanical and quite controlled. So I think in
- 45:15Speaker 9: going and perpetrating this shooting spree, he is kind of
- 45:18Speaker 9: immersing himself in fantasy, but unfortunately that fantasy is all
- 45:22Speaker 9: too real.
- 45:23Speaker 1: Liz, to what extent do you blame Nancy Lanza for
- 45:26Speaker 1: her son's crimes?
- 45:27Speaker 9: Well, I think we can put a lot of responsibility
- 45:30Speaker 9: in her hands because I think she constructed the environment
- 45:33Speaker 9: in which Adam Lanza, the spree killer, emerged.
- 45:39Speaker 1: The Sandy Hook massacre is a tragedy that will be
- 45:42Speaker 1: mourned forever. The horror of 20 young schoolchildren being gunned
- 45:46Speaker 1: down in cold blood will never be forgotten. They had
- 45:52Speaker 1: their entire lives ahead of them. Birthdays, graduations. weddings.
- 46:01Speaker 6: Every juncture, something was missed. If the school had referred,
- 46:05Speaker 6: if the community psychiatrist had seen this, if the father
- 46:09Speaker 6: had become more involved, if, if, if.
- 46:32Speaker 7: Thank you.