Texas Mass Murder Update
Texas Mass Murder (Update)
By
Edward Blackwelder, B.A., M.P.A., D.D.
The death toll following the mass murders at Fort Hood, Texas now stands at 13. Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, an Army psychiatrist who counseled troops and was upset about being deployed to Iraq, opened fire on a crowd of soldiers at Fort Hood Army base Thursday afternoon.
Hasan is a U.S. citizen born in Virginia to Jordanian parents, was wounded by a civilian police responding to a shooting rampage that is the worst ever on a U.S. military base. (Lt. Gen. Robert Cone)
Hasan graduated from Virginia Tech and spent six years working at Walter Reed Medical Center in Washington, D.C., before relocating to the Fort Worth area. After graduating from Virginia Tech Hasan received two degrees from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland. A review of Hasan’s academic records shows that he took a number of elective classes in weapons training, which seems a bit unusual for a psychiatrist. Hasan received poor grades for his work at Walter Reed and was not happy about his overall situation at Fort Hood where he apparently felt like he didn’t fit in, according to U.S. Representative Michael McCaul, R-Austin.
More than six months ago Hasan became suspicious to the federal law enforcement authorities due to Internet postings and various other threats. As I write this blog investigators are attempting to confirm that Hasan was the originator of the postings, one of which was a blog that equates suicide bombers with a soldier throwing himself on a grenade to save the lives of his comrades. It is my understanding from CNN that federal search warrants are currently being drawn up to authorize the seizure of Hasan’s computers.
Rest assured the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Army Criminal Investigation Division, and various additional investigative agencies will be looking into the depths of Hasan’s live. His bank records will be seized as will his credit card account histories; his friends and neighbors will be interviewed; his distant past will be dissected.
The question remains as to the “root cause” of this particular mass murder. For every action there is a reaction. Hasan did what he did out of some “warped” and flawed reasoning, something that must be determined, labeled, and studied by criminologist.
Lombroso classified criminals into four categories; (a) born criminals or people with atavistic characteristics; (b) insane criminals including idiots, imbeciles, and paranoiacs; ( c ) occasional criminals or criminaloids, whose crimes are explained primarily by opportunity, although they too have innate traits that predispose them to criminality; and (d) criminals of passion who commit crimes because of anger, love, or honor and are characterized by being propelled to crime by an “irresistible force.
Lombroso later modified his theory giving attention to more and more environmental explanations including climate, rainfall, sex, marriage customs, laws, the structure of government, church organization, and the effects of other actors.
This Fort Hood mass murder is the second similar incident to occur in recent weeks, the other being to new found knowledge of the fourteen women that disappeared from Cleveland, Ohio’s east side.
It will be most interesting to watch, study, and research this particular mass murder. Was it a result of “early-onset delinquency” that surfaced with the actions of this 39 year old psychiatrist? If so, I imagine the “seeds” to this professional’s action were planted many years ago and during childhood.
This is the first in a series of articles on Crime in America: Mass, Spree, and Serial Murder.