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Mark Gobell
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 Posted: Fri Dec 07, 2007 12:00 pm Post subject: |
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Washington Post
| Quote: | Mall Killer Had History of Mental Woes
19-Year-Old Threatened Stepmother and Was Made a Ward of the State
By Kari Lydersen and William Branigin
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, December 7, 2007; Page A10
OMAHA, Dec. 6 -- A troubled teenager who opened fire on holiday shoppers and employees in a crowded mall had a history of mental health problems and had been a ward of the state in Nebraska for four years after threatening the life of his stepmother, authorities said Thursday.
Armed with an AK-47 assault rifle and dressed in black, Robert A. Hawkins, 19, turned the Westroads Mall into a scene of carnage and terror Wednesday, gunning down victims at random, police said. He killed eight people and wounded five others, two of them critically, before turning the weapon on himself.
Shoppers and employees who were inside the Von Maur store at the Westroads Mall when a gunman opened fire, await news in the frigid weather, in Omaha, Neb., Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2007. Police locked down the shopping center while they searched for the shooter.
Shoppers and employees who were inside the Von Maur store at the Westroads Mall when a gunman opened fire, await news in the frigid weather, in Omaha, Neb., Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2007. Police locked down the shopping center while they searched for the shooter.
Hawkins, a high school dropout who had recently lost his job at a fast-food restaurant and broken up with his girlfriend, attracted the attention of mall security guards when he initially entered the mall briefly and then returned carrying something wrapped in a hooded sweatshirt, Omaha Police Chief Thomas Warren told reporters.
But Hawkins took an elevator to the third floor and began shooting before the unarmed security guards could intervene, Warren said, and the rampage was over by the time police arrived about six minutes later. He said Hawkins fired more than 30 rounds from the AK-47, which police believe he stole from his stepfather's residence.
Among the dead were five women and three men between the ages of 24 and 66. Two were shoppers, and six were employees of Von Maur, a department store popular with holiday shoppers. Of the five people injured, three were treated and released, and two remained hospitalized Thursday in critical condition, authorities said.
One man was apparently trying to call 911 near an escalator in an atrium on the mall's second floor when Hawkins aimed his weapon over a railing and shot him in the head from the third floor, witnesses said. The other victims were shot on the store's third floor.
"It appeared that the shooting victims were randomly selected," Warren said. "It didn't appear that any were specifically targeted."
In a news conference in Lincoln, officials of Nebraska's Department of Health and Human Services said Hawkins had been a ward of the state from 2002 to 2006 after spending time in a private mental health and substance abuse treatment facility for threatening the life of his stepmother. They also cited drug-related offenses and a fight with another youth. Hawkins's parents divorced when he was 3 years old.
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As recently as two weeks ago, Hawkins also had threatened to kill a 16-year-old girl and her family after accusing her of stealing things from his car, the Omaha World-Herald reported.
The director of the health department's Division of Children and Family Services, Todd Landry, said Hawkins initially was placed in the private Piney Ridge Center in Waynesville, Mo., in May 2002 "due to homicidal threats toward his stepmother." He was diagnosed at the time with attention-deficit disorder and mental health disorders, including one that made him extremely defiant, Landry said.
The state intervened after the family's health-care program refused to continue paying for Hawkins's treatment at Piney Ridge, Landry said. But the health department terminated its care in August 2006 after Hawkins failed to comply with a community service requirement and a court declared him "nonamenable to further services," he said.
Landry said the department acted properly in closing Hawkins's case, which did not represent "a failure of the system to provide . . . appropriate services." He said he did not think the state could have done anything more and that "all appropriate services were provided when needed for as long as needed." He added: "It would be nice to have had a crystal ball. . . . Certainly, if we had known this was going to happen . . . we would have stopped it."
Hawkins left a suicide note in which he denigrated himself and said he would no longer be a burden to anyone, adding ominously that he was "going to be famous now."
