High school student pleads not guilty to misdemeanor charge:
William Poole, the Kentucky Zombie Kid, has pleaded not guilty to a misdemeanor charge of criminal attempt to commit terroristic threatening. If convicted, the maximum he could get is 12 months. Then what happens when that twelve months are over?
Rocori shooter’s mental state scrutinized: (Log in info)
Forensic psychiatric evaluation for Jason McLaughlin: (Log in info)
The first article is about the testimony heard in John Jason McLaughlin’s insanity trial. The second is the psychological evaluation of McLaughlin by Dr. Maureen Hackett. Read them both at your leisure. I’ll even have the evaluation posted on the second page of this entry because it’s worth saving.
A doctor for the prosecution had this to say…
But on Wednesday, Dr. Katheryn Cranbrook, a state psychologist called by prosecutors, said McLaughlin is faking his illness in part because of the teen’s “fantastical” symptoms and because his illness has gotten better even though he has been off medication for a time this summer.
I have to agree based on what I’ve read. According to Dr. Hackett’s evaluation, McLaughlin started having hallucinations while in the sixth grade. He shot Seth Bartell when he was a freshman in high school. So you’re going to tell me that for 3 years no one noticed anything was wrong with him. I find that very hard to believe.
Insanity phase of McLaughlin’s trial continues: (Log in info)
The insanity phase of John Jason McLaughlin’s trial continues.
The defense…
Dr. Maureen Hackett, a Twin Cities psychiatrist, was on the stand again this morning after testifying all day Monday. She said McLaughlin has schizophrenia. His mental illness was so severe at the time of the shooting that it meets Minnesota’s tough standards for finding that someone is not responsible for his or her criminal actions, she said.
Hackett’s testimony on Monday revealed that McLaughlin has an imaginary companion named Jake who talks to Jason and sometimes appears to him during court proceedings. Hackett also said McLaughlin believes he has interacted with drug enforcement agent types who live in the woods near his Cold Spring home.
The defense also called Dr. Richard Lentz, a Park-Nicollet Clinic psychiatrist, who testified that he believes McLaughlin has schizophrenia. McLaughlin asked for more medication after reportedly seeing dead people in his cell at a detention facility, Lentz said.
The Prosecution…
Prosecutor Bill Klumpp has argued that McLaughlin is faking mental illness and that his hatred and jealousy of more popular students drove him to kill.
This morning, Klumpp said that McLaughlin’s description of his mental illness has been inconsistent and that the teen has given three different versions of when he first began to hear voices.
Klumpp repeatedly pointed out that no one had suspected that McLaughlin was mentally ill before the shootings. He said there are other explanations for symptoms Hackett had described.
And what, I think, is the most damning argument from the prosecution…
Klumpp also noted that Hackett said schizophrenics have problems thinking clearly: McLaughlin was capable of high-level thinking and decided that a stint in prison was worthwhile if he could hurt Seth Bartell,14.
“He did a cost-benefit analysis,” Klumpp said.
I wonder what he thinks of the cost now.
Psychiatrist says McLaughlin heard voices before shooting classmates:
From the “You’ve Got To Be Kidding Me Department”…
A former chief psychiatrist at the Minnesota Security Hospital in St. Peter says John Jason McLaughlin was schizophrenic and heard a voice urging him to shoot Seth Bartell in 2003.
Dr. Maureen Hackett was the first person to testify on McLaughlin’s behalf Monday afternoon.
Hackett says that while McLaughlin was in custody, the voice he heard became a hallucination named Jake, who was a sort of mentor figure in a trench coat that changed colors and had changing hair to match.
She says McLaughlin was suffering from a major mental illness that affected his reasoning.
Emphasis mine.
If McLaughlin was having these kinds of mental problems, why was he still in school? If he was having hallucinations, I doubt they just manifested on the day of the shooting,
I’m sorry, but this just smacks of a desperate defense team trying to spare their client life in prison.
Feds Want To Try Jourdain As An Adult:
For those of you who may not remember, Louis Jourdain was arrested in connection with the Red Lake shootings back in March. He is also the son of Red Lake Tribal Chairman Floyd Jourdain Jr.
He is alleged to have been some kind of an accomplice to Jeff Weise.
Not a lot of information has been released about his case because he is a juvenile.
Since the federal government has jurisdiction over the Red Lake Reservation, he would be tried in federal court and the feds want to try him as an adult. If he were to be convicted as a juvenile, he’d be free at the age of 21. He is 17 now. If he were to be convicted as an adult, he would be facing life in prison. A hearing to determine his status is scheduled to take place this week.
UPDATE: I found an interesting bit of information from this article from the Pioneer Press…
Sources with knowledge of the federal investigation have said that Weise and Jourdain wrote e-mails back and forth in which they planned the shooting spree.
Those sources have also said there were to be additional targets besides the school.
McLaughlin Found Guilty In Rocori School Shootings:
John Jason McLaughlin has been found guilty in the shooting deaths of Aaron Rollins and Seth Bartell, but it’s not over yet.
According to Minnesota law, the second phase of the trial will determine whether or not McLaughlin was mentally ill at the time of the shootings.
If he is found mentally ill, he could be found not guilty by reason of insanity but could be committed to the state mental hospital. If he is found to be competent, then he’s looking at life in prison without the possibility for parole.
Minnesota does not have the death penalty.
