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Judge Tentatively Dismisses Case Against Lori Drew
Posted by
timothy
on Thu Jul 02, 2009 03:23 PM
from the gotta-state-a-proper-claim dept.
from the gotta-state-a-proper-claim dept.
An anonymous reader writes "According to Wired, 'A federal judge on Thursday overturned guilty verdicts against Lori Drew, and issued a directed acquittal on the three misdemeanor charges.'" A similar story in the L.A. Times notes that "The decision by US District Judge George H. Wu will not become final until his written ruling is filed, probably next week." Update: 07/02 21:15 GMT by T : For those not following, Lori Drew's three convictions sprang from charges of online harassment of Megan Meier, a Missouri teenager whose suicide was linked to Drew's actions.
Related Stories
[+]
Woman Indicted In MySpace Suicide Case 654 comments
longacre writes "The Associated Press is reporting an indictment has been handed down in the sad case of Megan Meier, the girl who committed suicide after receiving upsetting MySpace messages from someone she perceived to be her boyfriend. It was later determined the boy, Josh Evans, was a fictitious identity created by a neighbor of Meier's family. Lori Drew, of a St. Louis suburb, has been charged with 'one count of conspiracy and three counts of accessing protected computers without authorization to get information used to inflict emotional distress on the girl.' Interestingly, despite the alleged crime having occurred strictly in Missouri, the case was investigated by the FBI's St. Louis and Los Angeles field offices, and the trial will be held in Los Angeles, home of MySpace's servers. Wired is running a related story about the potentially 'scary' precedent this case could set."
[+]
Lori Drew Trial Results In 3 Misdemeanor Convictions 568 comments
grassy_knoll writes "As a follow up to an earlier story, the Lori Drew 'cyber-bullying' trial has resulted in misdemeanor convictions." grassy_knoll quotes from the AP story as carried by Salon: "The Los Angeles federal court jury on Wednesday rejected felony charges of accessing a computer without authorization to inflict emotional distress on young Megan Meier.
However, the jury found defendant Lori Drew guilty of three counts of the lesser offense of accessing a computer without authorization.
The jurors could not reach a verdict on a conspiracy count.
Prosecutors said Drew violated the MySpace terms of service by conspiring with her young daughter and a business assistant to create a fictitious profile of a teen boy on the MySpace social networking site to harass Megan.
Megan, who had been treated for depression, hanged herself in 2006 after receiving a message saying the world would be better without her."
Adds reader gillbates: "She now faces up to 3 years in jail and $300,000 in fines — a troubling precedent for anyone who has ever registered with a website under a pseudonym."
Submission: Judge tentatively dismisses case against Lori Drew by Anonymous Coward
[+]
Lori Drew Cyberbullying Case Dismissed 408 comments
Trepidity writes "About seven weeks after the judge tentatively overturned Lori Drew's guilty verdict for 'cyberbullying' following her online harassment of a teenager that was linked to the teenager's suicide, the case was finally officially dismissed. In a 32-page opinion (PDF), the court avoided a minefield of possible follow-on effects that civil-liberties groups had warned of by holding that merely violating a website's Terms of Service cannot constitute 'unauthorized access' for the purposes of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (18 U.S.C. 1030)."
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They should have found a more appropriate charge (Score:5, Insightful)
It will be interesting to see the public reaction to this.
It's the correct decision, but the emotional "she must pay" reactions are going to be pervasive.
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:5, Insightful)
I would have to disagree. What was done to this child was *not nice* but being a big fat meanie-head isn't illegal.
In the end, you are responsible for your own actions. If someone tells me that microshaft stock is going through the roof tomorrow and i buy in big only to see them tank...well too bad, so sad. There are, of course, exceptions for someone you employ who intentionally gives you known wrong information - but in that case you have a contractual agreement (verbal, virtual, or on paper) that they are violating.
If you want to criminalize lying or making someone feel bad I suggest you go lobby for yet another unenforcible law that will make the non-sheeple shake their heads.
I don't like what she did - it was a terrible thing to do - but I support a person's right to saw what they want no matter how much i disagree with it.
Parent
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:4, Insightful)
If tormenting children is against the law, then why wasn't she charged with that, instead of a "unauthorized access of a computer system" (breaking a EULA).