Omaha police said Thursday that they are investigating that note as well as other "correspondence," such as cellphone text messages between Hawkins and his former girlfriend and records on his computer hard drive, that might illuminate his motives and planning.
In television interviews, Debora Maruca-Kovac, a nurse whose family took Hawkins in a year ago, likened the troubled teenager to "a lost pound puppy that nobody wanted." She said Hawkins had called her before the shooting to thank her and tell her about the note he had left.
He said he was "sorry he was a burden to everybody and his whole life was a piece of [expletive] and now he'll be famous," Maruca-Kovac told CBS's "Early Show." She said she feared he was going to commit suicide, "but I had no idea that he would involve so many other families."
Branigin reported from Washington. Staff writer Jenna Johnson contributed to this report. |
It is reported that Hawkins was made a ward of state on September 17 2002, after he was treated at the Piney Ridge Center since May 2002 and was released from state care on August 21 2006 or August 24 2006.
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Last edited by Mark Gobell on Fri Dec 07, 2007 12:11 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Fri Dec 07, 2007 12:10 pm Post subject: |
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Independent
| Quote: | High school drop-out kills eight in US mall shooting
By Andrew Gumbel in Los Angeles
Published: 06 December 2007
A 19-year-old high school drop-out opened fire with a rifle at a shopping mall in Omaha, Nebraska, yesterday, killing eight people and injuring at least five others before turning his weapon on himself.
America's latest mass shooting triggered panic among hundreds of shoppers out buying presents for the holidays. And it rocked a city which is a virtual byword for the heartland – friendly, overweight, and heavily suburbanised.
The killer, identified as Robert Hawkins, marched into the Von Maur department store at the Westroads mall just after lunch and created mayhem on the second and third floors.
Shoppers barricaded themselves in dressing rooms for safety. One group of employees and customers huddled down in a cupboard behind the gift-wrapping room.
Hawkins, dressed in camouflage gear, worked his way up to the third floor, began shooting down from a balcony into the shopping mall, then took his own life by turning the weapon on himself, according to police who rushed to the scene.
Someone called the emergency number 911, but by the time police arrived on the scene six minutes later it was all over. Eyewitnesses said Hawkins fired an initial volley of five or six shots, followed by 15-20 more rounds.
One eyewitness, Shawn Vidlak, told the Associated Press that the shots initially sounded like a nail gun. He assumed it came from construction work going on in the building.
Then, he said: "People started screaming about gunshots. I grabbed my wife and kids and we got out of there as fast as we could."
Within half-an-hour, a woman came forward with a note she said she had found – it was not immediately clear where she had picked it up from.
Police said the note "could be interpreted as suicidal". One local television station reported that the note announced Hawkins' intention to "go out in style".
Little was immediately known about the shooter, except that he had been a student at Papillion-La Visa High School. He was reported to be still enrolled, although he dropped out in March last year.
Mass shootings have continued unabated across the United States in recent years, as disgruntled – and usually suicidal – gunmen have claimed victims in schools, on university campuses, at work places and even in church.
The Bush administration has refused to continue a federal ban on automatic weapons begun during the Clinton presidency, and gun laws remain lax enough to make it relatively easy to buy deadly weapons in just about any state in the union.
Omaha is on the eastern edge of Nebraska, a plains state which has made itself famous for cattle-raising and meat processing, right on the border with Iowa – where politicians of all stripes have been campaigning hard in anticipation of the Iowa caucus on 3 January.
