The Writings and Effects of Sandy Hook's Shooter Adam Lanza Must Be Made Public, Court Rules

HARTFORD, Conn. – The police must make public to the disturbing writings and other items belonging to the shooter of Newtown School, as they are not immune from state laws relating to the public record, a ruled on Tuesday the Connecticut Supreme Court.

The judges made a 5-0 decision in favor of the Hartford Courant and the state's Freedom of Information Commission, whose order to enforce the shooting by the police Adam LanzaThe affairs of the court were set aside by a lower court judge. This is not immediately clear when the items will be released.

Lanza, 20, shot dead 20 first-year students and six Sandy Hook Elementary School December 14, 2012, after killing his mother in their home in Newtown. He died of a fatal blow when the police arrived at school.

The reason for the shooting was never clarified. According to a report by the Connecticut Children's Advocate, Mr. Lanza's serious and increasingly serious mental health problems, his concern for violence and his access to his mother's legal weapons "turned out to be the recipe of a mass murder ".

State police raided Lanza's home and seized firearms, ammunition, and his belongings, including his diaries.

Among the personal belongings were a spreadsheet classifying mass murders and a notebook called "Grandma's Grand Book". The notebook contains a story that Lanza wrote in grade five about a woman using her "rifle cane" to kill people in a bank, a hockey game, and a navy training camp.

The book also contains several chapters with the adventures of "Dora the Beserker", influenced by a popular children's television show. When Granny asks Dora to murder a soldier, she responds: "I like to hurt people … especially children." In the same episode, Dora sends "Swiper the Raccoon" to a daycare to distract the kids, then comes in and says, "Let's kill the kids."

State police have already published some of Lanza's writings, as well as thousands of pages of interviews, documents and other evidence from the investigation. But the complete contents of the spreadsheet and notebook "Granny" have not been published.

The Courant asked to see 35 items seized from Lanza House, but the state police rejected the claim on the basis of the right to privacy provided for by the State Search and Seizure Act.

The newspaper appealed to the Freedom of Information Commission, which decided that the property should be made public, as the Law on Search and Seizure does not expressly prohibit the documents seized in the documents. people's homes – and not used in lawsuits – to be forwarded to the authorities. Public. The state police appealed to the Superior Court, where Judge Carl Schuman agreed with the state police and overturned the commission's decision.

Andrew Julien, publisher and editor of the Courant, said Lanza's belongings are important for understanding mass shootings.

"Understanding what a mass killer was thinking not only paints a clearer picture of the individual, it also helps us to identify and understand the alarm signals that could be part of a formula." prevention of future large-scale shootings, "he said on Tuesday.

The attorney general's office, which represented the state police, declined to comment on Tuesday. The bureau could ask the state Supreme Court to reconsider its decision or possibly appeal to the US Supreme Court.

State police officials did not immediately return messages requesting comment.

Judge Raheem Mullins wrote in the unanimous decision that the court should "narrowly construe" the wording of national law allowing exceptions to public disclosure ", otherwise any law governing the general treatment of documents by an agency becomes a possible restriction. disclosure ".

"The court of first instance has not said anything in the explicit terms of the laws on search and seizure that creates confidentiality in the documents or otherwise limits the disclosure, copying or distribution of documents", Mullins writes. "Indeed, search and seizure laws are silent on issues of confidentiality, copying or public disclosure."