Police in the small Arizona town of St. Johns, population 3,865, are still trying to determine the motive for a double homicide committed there last week by an 8-year-old boy. Evidently the youth's father had remarried just two months ago and had sought the opinion of a local priest concerning teaching his son to shoot a .22 caliber rifle. This apparently was the same weapon used by the young man to shoot and kill his 29-year-old father and a 38-year-old coworker of his father who rented a room in their home. After the boy told a neighbor he thought his father was dead, police were called and found one man dead on the second floor of the home and a second dead just outside of the front door of the residence. Both victims had been shot in the head and chest. Authorities are now considering charging the 8-year-old as an adult, something that state law would evidently allow.

According the new local police chief who commands the 10-officer department, the young suspect did not have a disciplinary record in his local school and he was no problem in religion classes, noting he was to make his First Communion later this year. Evidently there were domestic violence complaint calls to the residence, but these may be related to problems in the father's former marriage, and while the shooter's mother had recently visited him, she resided in another state and did not share custody of the boy with his father. The youthful shooter did indicate that he had been spanked the night before the double murder and the boy's biological mother, who divorced from his father six years ago but says she visits her son monthly from Mississippi, says her son stated that his father and new step mother argued frequently.

A read of FBI statistics indicates that homicides by children younger than eleven are extremely rare, with three each in the years 2003 – 2005 and none in 2005-2007, this when murders across America numbered about 16,500 each year. Going back even further, from 1976 to 2005 sixty-two children between 7 and 8 were arrested for murder, only two of which had a parent as a victim. So who, other than the diminutive shooter, is responsible for these two deaths and why? The local police chief has said the murders were premeditated and his department was looking into suggestions of child abuse, something other members of the large, extended family deny was taking place. There seems to be no question as to "the who" in this case; the real question is "the why."

In most cases concerning young killers, the motive usually involves a mental illness, or extreme physical or emotional abuse of the child killer, or evidence that the killer was a budding sociopath or psychopath, although some would argue that one so young could not exhibit behavior associated with the sociopathic personality. But why, his community asks, did this otherwise average young boy intentionally work the bolt on his gun at least four times to kick out a spent round and load a fresh round into the rifle's chamber, ready to be methodically fired one at a time into his two victims.

As in similar matters involving violence and murder by a child, most will try to round up the usual suspects. What violent video games did the young boy play, games that give points for human kills, and what violent movies did he watch; those that portray violence, especially gun violence, as an acceptable form of conflict resolution? Ninety percent of children in America ages 8-16 spend at least 15 hours per week playing video games and research suggests that playing violence-based video games can makes children more aggressive and violent in real life. The shooter's mother indicated her son played video games non-stop.

A recent study looked at both American and Japanese kids and found that when children are exposed to violent video games, they become more violent over time, believing the world is a dangerous place and learning that violence can be the key to survival. But if this is true, why don't more children, young men and women who have become desensitized to human suffering by means of such games, pick up guns and kill? And what about children who witness, on the average, 8,000 TV murders by the time they complete elementary school and watch 200,000 violent acts (16,000 murders) by the time they reach age 18? Ninety-nine percent of American homes have one or more TV sets, 2/3's of which have 3+ TVs of which one or more runs seven hours per day. Children in these homes watch TV for 1,680 minutes per week while having meaningful conversation with their parents for just 3.5 minutes in the same week.

Children eight and under really cannot tell the difference between reality and fantasy, making them vulnerable to believing what they see on TV and in games, in this case murder and mayhem is normal in American life. One 17-year long study found that teenage boys who grew up watching long hours of TV every day were more likely to commit acts of violence than their peers who watched less TV.

As this has been the season, a l-o-n-g season, for politics, most recall the name of Bill Ayers, the alleged non-repentant domestic terrorist who, in 1969, allegedly suggested that children should kill their parents and indicated his belief that teenage murderers should not be held responsible for their crimes. He later indicated he was joking concerning the distribution of wealth in America, but once those words leave your mouth, like episodes of "I Love Lucy" floating around in outer space, they can haunt you forever. Every citizen is responsible for his words, and those who make and sell violent video games and violent movies need to take some responsible for the actions that their games and films encourage in others.

This takes me back to one of my earlier questions. If violent videos and movies contribute to violent behavior, why don't all of us shoot those we dislike or who otherwise get in our way? The socialization process tries to balance out the violence that we see on TV, the movies, and in the games some play. As far as gun related violence in the home, much of what we see and hear about can be prevented by simply locking up our guns and keeping ammunition and guns separate. How, for example, did this 8-year-old manage to get his hands on the .22 rifle he used to commit this double murder? Many, like me, grew up in a home in which firearms were maintained. As an FBI Agent, I taught my wife and children to handle firearms and how to render them safe, as well as to avoid those who flaunted their access to guns. Gun safes or at least trigger locks should be the rule in any home in which one or more of the estimated 280,000,000 American guns can be found.

