Newtown Massacre and the Lessons about Mental Illness

Nobody will ever know what led Adam Lanza to slaughter twenty 6- and 7-year-olds last Friday at the Sandy Hook School in Newtown, Connecticut. But what has been reported strongly suggests that he was a young man who needed help. Is it ever possible to know what a killer is thinking? In 1999, as a reporter for the Los Angeles Times, Rick Meyer interviewed 17-year-old Jamie Rouse for more than 30 hours over several days. Using a semiautomatic rifle, Rouse had killed a teacher and a 14-year-old student at the Richland High School in Lynnwood, Tennessee.