Parent
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:5, Insightful)
If tormenting children is against the law, then why wasn't she charged with that, instead of a "unauthorized access of a computer system" (breaking a EULA).
IANAL, but I see old men getting arrested several times a week on "To Catch a Predator" who never touched a soul and the jail bait they were supposedly talking to was not even true jailbait, but an undercover person (not even an officer) acting like jailbait. This woman, an adult, had a relationship with a child, a real child, assaulted her causing emotional distress and eventually contributing to the child's death. If I were the lawyer, I would have gone after her for pedophilia and assault on a minor (doesn't have to be physical) at the VERY least. In civil court, I would have gone after everything. I would have owned that bitch's grandkids!
So, like I said, IANAL, but whoever the lawyer was in this case was a friggin moron for not finding better charges to go after. Well, I guess he wasn't that bad since he won the first round. Who knew he'd get a bigger moron of a judge in the appeals court!!??!
Parent
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:4, Insightful)
No, being a "big, fat, meanie" is not illegal. Tormenting underage girls when you are an adult IS illegal.
Well, apparently not, because she wasn't even charged with that.
And what exactly would that even mean? How do you define "tormenting"? Drew's behavior doesn't even meet the standard of "harassment" or "spam", since the communications were engaged in voluntarily on both sides, and both Meier and her parents could have stopped them whenever they chose.
The conversations were under false pretenses. Saying that it doesn't meet the standard for "spam" is rediculous. If you are approached on MySpace, FaceBook or whatever site this happened on by a Nigerian Scammer, do you mean to tell me that they are acting legally?
She acted like a teenage boy with the intent of having a relationship with an underage girl. I see men get arrested weekly on "To Catch a Predator" that do much less than that.
Parent
Manslaughter (Score:5, Informative)
She engaged in a criminal conspiracy to harm someone which accidentally resulted in their death. That's manslaughter.
Parent
Re:The charges were all bogus (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:4, Insightful)
If we decide she can be imprisoned based simply on her speech, it's is not just her but we who will face the consequences.
Parent
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:5, Insightful)
If we decide she can be imprisoned based simply on her speech, it's is not just her but we who will face the consequences.
That's already been decided. To take the classic example, if you yell "Fire!" in a crowded theater, you are responsible for the consequences.
Parent
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:4, Interesting)
That's a horrible example, and you should be ashamed of yourself for using it. The case in question, if you care to do some research--did not involve a person shouting fire in a theatre. It did not involve anyone shouting fire. That quote came from a judge convicting a man of distributing communist leaflets. "Fire in a theatre" seems totally appealing to the average person--but the precedent it set was that politically unpopular speech was equivalent to inciting a dangerous panic.
Please--can we abolish the example of fire in a theatre forever more? In the eyes of the judiciary--it's equivalent to handing out fliers.
Parent
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:5, Insightful)
Then charge her for that. They basically decided to make up some bullshit about unauthorized access to a computer system and charge her with that.
The difficulty here is that killing oneself is generally considered to be an irrational action, and therefore it defies a typical causal relationship. Should this woman have known that her actions would cause the girl to commit suicide? Personally, I wouldn't think that anything I could do would make anyone else kill themselves. We've all acted cruelly to others, and had others act cruelly towards us, but still, most of us don't kill ourselves (and presumably nobody reading this has killed themselves). And when others do kill themselves, e.g. because a relationship ended, we're all quick to point out that it wasn't the fault of the other person. We acknowledge that the suicide victim had deeper issues and behaved abnormally to normal events.
It's hard to say what the case is here. Clearly adults should be held more responsible for their behavior toward minors, the same way they are for sexual assault, or providing substances to minors. The same should probably apply for harassment as well. If there's not already a law for this, then we can make one. But our goal should be to fix the problem(s), not to find vengeance. Vengeance is not a solution, and the respite it brings is virtually inconsequential. Nobody ever says that everything is better after a murderer is executed -- the healing process continues in the same way, as it must, whether they're executed, locked away for life, or escape to some third world country. It does bring a sense of order, in that people suffer the consequences of their actions, but that sense is only illusory anyway. Bad things happen to good people, just as good things can happen to bad people, and it's just something we have to accept at times. And when there's no law in place to punish certain actions, that's one of those times. The potential damages of writing laws that are effective retroactively far outweighs any benefit or solace we might find in "setting things right," particularly because it's not setting things right when we have to compromise our values in the process. In effect, we as a society bear some of the responsibility here for not having clearly defined such behavior to be off limits in the first place.