President Bush was in Nebrasksa yesterday to raise money for Republican candidates, but left shortly before the shooting started. Omaha is the home of Warren Buffett, the celebrity investor and financial guru, and also the setting for many of the films made by native son Alexander Payne – films about the casual absurdity of heartland American life such as Election and About Schmidt. |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Fri Dec 07, 2007 12:17 pm Post subject: |
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CNN
| Quote: | State official: Shooter placed in mental health facility 5 years ago
* Story Highlights
* DFAS official: Treated after making homicidal threats toward his stepmother
* DFAS: Diagnosed with attention deficit disorder, mood disorder, others
* Friend: Shooter was taking antidepressants
LINCOLN, Nebraska (CNN) -- The troubled teen who killed eight people and himself at an Omaha, Nebraska, mall was placed in a mental health treatment center five years ago after making homicidal threats toward his stepmother, a state official said Thursday.
Todd Landry, director of the Nebraska Division of Family and Children's Services, described for reporters the laundry list of residential treatment centers and group and foster homes where Robert Hawkins spent much of his teen years, because of his behavioral and psychiatric problems.
At one point during that period Hawkins also filed a report with police alleging he was molested by a roommate at one of the facilities. The case was resolved internally, according to the report.
Asked about the allegation, Landry responded, "I can't confirm or deny that that may have happened."
Hawkins was sent to Piney Ridge Center in Waynesville, Missouri, on May 18, 2002 -- a day after his 14th birthday. The center specializes in mental health and substance abuse services, according to its Web site.
Landry, reading from a juvenile court petition filed by Sarpy County, Nebraska, said Hawkins was placed at the center because of "homicidal threats to his stepmother."
"He also had two psychiatric hospitalizations, and has been diagnosed with attention deficit disorder, mood disorder, oppositional defiant disorder, and parent-child relationship problems," Landry said.
He offered no details about the problems with the stepmother.
When the teen went to live with friends of the family one and a half years ago, "issues with the stepmother" were the reason, said Debora Maruca-Kovac, into whose house he moved.
Video Watch her describe their last conversation »
Landry divulged only information from public records, as allowed by law.
Hawkins was a ward of the state from September 17, 2002, through August 24, 2006. Parental rights were never severed, authorities said.
Among the problems cited in the records were his involvement in a fight and substance abuse problems.
Nebraska court records show a Hawkins with a matching age had a juvenile criminal history including charges of alcohol and drug use, disorderly conduct and contributing to the delinquency of a minor. He is listed in the records as living with a foster parent.
According to Landry, Hawkins' treatments were extensive, and cost the state $265,000 while he was in its custody.
"This tragedy was not a failure of the system to provide appropriate quality services for a youth that needed it," he said.
Maruca-Kovac described Hawkins on CNN's "Anderson Cooper 360" Wednesday night as "kind of like a pound puppy that nobody wanted."
Paraphrasing a suicide note he left in their home, she said, "He didn't want to be a burden to people and [said] that he was a piece of s--- all of his life and that now he'd be famous."
Video Watch officials detail the rampage »
Hawkins' body was found on the third floor of the Von Maur store inside Westroads Mall. Police believe the attacks were premeditated, but the victims were targeted at random.
Omaha Police Chief Thomas Warren said Hawkins visited with a friend before going to the mall, and he sent a text message to a girl, apparently a recent ex-girlfriend. He also left voicemail for his mother, Warren said.
Maruca-Kovac told CNN Hawkins left the house Wednesday about 11 a.m., and called her about two hours later, sounding upset.
"He just said he wanted to thank me for everything I'd done for him ... and he was sorry," Maruca-Kovac said. He told her he had been fired that day from his job at McDonald's, she said.
See a map of where the shooting took place »
"I said, 'Come home and we'll talk about it.' "
"He said, 'It's too late.' He said he'd left a note explaining everything."
The suicide note left at Maruca-Kovac's home was turned over to police, who wouldn't divulge its contents.
"He basically said how sorry he was for everything," Maruca-Kovac told CNN on Wednesday night. She described Hawkins as well-behaved, although "he had a lot of emotional problems, obviously."
This past summer, Hawkins tried to enlist in the U.S. Army but was turned down, a source familiar with the situation told CNN. The source didn't want his name used because revealing information about potential recruits is against military rules.