Glenn R. Stutzky: State’s terror law is abused:
According to the article, Glenn R. Stutzky is a clinical instructor at Michigan State University’s School of Social Work. The law he is referring to is the law that convicted would be school shooter Andrew Osantowski. He has some issues with Michigan’s terror law…
The terrorism statute was designed to assist law enforcement in dealing with adults who threaten to commit acts of terrorism and not for use against school-aged children.
So what you’re saying is that school-aged children, in this case, 17-years-old, are not capable of acts of terrorism? I think there are some people in Colorado and Minnesota who probably disagree with you.
Here is the problem: The terrorism law does not distinguish between a student “making” a threat and actually “posing” a threat.
Did Andrew Osantowski really “pose” a threat?
That may not be the best question; a better one might be: “Where was he along the continuum between just blowing off steam and actually taking action?”
Andrew Osantowski did, in fact, pose a threat. Or was having guns, ammo, and bomb-making instructions just blowing off steam?
Mr. Stutzky also pushes some well-meaning but probably doesn’t apply in real life program…
Oakland Schools has developed “Guidelines for Assessing Threatening Dangerous Behaviors in Schools”, a systematic and comprehensive process to assess threats made by students and a means to address dangerous behaviors through an integrated intervention plan.
The intervention begins immediately and ultimately involves the student, family, school, and community. Every threat is taken serious and initiates a process that results in a determination of the level of concern that exists – strong, moderate, or minimal and has a clear threshold of when to contact and involve the police.
Law enforcement benefits from GATDBS by not having to immediately come out to a school every time a threat is spoken, e-mailed, or written on a bathroom wall.
Emphasis mine.
That’s some good thinkin’ there, Glenn. If the police didn’t take every threat seriously, how many shootings do you think would have happened by now, including the one involving Andrew Osantowski? How many people do you think Andrew Osantowski would have killed if his threat was not taken seriously? Do you want that kind of blood on your hands? You probably wouldn’t care. You’d just blame it on something else. Like the oppressive legal system or some such other nonsense. And the fact that you consider yourself an educator is frightening.
Jury hands down Poole indictment:
Remember William Poole? The kid who was arrested for making threats against his school, but he said he was just writing a story about zombies for his class?
Then it turned out there were no zombies in the story, and it was not an assignment by any of his teachers, and he tried to recruit other students.
Well, the grand jury handed down an indictment, but only for the misdemeanor charge of attempt to commit terroristic threatening.
The police had charged him with second-degree terroristic threatening, which is a felony.
If convicted, the maximum he could get is 12 months.
Judge in murder trial to view McLaughlin video:
Nothing of any earth-shattering importance about the Rocori trial from this article, except that the judge in the case is going to be reviewing the videotaped interview of John Jason McLaughlin that was taken while McLaughlin was in custody. The article says the interview took place 90 minutes after the shooting. There is one thing in the article I want to address…
(Bureau of Criminal Apprehension Agent Ken) McDonald had only a few details about the shooting at the beginning of the interview, not knowing how many students had been shot. When informed that a student had died, McLaughlin reacted with surprise, according to previous court filings by (McLaughlin’s attorney, Dan) Eller. McLaughlin thought it must be Bartell who was dead, when in fact it was Rollins, Eller has argued.
Eller has said the interview will be essential to convincing Kirk that McLaughlin didn’t premeditate murder. Kirk could have a verdict as early as Wednesday.
He didn’t premeditate murder? He took a gun to school, took careful aim, and when the first shot missed, he ran after his intended target and shot him in the head.
Sounds premeditated to me.
Attorneys differ over e-mails of Rocori suspect:
Some strange testimony out of the Rocori trial…
On the morning before the fatal shootings at Rocori High School, the accused gunman used a school computer to e-mail a farewell letter to another student.
John Jason McLaughlin’s chilling e-mail address? “sharpestshot290@yahoo.com”
The student who got that e-mail and others, Brittany Kelley, took the stand Friday as McLaughlin’s trial continued in St. Cloud.
Kelley, 16, tearfully told of the increasingly bizarre messages she had received from McLaughlin’s e-mail address during the summer before the shootings of Seth Bartell, 14, and Aaron Rollins, 17.
Two days before the shootings, an e-mail to Kelley from McLaughlin repeated the phrase “hi hi hi hi hi” for pages, before ending with “goodbye.”
One day before the shootings, another e-mail repeated “ok ok ok ok” for pages with brief interruptions for the phrases “i’m good” and “steve says hi too” before continuing on with the repeated “ok ok ok ok.”
Like that’s not enough, John Jason McLaughlin liked to write e-mails as a fictional girlfriend…
Some of the e-mails were written under the name Soki Renoko, a fictional girlfriend created by McLaughlin. Those repeatedly described him as a cold, steely action figure who beat up people who offended him or his family — and said he claimed to be a sniper.
Now, from the defense attorney…
Eller said the prosecution will use the e-mails to prove that McLaughlin planned the shootings and meant to kill that day, which is critical in making the first-degree murder charge stick. But Eller said he sees the e-mails as evidence of McLaughlin’s mental illness.
Yeah, he has a mental illness. He’s criminally insane. Isn’t it to be found not guilty by reason of insanity, don’t they have to prove that McLaughlin couldn’t tell the difference between right and wrong?
And this is the best quote of all…
Eller said McLaughlin believed he shot Bartell in the shoulder, not the forehead, and didn’t intend to kill anyone that day.
How can you get confused between the shoulder and head, especially considering he shot Seth Bartell at an almost point-blank range? Is it a defense attorney’s job to insult people’s intelligence? This isn’t even a jury trial so he’s basically insulting the judge’s intelligence.