Computer in Connecticut Gunman’s Home Yields No Data, Investigators Say

[ellisonz]

By JAMES BARRON and MICHAEL S. SCHMIDT
Published: December 17, 2012

Investigators have not managed to retrieve any data from a computer they took from the house where the gunman in the Newtown, Conn., school shootings lived with his mother because he had all but destroyed the hard drive, a senior law enforcement official said Monday.

“It looked like he took steps to damage it — he smashed it,” said the official, adding that the Federal Bureau of Investigation had joined the State Police in an unsuccessful effort to recover data that might lead to some understanding of what might have prompted the gunman, Adam Lanza, 20, to go on a rampage.

He began at his own house, shooting his mother, Nancy Lanza, with one of the five weapons that were registered to her there, and then moved to Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, where he killed 20 first graders and 6 school employees with a semiautomatic assault rifle. Some were hit 11 times.

But the official said it did not appear that Mr. Lanza had left any letters or notes that would offer a motive for the killings, or explain why he had targeted the school.

More: NYTimes Story

That he actively destroyed his computer suggests to me that he was not a complete non-social loner (although reports are that he did not have Facebook or other social media). Many of these other mass shooters who fit his profile had very active online lives. Moreover, the profile we have suggests he was highly intelligent. Who wants to bet that he had no involvement with right-wing hate, gun extremist, and conspiracy theory websites? I would just find it extremely odd that he did not find his way to those communities.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

1. Probably mentally ill with a 'mission'

to kill his mother and many school children. Something wound him up at home I expect?

[ellisonz]

2. I don't think it's likely that a domestic disupte spills...

...onto a random target. Furthermore, that his mother was so engaged in the gun culture suggests to me that he was immersed in it too. Why destroy his computer if there was nothing on it?

[Shivering Jemmy]

3. Why don't you think that's likely?

Gets mad kills his mom for something stupid. Figures he's dead anyway and decides he might as well go out as history's greatest mass murderer.


I can see it.

[ellisonz]

4. I think he'd be more likely to lash out at people...

...he had perceived as having done him wrong. Choosing the random target is terrorism - Adam Lanza wanted to terrorize society by killing those kids like that.

Again, if there was nothing damning on that computer, why destroy it? Also, it appears the mother was a prepper. You've got to wonder what the topic of dinner conversations were...

[Rosa Luxemburg]

5. I wonder

The fact that the mother was at the school and that he had been plotting this for some time to get revenge? One hears of children killing their parents for being angry at their grades.

[LisaL]

6. His mother didn't work at the school.

She wasn't working at all. She had large alimony payments from her ex-husband to live on.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

8. I thought it said that she was connected to the school

[ellisonz]

7. The mother was not at the school and had no connection to it.

She was killed at their home. It's been suggested that in all likelihood Adam Lanza may have attended Sandy Hook Elementary.

News reports on Friday suggested that Ms. Lanza had worked at the elementary school where the shooting occurred, but on Saturday the school superintendent said there was no evidence that she had ever worked there.

--------

Many of those who knew Ms. Lanza in Newtown were at a loss to describe what she did for a living. Her brother in New Hampshire said she had not been working, but had once been a stockbroker.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/16/nyregion/friends-of-gunmans-mother-his-first-victim-recall-her-as-generous.html