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Mass Shootings: Driven by Evil or a Desire for Celebrity Status?

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If all a gunman, who opened fire and randomly killed nine people, wanted was 15 minutes of fame, he could have achieved this running naked into the field at a major league baseball game.

At least one criminologist believes that the driving force behind mass shootings is a desire for celebrity status. According to Adam Lankford, a criminologist at the University of Alabama, they want to be famous.

But this theory has holes. You don’t have to kill people to be famous, and since when are murderers treated like celebrities? Since when does celebrity treatment include prison food?

If it all came down to wanting to be famous, then why do these mass murderers always have troubled pasts, particularly a history of being victimized by bullying?

However, many criminologists do believe that most shooters are seeking infamy – even though, certainly, anyone who’s planning a shooting spree knows there’s a good chance they’ll get killed in the process – in which case, they won’t be alive to revel in their infamy.

In an attempt to prevent future mass shootings, the media has decided not to mention the killers’ names more than once, such as with the 2012 movie theatre slaughter in Colorado and the 2017 Las Vegas concert massacre.

This tactic has proved futile, given the shootings that occurred the first week of August 2019 in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio, plus many additional (smaller) shootings since 2012 and even 2017.

Nevertheless, supposedly the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooter kept a journal detailing decades of mass shooting events.

If a man has suffered a corrupt childhood and is seething with hatred towards people, feels no hope for his future and knows how to get an AK-47, or AR-15, do you really think that he cares whether or not his name is mentioned after a killing spree?

Sure, he’d like to gain a lot of notoriety – as long as he’s going to commit the deed. But notoriety isn’t the reason he wants to kill people.

Are killers born or made via childhood environment?

These killers may have come from “privileged backgrounds,” but a big house, a swimming pool in its backyard and tennis lessons can still be part of a childhood environment that’s conducive to creating a soulless, evil person who hates humans so much that he one day decides to shoot into a crowd.

We can argue till the cows come home whether or not years of bullying led to the Columbine massacre, or if while growing up El Paso murderer Patrick Crusius frequently heard his father rant that Mexicans didn’t deserve to live.

But at the end of the day, it really makes no sense that wanting to hear your name on CNN would make a well-adjusted man go on a homicidal rampage.

Robert Siciliano personal security and identity theft expert and speaker is the author of Identity Theft Privacy: Security Protection and Fraud Prevention: Your Guide to Protecting Yourself from Identity Theft and Computer Fraud. See him knock’em dead in this Security Awareness Training video.

Here’s What Crazy Mass Shooters Look Like

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Mass shootings. They happen so often these days, they are hardly making headlines, and when they do, they are soon pushed out of the news cycle thanks to what’s going on in the White House or in Russia. There are many red flags that show what crazy mass shooters look like.

Look at this:

According to reports, the Thousand Oaks shooter assaulted his track coach. The Florida high school shooter was accused of threatening, abusing, and stalking people he knew. People say that the Las Vegas shooter was verbally abusing his girlfriend while in public. What do you see here? A pattern.

The FBI is on the case here, but that’s hardly comforting due to the sheer volume of unstable people out there. Earlier this year, the FBI released a report that shows the “pre-attack behaviors” of people accused of or convicted of mass shootings. Here’s another takeaway: 63 percent of them were white, and 94 percent of them were male. The report concludes with a takeaway that shows a very troubling and complex view of the people who have failed to positively handle the stressors in lives. In addition, they all display several concerning behaviors, they plan and prepare, and they often share their intent to attack with others.

It often takes several people to spot every red flag that a potential mass shooter displays, according to the FBI. These flags often include violent behavior, abuse, bullying, and harassment. To get even closer to what a mass shooter looks like, take a look at the following stats:

  • 57% of shooters have shown “concerning” behaviors
  • 48% of shooters have talked about suicide
  • 35% of shooters have made threats
  • 33% of shooters have a history of physical aggression
  • 33% of shooters have anger issues
  • 21% of shooters have used firearms inappropriately
  • 16% of shooters have used violence against their partners
  • 11% of shooters have been accused of stalking

The FBI report also shows that most shooters spent at least a week planning their attacks, and they often give their family and friends some type of “preview” of what’s to come. If people do become concerned about a future mass shooter’s behavior, it’s rare for them to go to the police, and they often become targets of the shooter, themselves.

It’s easy to make a report, however, so if you feel that someone you know might have the makings to be a mass shooter and made threats, you can report this to the FBI online. Finally, there are 13 states where “red flag” gun laws are in place. This means that a person’s guns could be removed if they are showing a high risk of violent behavior. These states are:

  • California
  • Connecticut
  • Delaware
  • Florida
  • Indiana
  • Illinois
  • New Jersey
  • Maryland
  • Massachusetts
  • Oregon
  • Rhode Island
  • Vermont
  • Washington

Robert Siciliano personal security and identity theft expert and speaker is the author of Identity Theft Privacy: Security Protection and Fraud Prevention: Your Guide to Protecting Yourself from Identity Theft and Computer Fraud. See him knock’em dead in this Security Awareness Training video.

Should you take active Shooter Training?

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Gunman Storms Building, Shot Dead by Receptionist

Wouldn’t it be great to see a headline like this for once? More than ever, employees are being trained to react tactically should a gunman go on a rampage.

2BThere has to be a better way, for instance, to protect children in a classroom than the teacher diving between them and the bullets and getting killed. Being hailed a hero is no consolation to the family he or she leaves behind.

In Boston, active shooter training is taking place, says an article at myfoxboston.com. Todd McGhee, a former state trooper, is the instructor. He charges $150 per person for an hour. May sound like a lot, but think of all the ways someone can mindlessly drop $150 over one weekend.

Active shooter training is also offered by some private firms in most metropolitan areas. It’s catching on in this day and cyber-age when every public gunning incident seems to get news.

In a real life scenario, the victim has maybe less than two seconds to make a life altering decision: bolt, dive out a window, hide, put their body between the gunman and children (and often, this results in death), rushing the gunman, playing dead once the bullets start flying (this has actually worked), and who knows what else—like whipping a pistol out of your pocket and shooting back. Reasoning with the gunman has also worked, but these are truly exceptional cases.

In a workplace setting, often the gunman is a former employee. The grievance he has may be towards his boss or someone there he was dating or wanted to date but was rejected.

The myfoxboston.com article notes some risk factors for deviantly violent behavior including divorce, loss of the job, financial woes, being bullied and experiencing child custody issues. However…it stands to reason that anyone who’d bulldoze into a business or public setting and start shooting has at least several of these problems.

Though issues such as being passed up for a promotion, ridicule by coworkers, being recently fired and other workplace problems normally don’t turn employees into killers, these situations are a common thread among such gunmen.

Sometimes the most meek employee turns out to be the shooter, and employees need to learn how to respond with tactics, strategy and proven methods rather than with panic and screams.

Robert Siciliano personal and home security specialist to BestHomeSecurityCompanys.com discussing burglar proofing your home on Fox Boston. Disclosures.