Mass shootings: why do authorities keep missing the warning signs?
While almost all the public passion in the wake of the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, has centered on guns and the proliferation of military-style assault weapons, experts and policy analysts in law enforcement have been haunted by a different but equally troubling question: why do we keep making the same mistakes?
The missed warnings were particularly egregious in the case of Nikolas Cruz, the disaffected former student who returned to Parkland’s Marjorie Stoneman Douglas high school on Valentine’s Day and gunned down 17 students and teachers. The local sheriff’s office was first warned two years ago that Cruz was thinking of shooting up the school, and the FBI twice received specific warnings that it failed to follow up or pass on.
Such failures, however, are hardly unique to the Parkland case.
Omar Mateen, who killed 49 people and wounded 58 others at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando in June 2016, had previously been the subject of a 10-month FBI terrorism investigation.
Esteban Santiago, who killed five people and wounded eight at the Fort Lauderdale airport in January 2017, had walked into an FBI office in Alaska with a loaded handgun magazine two months earlier and reported having “terroristic thoughts”.
Devin Kelley, who killed 26 people at a church outside San Antonio, Texas, last November, had been kicked out of the air force following a conviction and prison sentence for domestic violence, but the air force forgot to notify the National Criminal Information Center so he would be prevented from buying firearms in future.
The missed warnings were particularly egregious in the case of Nikolas Cruz, the disaffected former student who returned to Parkland’s Marjorie Stoneman Douglas high school on Valentine’s Day and gunned down 17 students and teachers. The local sheriff’s office was first warned two years ago that Cruz was thinking of shooting up the school, and the FBI twice received specific warnings that it failed to follow up or pass on.
Such failures, however, are hardly unique to the Parkland case.
Omar Mateen, who killed 49 people and wounded 58 others at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando in June 2016, had previously been the subject of a 10-month FBI terrorism investigation.
Esteban Santiago, who killed five people and wounded eight at the Fort Lauderdale airport in January 2017, had walked into an FBI office in Alaska with a loaded handgun magazine two months earlier and reported having “terroristic thoughts”.
Devin Kelley, who killed 26 people at a church outside San Antonio, Texas, last November, had been kicked out of the air force following a conviction and prison sentence for domestic violence, but the air force forgot to notify the National Criminal Information Center so he would be prevented from buying firearms in future.
Source:
theguardian
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