But did this young man kill because of some secret abuse he had undergone in his home, a plight many children have had to endure in their own homes, noting that the 2006 Child Maltreatment Report indicates that 220,000 cases of "known or substantiated" child and teenage physical and sexual abuse were reported that year, what some believe to be just the tip of the "child abuse iceberg." Or was he flailing his emotional arms in anger, fear, or confusion at the new home situation he encountered, or did he simply lack the ability to separate what he saw on TV and perhaps played in video games from real life and death? The young shooter may not be able to answer these questions himself and as far as premeditation, where were his parents and family members as he allegedly planned this act?

Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the teenage shooters at Colorado's Columbine HS, murdered 12 and wounded 23 in 1999 before committing suicide. Some have suggested that their parents should have know what they were up to, but again, how much time do we, as parents, actually spend with our children vs. using the TV as an in-house babysitter? Should, or could this young man's parents have suspected; we just don't know. Should the court decide not to charge him as an 8-year-old adult, as a juvenile he can still be held until he reaches 18, meaning even as a child he could be in custody for the next decade. Meanwhile the slight boy is brought into court in shackles with the security belt looped around his little waist three times because of his size. No childsize belts were available for someone so small.

If this youthful killer was truly unable to tell the difference between fantasy and reality, should he be held to the adult standard, and penalty, for homicide, a double homicide in this case, or should he remain in juvenile custody as both he, and his caregivers, try to understand the what and why of his actions? To try him as an adult, the prosecution would need prove a number of things. The youthful shooter understood the charges against him, he understood court and trial proceedings, he was able to assist in his own defense, and the prosecutor would also need to somehow prove the young shooter could not be rehabilitated by the time he turned 18; therefore the need to keep him incarcerated as an adult. Yet another case requiring the wisdom of Solomon from our criminal justice system. What is really right for the community, society, and one small boy who may not fully appreciate the reality and finality of his actions?

UPDATE 2/20/09

While the charges against the now 9-year-old suspected killer have been resolved in a courtroom with a simple guilty plea to one count of negligent homicide, the "why" of this cases continues to baffle most who know about it. Why did this young man take up a gun against his father and a male renter, shooting both to death with head shots?

While the defense attorney in this case says the public will never get to know the details, the "why" of this double murder, some details, nonetheless, continue to come out. The plea covered the shooting death of the 38-year-old male renter while the charge related to the murder of the young shooter's 29-year-old father was dropped. His plea also prevented him from being tried as an adult and keeps him out of the state's juvenile corrections system, leaving the county juvenile system or, perhaps, outpatient mental health care as his "sentence." By not pleading to the murder of his father, he was also spared the emotional scare, say some, of having to admit to the killing of his dad to himself. "Come on." Even at eight or nine he now knows he shot and killed his dad, whether he says so in open court or not! Others, including family members of the two victims believe the case centered more on the diminutive shooter than his two victims.

The now convicted killer will undergo extensive mental health evaluations designed to determine if he is a continuing threat to himself or to the community. It will be these results that will be used to determine when and if he will be allowed to continue his education outside of the home where he now resides with his mother. His step mother and her two daughters had openly objected to the plea deal.

But the question of "why" still hangs in the air unanswered. One possible answer may have leaked from the young boy's mouth during an interview by a child protective services worker, this when he stated, "his 1,000th spanking would be his last." While those in the neighborhood and community saw the boy's father, Vincent Romero, as loving and caring, once again the old adage "you never know what goes on behind closed doors," may provide some answer as to why such a young person would commit such a terrible crime.

Yet another Terrible Story:

February 2009 saw yet another terrible shooting of a family member by a child. This time it was in rural Wampum, PA, where 11-year-old Jordan Brown was charged as an adult (thus the release of his name) for the shotgun murder of his father's 8-month pregnant girlfriend, Kenzie Marie Houk. Brown, who was said to be "consumed with jealousy" because of the amount of attention his father was giving to Houk and the baby boy she was carrying, allegedly, with premeditation, took his own .20 gauge shotgun into Houk's bedroom and shot her in the head as she lay sleeping. He then calmly caught the bus to school, later telling authorities a contrived tale of a mysterious black vehicle that was linked to the murder.

It was Houk's 4-year-old daughter that first found her mother's dead body, and her 7-year-old daughter that told police it was Brown who shot her mom. Brown, who is said to have threatened to harm Houk in the past, has been charged with a double homicide, this for the murder of his father's girlfriend and her unborn child. As history down through the ages has shown, what some people will do in a fit of jealousy, even children, really knows no limits. While some have referred to the boy as "a bad seed," others question those responsible for cultivating and raising "the seed." Something in his own emotional DNA, and/or in the minds and hands of those charged with raising him, something went terribly, terribly wrong. And the signs and sounds of a killer to be were simply not responded to in the proper manner, and for this, two lives were taken and others were left emotionally scared for life.