Parent
can you shout fire in a crowded theatre? (Score:5, Insightful)
no. but that's "simply speech"
well, actually, no, there is no such thing as "simply speech." there are plenty of things that you can write on the internet or issue from your mouth that should rightfully result in you being imprisoned
such as shouting fire in a crowded theatre
such as an adult
1. purposefully playing with the emotions of one specific child (not general rants on the internet)
2. a child she knows to have psychologically problems
3. over an extended period of time
4. directly suggesting suicide after manipulating, setting up, and torturing this child
that's not "simply speech". not REMOTELY "simply speech"
this is nothing like me calling gw bush a douchebag or advocating for greater acceptance of necrophilia or defending westboro baptist church or anything else that someone might object to but is obviously free speech. there are lots of free speech that are odious but not criminal
your opinion is invalid because its too broad, and does not consider how complicated the interplay between your rights and your responsibilities are in this world
no, you do not get automatic protection from the consequences of EVERYTHING you can possibly say
Parent
Re:can you shout fire in a crowded theatre? (Score:4, Insightful)
Is that really the only thing you anti-free-speech people can come up with? I mean, really... if I wanted to cause chaos and yelled "fire" in a crowded theater - assuming that people really did trample each other and get hurt, rather than just filing out in an orderly fashion or looking around, saying, "I don't see a fire. Where? What fire?" and then going back to their movie - I could always claim that I saw a fire, sorry about all that, don't know what happened to the fire...
Parent
say i develop a strange fascination about you (Score:5, Insightful)
over an extended period of time, i send to your email address explicit detailed accounts of how i am going to brutally murder you. i do this for months on end. i show you i know where you live on a map, i send you pictures of you getting in and out of your car, i send you pictures of your family
is that protected speech in your mind?
of course not, its stalking and harassment, and deserves to be punished
but all i did was communicate with you over the internet. its protected speech, right? bullshit
not all speech is protected. please understand that. what this woman did is like stalking and harassment cubed: it was pointed at a MINOR, a minor she KNEW had psychological problems, it lasted over an extended period of time, it involved lies, manipulation, setting someone up for a fall, suggestions of suicide
this is not shouting angry warped words at anyone in general or anonymous people you don't reallty know. thats free speech. but this is specific to one person, a crafted, tailored and dedicated long-term attempt at psychologically torturing a specific person, a minor, a minor with psychological problems the woman KNEW about
no, that's way, way, way beyond free speech, and it is criminal
the legal strategy the prosecuters used to try to punish this woman is retarded. i don't know why they just didn't go with some sort of laws pertaining to the psychological abuse of a minor
Parent
exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
its all about the consequences of your actions, cause and effect. free speech or not free speech is really just a sideshow to the real issue: responsibility
people are always clamoring for their rights... and promptly shut up when the subject matter of their responsibilities comes up. guess what folks? if no one takes responsibility, there are no rights in this world. rights and responsibilities are fused at the hip. for every right you are granted, you are also, implicitly or explicitly, describing a responsibility you take ownership of as well
explicit right: freedom of speech. implicit, unmentioned responsibility: you are responsible for the consequences of what you say. nothing protects you from that reponsibility. nothing. well, something DOES protect you from that responsibility... in a society that has no right to freedom of speech at all. if you have no rights, you also have no responsibilities. so exercise your fucking responsibilities in this world if you want to retain your precious rights
if you avoid responsibility, you weaken the entire right to freedom of speech, as you have demonstrated that you, at least, are incapable of maintaining the social environment in which your rights work. if you do not exercise your responsibilities, you add fuel to the argument that you don't deserve the rights you cherish. no, we all deserve the right to free speech, we just need a big wake the fuck up to the morons who don't know that freedom of speech carries with it a burden: responsibility for the consequences of what you say
if someone says gw bush is a douchebag, a zealot would say that terrorists gain support when this kind of dissent is demonstrated, and therefore, this kind of speech should be censored. which is of course completely bullshit cause and effect. the holes in that "logic" are like swiss cheese