The two recruiters who spoke with Hawkins said he appeared to be a typical teenager.
"He said he'd had a rough time in his life and wanted to see about changing it," Army Sgt. Edward Dust said.
Hawkins had been on antidepressants but stopped taking them because they made him feel "weird," Maruca-Kovac said. There was no public information on how long he had been off the medication or what the medication was.
When Hawkins moved in with Maruca-Kovac's family, Maruca-Kovac said, he felt mistreated and rejected by everyone. He also suffered from depression.
"When he first came and lived with us, he was in the fetal position and chewed his fingernails all the time, and was unemployed, and hopeless. After awhile, he got a job and came out of that," Maruca-Kovac told CNN. He also got a haircut, and seemed happier, she said.
She said she was unaware Hawkins had any guns, although she said he knew a lot about them, as did his stepfather. Although police haven't completed tracing the weapon Warren said police believe Hawkins stole the firearm, which was stored at his stepfather's residence. Warren said it was an "AK-47 assault weapon."
Maruca-Kovac said her family is "devastated" by what happened.
A friend, Shawn Saunders, told CNN, "It's still hard to imagine the guy that I knew, that I used to hang out with, was capable of something like this."
Video Watch how Saunders learned Hawkins was the shooter »
He added, "I'm not sure the level of depression, I just know he was on antidepressants the last couple of months. I guess it was just getting worse over time with the loss of his job and I guess issues he had going on with the girlfriend at the time." |
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The Medium is the Massage - Marshall McLuhan.
Last edited by Mark Gobell on Fri Dec 07, 2007 12:55 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Fri Dec 07, 2007 12:43 pm Post subject: |
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Transcript from CNN Video titled "Mall shooting update".
Governor Dave Heineman confirms that Robert Hawkins had been a ward of state between 17.9.2002 and 24.8.2006
Police Chief Thomas Warren:
| Police Chief Warren wrote: | For the record, the weapon that was used in this incident was an AK47 assault weapon. We believe that Mr Hawkins obtained the firearm from his stepfather. The parents are estranged, divorced, we believe that Robert Hawkins stole the firearm, it had been stored at his father's residence. It appears from the surveillance video that Hawkins had entered the main entrance of Von Maur on the 2nd level, approximately 6 minutes prior to the ultimate shooting incident.
He re-entered the store, appeared to be concealing something, balled up in a hooded sweatshirt.
From the video camera surveillance you can't discern, specifically that he's actually carrying a firearm.
Then of course upon entering the foyer area of the store he immediately took the elevator which was to the right of the entrance.
He took the elevator to the 3rd floor and upon exiting the elevator, immediately started firing shots.
....and ultimately at the conclusion of this event.
He took his own life. |
The overall length of an AK47 is 870mm or 34.3 inches.
_________________
The Medium is the Massage - Marshall McLuhan.
Last edited by Mark Gobell on Fri Dec 07, 2007 1:50 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Fri Dec 07, 2007 12:59 pm Post subject: |
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CNN
| Quote: | 911 calls show fear, chaos during mall shooting
* Story Highlights
* "I'm hiding in a clothes rack," a caller says
* A rapid burst of gunshots can be heard in another call before the line goes dead
* Robert Hawkins killed six employees and two customers before taking his own life
* "I see him laying by the gun," a woman tells the dispatcher
OMAHA, Nebraska (CNN) -- Dozens of calls flooded the Omaha Police Department's 911 emergency line after a gunman opened fire inside the city's Westroads Mall, with witnesses calling in tones that ranged from almost matter-of-fact to near terror.
"I haven't seen anything. I'm hiding in a clothes rack," a woman said after a dispatcher asked her for a description of the shooter. "I mean, there's been like 50 gunshots."
In one of the recordings, provided to CNN by the police department, a rapid burst of three gunshots can be heard, followed by two more a moment later before the line goes dead.
A dispatcher asked one caller to move away from a woman shouting in the background.
