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Journalism of Courage
Inside the rambling,pale-yellow,Colonial-style home in a Connecticut suburb,Adam Lanza lived amid a stockpile of disparate weaponry and macabre keepsakes: several firearms,more than 1,600 rounds of ammunition,11 knives,a starter pistol,a bayonet,3 samurai swords. He saved photographs of what appeared to be a corpse smeared in blood and covered in plastic,as well as a newspaper clipping that chronicled a vicious shooting at Northern Illinois University.
A gun safe was in what investigators believed was his bedroom. Among his clothing was a military-style uniform. There was also a holiday card that contained a check made out to Lanza,20,and signed by his mother. Investigators suggested that the money had been intended to buy a gun.
The disturbing details of Lanzas possessions were disclosed on Thursday for the first time since he carried out the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown,one of the deadliest school shootings in the nations history.
The interviews revealed that his mother,Nancy Lanza,confided to friends several years ago that her son,who classmates said had been found to have a type of autism,was faring poorly and being bullied in high school. More recently,he had cocooned himself in front of electronic game consoles in the basement of their home,playing warfare games.
After killing his mother at their home on the morning of Dec. 14,Lanza drove to the grade school that he once attended and carried out the massacre in less than five minutes,according to the search warrant.
The rampage brought the nation and world to tears and touched off a national debate over gun control.
The police also found a certificate from the National Rifle Association bearing the name Adam Lanza. The type of certificate was not clear. The organization on Thursday said Adam and Nancy were not members.
There was also a receipt from a shooting range in Oklahoma,an NRA guide to the basics of pistol shooting and training manuals on the use of a variety of firearms.
The Hartford Courant previously reported that investigators had found news articles about the Norwegian mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik in a bedroom of Lanzas. Breivik killed 77 people in two attacks in July 2011,most of them teenagers who were attending a summer camp.