but if someone picks on 1. one specific 2. mentally unstable 3. minor for 4. months on end, a clueless "free speech defender" would say what the woman did has nothing to do with the teenager's suicide, and therefore the woman shouldn't be punished. fucking bullshit. the woman psychologically tortured and harassed the poor girl to death. the cause and effect is obvious and real
avoid responsibility, and you erode your rights. remember that
Parent
she knew the girl was mentally unstable (Score:4, Insightful)
if i send you a rant saying you should kill yourself, and you do, my culpability is near zero because i don't know who you are, how old you are, what your mental state is, etc. i'm just an asshole
but this woman knew this girl. she knew she was a girl, she knew her mental state was unstable. she purposefully manipulated her and purposefully told her to kill herself after a long sustained period of purposeful manipulation
so when the woman acted, she acted with specific knowledge that if she manipulated the girl with a fake profile of a fake boy to get her interested, then suddenly switched it up as cruel as possible so as to cause the most mental trauma possible and said no boy would ever like her and she should just kill herself, this is pretty much murder because she KNOWS this kind of abuse has a good chance of actually making the girl kill herself
allegory: if you find a random person and scare them with a big BOO in the dark, and they die of a heart attack, you're an asshole, but not a murderer
however, if you KNOW the person you are going to scare and you KNOW they have a serious heart condition that a fright could push them into cardiac arrest... and you STILL scare them with a big boo in the dark and they die, then you are as a good as a murderer
see the difference?
if i drop rocks over a cliff randomly in the dark, in the middle of nowhere, and one kills a hiker, i'm pretty much innocent because i had no idea that would happen, and no one would expect me to know that would happen in the middle of nowhere
but if i look carefully for a hiker at the bottom of a cliff in broad daylight, and carefully aim the rock to hit the hiker, i'm a murdering piece of shit
that's the difference between free speech and what lori drew did
Parent
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:5, Informative)
Um, no she didn't, there was never *any* intent to drive Meagan to suicide.
Beyond that, Lori Drew wasn't even the one who wrote the messages that set Meagan off. Another teenager testified at Lori Drew's trial that she (the other teenager) had also had access to the account and had written the final messages.
Parent
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately, she needed to be charged with the right crimes. The Prosecutor thought he'd be cute by charging her with a bunch of computer crimes instead of going for boring old crimes like "harassment" or "criminal negligence causing death" or something like that. So she'll get to walk, in all likelihood.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
FTA, somebody else: signed up on myspace, created the profile, AND sent the last message to the teen. The person that actually PERFORMED the actions copped a deal for ZERO punishment.
And what she was charged with, because they couldn't charge her for anything directly related to the teen's suicide, so they charge that violating a site's TOS as a criminal offense? That's ridiculous.
Is she a bad person? Yes. But there wasn't any enacted law she broke, so there is no punishment the public can enforce, othe
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:HMMM? (Score:4, Insightful)
Teen girls are bags of hormones. Not surprising that one could be pushed over the edge. Especially by a devious, malicious, adult.
Hell yes the family should have been more involved in her life. But Lori Drew should not have been involved at all.
Who sought out whom?
Parent
Re:They should have found a more appropriate charg (Score:4, Insightful)
That's because a similar situation without a computer would have been manslaughter. (Homicide without intent.)
Being rude and offensive is not manslaughter.
The daughter was mentally ill and apparently suicidal; it was her parents' responsibility to keep her out of situations that would trigger a suicide.
Parent
As much as I would like to see her in jail... (Score:3, Insightful)
...she was convicted of the wrong charges.
She should have been charged with cyberstalking, stalking, harassment, something. Not for violating a website's terms of service.
That being said, this is one of those cases where I hope the family of the victim sues her for everything she has.
Re:As much as I would like to see her in jail... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:As much as I would like to see her in jail... (Score:5, Insightful)
The incompetent prosecuter screwed this one up big time
The "incompetent prosecutor" was limited by his jurisdiction. The crime, if there was one, happened in Missouri where the prosecutors declined to bring a case. The only way the LA prosecutor could get involved was if he forwarded a theory that the crime was against MySpace.
So, the LA prosecutor wasn't incompetent. Wrongheaded to try to bring the case at all, but not incompetent.
