Why Riverton? Why now?FBI agent:Reasons rarely clear, even with hindsight

The Joplin Globe

April 23, 2006 01:06 am

— By Andy Ostmeyer
Globe Assistant Metro Editor
No easy answers. No easy solutions.
That's what Dwayne Fuselier concluded. Human behavior is complex, violence no less so, he said Friday.
That's the message he offered residents in Southeast Kansas who may be wondering how five of their sons, brothers and friends ended up being arrested, allegedly for plotting to shoot students and employees at Riverton High School.
"Everybody who was involved with Columbine was asking the same question. Why these kids? Why here? Why now? I don't think anybody has the answer," said Fuselier, of Denver, a psychologist and special agent for the FBI who was the agency's lead investigator following the Columbine massacre on April 20, 1999.
A few years ago, Fuselier joined a panel of experts who developed a way to assess school threats and intervene, and it identified behaviors, personality traits and family, school and social dynamics that could be associated with violence. The list included low tolerance for frustration, feelings easily bruised, poor coping skills, depression, narcissism, lack of empathy and more. Any of these traits, or several, also show up in students who are not violent, and who would never bring a weapon to school, let alone use it, the panel's report noted.
But these things are rarely clear, not even with hindsight.
"If somebody is looking for 'the' reason, as if there is one single reason kids do things, I think they are off base."
April 20
If there is a connection between what might have happened in Riverton and what did happen in Columbine, it could be the date. Both occurred April 20. And in both cases, students linked to the event allegedly showed a fascination with the Nazi Party.
A message posted on the Web site www.myspace.com last week urged students in Riverton High School to mark the anniversary of the birth of Adolf Hitler - he was born April 20, 1889, and his 50th birthday in 1939 was marked with goose-stepping Nazi pageantry - by wearing bulletproof vests. It was that message that prompted school officials to look into the issue.
Cherokee County Sheriff Steve Norman said some of those arrested in Riverton appeared to have a fascination with Hitler and Nazism. He also said that some material found in their school lockers was "very concerning and very dark."
Dr. Frank Ochberg, a Michigan psychiatrist who also studied Columbine, said there is no doubt the date was important for Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, who killed 13 people and wounded others before killing themselves at Columbine High School.
People who set out to do these things often choose a date they feel gives their act additional weight, and in the Columbine case, it could have been part of their fantasy to tie it to the Nazi Party.
"They want it to be part of something bigger than themselves," said Ron Doerge, a former Newton County sheriff, now retired, and what is bigger when it comes to violence and murder than the Nazi Party?
Doerge said there is not an organized neo-Nazi presence in the region, although there are what he called "wannabes."
Ochberg and Doerge said that, somewhere along the way, the line is crossed between fantasy and reality, and the "talking" stage escalates to the "doing" stage.
School bombing
Denver writer Dave Cullen, who covered the Columbine shooting seven years ago and is now working on a book about it, "A Lasting Impression on the World," believes the Columbine shooting was originally planned for one day earlier.
"The date was apparently originally supposed to be April 19. The sheriff's report state's that," he said.
That was the anniversary of the fire that engulfed the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, and the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995.
Cullen said there are no references to April 20 in the writings and tapes left behind by Harris and Klebold, but there are references to something happening on April 19.
"The most likely reason for the delay is having trouble getting the ammo," he said. They got that April 19.
Not concrete
Steve Davis, a Columbine investigator at the time who is now with the Police Department in Lakewood, Colo., said even that date - April 19 or 20 - will never be certain.
"We were never sure that the dates had any true meaning to them. I think they were aware of some things," he said, mentioning the date as Hitler's birthday. "There was also some speculation that they wanted to be close to, if not on, the date of the Waco or Oklahoma City bombings. I don't remember ever hearing anything that was concrete."
Fuselier agrees.
"Any answer to that question is at least partial speculation."
Jim Shires, spokesman for the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department in Colorado where Columbine is located, said investigators looked for links in that killing to Hitler and to Oklahoma City. While there may have been allusions to them, he said that's all there was.
But what happened in Columbine, for whatever reason, has spun off its own imitators, he said. Many contain references such as "Columbine-style" or "Columbine-like" or finishing the work of Klebold and Harris.
"We have been made aware of other events throughout the nation," he said. "Sometime in the month of April in general is when they start to pop up."
Conclusions of report
"Overall, the level of violence in American schools is falling, not rising."
"We know that students will continue to make threats in schools, and that most will never carry them out."
"Threats in schools are not just the schools' problem; therefore, neither is the solution."
Source: The School Shooter: A Threat Assessment Perspective

Copyright © 1999-2008 cnhi, inc.