As for the Missouri prosecutor... Well, you know what they say: Missouri loves company.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
...she was convicted of the wrong charges.
She should have been charged with cyberstalking, stalking, harassment, something. Not for violating a website's terms of service.
Harassment would probably be appropriate.
That being said, this is one of those cases where I hope the family of the victim sues her for everything she has.
Despite the outcome, what she did really wasn't that horrible.
The fact of the matter is that this girl committed suicide because a boy that she liked (who was actually not real, but she never knew that) told her that the world would be better off without her.
Yes, it's strange for a grown woman to make a MySpace (or was it FaceBook?) account just to harass a kid... But let's be realistic here - all she did is call that girl names. That kind of stuff happens on a dai
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
No, she shouldn't be charged with anything. Charging her with one of the above is far beyond the intent or probably the letter of the law, or are so vague that anyone could be potentially charged with those crimes. We have enough crazy catch-all laws as it is, don't validate their existence just because hang a woman that did something you don't like.
The girl had emotional problems beyond just someone messing with her on the internet, and to be quite honest if your skin is so thin that you can't take being
Re:As much as I would like to see her in jail... (Score:4, Informative)
Double-jeopardy protection would apply. The whole point of double-jeopardy is to prevent exactly that: a prosecutor simply repeatedly trying charges until they find one that'll stick. I heartily approve of that idea. Yes, it means people walk away when the prosecutor screws up. The problem there isn't that the people walked away, it's that the prosecutor couldn't or wouldn't take the time to sort through the case and figure out what charges really did apply before going ahead with it.
Parent
Re:As much as I would like to see her in jail... (Score:5, Informative)
No, it prevents you from (among other things) being charged twice for the same act: "DOUBLE JEOPARDY - Being tried twice for the same offense; prohibited by the 5th Amendmentto the U.S. Constitution. '[T]he Double Jeopardy Clause protects against three distinct abuses: [1] a second prosecution for the same offense after acquittal; [2] a second prosecution for the same offense after conviction; and [3] multiple punishments for the same offense.' U.S. v. Halper, 490 U.S. 435, 440 (1989)." [lectlaw.com]
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Whatever you do, don't (Score:3, Insightful)
go to the St. Louis Post Dispatch website and read the comments. Whenever I begin to have faith in humanity, I go there and am reminded that I am surrounded by idiot racist filth.
But I love St. Louis. Really.
Re:Whatever you do, don't (Score:5, Funny)
I can take it. I've read some youtube comments and lost all faith in humanity already.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Rule of Law (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a raw that Lori Drew won't be held responsible for her actions, but I prefer not stretching and bending the law to meet an emotional need. New situations arise, people suffer, but hopefully some level headed evolution of the law can deal better with similar occurrences in the future.
That said, Lori Drew is an evil cunt.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You do have to ask yourself why a 50 year old woman is creating fake myspace accounts and luring underage girls into discussing things. If it was a man doing this it would be called grooming.
Re:Rule of Law (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a raw that Lori Drew won't be held responsible for her actions, but I prefer not stretching and bending the law to meet an emotional need. New situations arise, people suffer, but hopefully some level headed evolution of the law can deal better with similar occurrences in the future.
That said, Lori Drew is an evil cunt.
Instead of wallowing in how evil such people are (and I do not doubt that), why don't we instead teach young people that this is why you cannot base your life's meaning and your self-esteem on the writings of pseudononymous trolls? And then, instead of merely paying lip service to the concept, give them good examples of what it means to find those things from within by both celebrating and striving to be those strong individuals who understand this?
That would accomplish so much more than another two minutes hate.
Parent
Re:Rule of Law (Score:5, Insightful)
...why don't we instead teach young people that this is why you cannot base your life's meaning and your self-esteem on the writings of pseudononymous trolls?
Most of us do. As parents, we also teach them to be careful about what they post. However, young people are... well, young. And inexperienced. And not completely rational. Which is why we occasionally need to deal with older people, like Lori Drew, who should have known better.
Either way, what's done is done. As far as I'm concerned, Lori Drew was and still is a child abuser. She knew what she was doing and intentionally went out of her way to inflict suffering on a child.
Parent
Will she pay? (Score:3, Informative)
I think a Wrongful Death suit is appropriate.
Freedom of speech means (Score:3, Insightful)
It all worked out out in the end (Score:4, Insightful)
It all worked out out in the end. Ms. Drew is freed from the predations of an overzealous prosecutor while she has to live with her reputation tarnished. For the rest of her life people will be able to read about the terrible thing she did to that poor girl and shun her for it.
Thank Goodness (Score:4, Interesting)
Thank goodness that judges have the ability to overrule the jury (only in the favor of the defendant) when there is a serious miscarriage of justice being performed...
Haven't had much occasion to do it recently, but chalk up a win for the American justice system.
Of course I don't like her, but someone should never be found guilty of completely BS charges, even if they're guilty of something else.
Cyber-bullying isn't even a real word (Score:4, Insightful)
What she did could be called harassment, stalking, maybe even grounds for a wrongful death suit. Had she done this by phone, or snail mail, or paper airplane she probably would have wound up under one of those anvils. Instead, just because her evil-doing happened to be done through a computer the media feels the need to refer to it by a stupid made-up word, and the prosecutor feels the need to dig into some wacky interpretation of computer hacking law.
What's the result? This poor judge is forced to make a ruling that will make a lot of people angry, probably to the detriment of his own career, and let an evil woman go free. Guess what, he had to do this because of the shenanigans of the media and prosecution, fortunately he has the foresight to avoid setting a terrible precedent that violating ToS is "hacking."
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
A simple glance at TFA would have told you that:
Drew was accused of participating in a cyberbullying scheme against a 13-year-old girl who later committed suicide.
Re:Summary is lacking. (Score:5, Informative)
I don't get the feeling I know what Lori was charged with.
She killed Michael Jackson.
Parent
Re:Summary is lacking. (Score:5, Funny)
She's quite a Smooth Criminal then to be charged with this and be able to Beat It.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
As mentioned in the tags, this is a horrible summary. I don't get the feeling I know what Lori was charged with. Is it piracy? Is it shoplifting? Speeding? Drug charges?
She was charged with not RTFA, which is now a felony. Somebody get a rope!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
From the article:
Drew was accused of participating in a cyberbullying scheme against a 13-year-old girl who later committed suicide. The case against Drew hinged on the governmentâ(TM)s novel argument that violating MySpaceâ(TM)s terms of service for the purpose of harming another was the legal equivalent of computer hacking.
Sounds like they were trying to create the online equivalent of "disorderly conduct." That is, "we don't have any other crime to charge you with but we really, really don't like you, so have this generic charge instead."
Re:Summary is lacking. (Score:5, Informative)
She trolled someone to death.
Allegedly. Prior to the original verdict, even the girl's mother confirmed the she and her daughter had argued when her daughter tried to speak to her about the supposed boy who broke her heart. It was not directly after she received the message "the world would be better off without you" when the girl hung herself, but after an argument with her mother and her mother left for work.
I have no doubt that Lori Drew's actions were a contributor to the girl's behavior, but I don't believe it was the only catalyst.
Parent
Re:Summary is lacking. (Score:5, Insightful)
She trolled someone to death.
Allegedly. Prior to the original verdict, even the girl's mother confirmed the she and her daughter had argued when her daughter tried to speak to her about the supposed boy who broke her heart. It was not directly after she received the message "the world would be better off without you" when the girl hung herself, but after an argument with her mother and her mother left for work. I have no doubt that Lori Drew's actions were a contributor to the girl's behavior, but I don't believe it was the only catalyst.
What disturbs me significantly more is that a child can have such deep and painful psychological problems without a parent, or a teacher, or a neighbor, or a peer, noticing this and doing something about it.
It's sort of like the Columbine massacre. Those boys obtained guns and ammunition and assembled homemade bombs in their bedrooms without the parents even noticing that something wasn't right about them. If they did notice, they didn't step up to the plate and act like parents.
Do some parents really believe that they can be so uninvolved in the lives of minor children who really need their loving guidance without something bad happening? Does some disaster or massacre really have to take place before people decide that this is a really bad idea? I bet one person who really gives a shit can accomplish what hundreds of metal detectors could never do. Usually the subject is computer security when I say things like "we as a culture do not believe in prevention, in being proactive, or in exercising foresight" but things like this are sad reminders of just how deeply ingrained this character flaw really is.
Parent