"Oh Lord God help us," the woman can be heard screaming.
Video Hear some of the 911 calls »
"She said there is a bunch of people shot," the caller says.
Robert Hawkins, 19, killed six employees and two customers of Von Maur department store on Wednesday before turning his AK-47 rifle on himself.
Two employees remained hospitalized Thursday, one with critical injuries and one in serious condition.
* Computers may yield clues about shooter
* State official: Shooter placed in mental health facility
A woman who called 911 before ducking into a security office in the store said she heard the gunman demand that a vault be opened near the store's customer service area.
Police have not described the shooting as a robbery attempt, saying Thursday they don't know why Hawkins chose the store as a target.
The caller described the shooter as having "a very large gun" and said he came out of an elevator on the store's third floor and began firing shots into the air.
"I heard the gunshots and I got down as soon as possible because I've got kids," she said.
Later, she told the dispatcher she'd moved into the security office -- where she appears to have seen Hawkins' dead body on a surveillance camera.
"Oh my gosh! It looks like the gun is laying over by customer service -- it looks like he might have killed himself," she said, breaking into tears. "I see him laying by the gun!"
Police said Thursday that Hawkins had had "some mental health problems," including thoughts of suicide. He had lost his job and recently broken up with his girlfriend, according to a family friend. |
From the video titled "Hear some of the 911 calls »" the full transcript is:
| Quote: | Jody: My name is Jody and I'm with Von Maur. I have people who are down and injured who've been shot.
911: Where are you at. What part of the store?
Jody: I am on the third floor that's where most of the people who've been shot are at.
911: OK. How many people do you have that are shot in there?
Jody: As far as I can tell I have two to roughly four that I have seen.
CNN: That woman locked herself in an office where she could see the security cameras. What she told the dispatcher next, is chilling.
Jody: "Oh my gosh! It looks like the gun is laying over by customer service. There's an officer there now. I wonder if he . . .
911: Customer Service on the third level?
Jody: Correct. It looks like he might have killed himself.
911: OK. Do you see him laying by a gun?
Jody: I see him laying by the gun. <inaudible> |
I've attached an MP3 (78k) of Jody saying:
| Jody wrote: | | Jody: I see him laying by the gun. <inaudible> |
For anyone that would like to help to work out what the inaudible bit might have been:
| Description: |
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Download |
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jody inaudible.mp3 |
| Filesize: |
77.91 KB |
| Downloaded: |
655 Time(s) |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Fri Dec 07, 2007 1:36 pm Post subject: |
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Fuller transcript from Action 3 News claiming that Hawkins demanded the vault opened.
| Quote: | Mall Massacre
Police Release 911 Calls from Shooting
Posted: Dec 7, 2007 05:18 AM
Omaha, NE - Police have released the frantic calls for help that flooded 911 when the shooting started at Westroads. Dispatchers took more than 450 calls.
They are difficult to listen to. We have chosen to not air all of them as they are too graphic. But a warning, one of the first things you will hear on the video are the shots Hawkins fired.
Police say moments after Robert Hawkins stepped off the elevator on the third floor, he went over to Customer Service.
"(dispatchers) 911 whats your emergency?"
"(gunfire heard)"
"(dispatcher) hello 911?"
"(gunfire heard)"
"(dispatcher) 911 whats your emergency."
Then one of the Von Maur workers manages to call 911 while her co-workers are laying on the ground with gunshot wounds.
"My name is Jody," she says. "I'm with Von Maur and I have people who are down. People who have been shot."
"(dispatcher) Where are you at? What part of the store?"
"(Jody) I am on the third floor."
Dispatchers keep her on the phone. She tells them that before or after Hawkins started shooting, he said something while holding the automatic weapon.
"(Jody) When he came in, he went over to Customer Service and told them to open the vault."
"(dispatchers) He told them to open the vault when he went over to Customer Service?"
"(Jody) Yeah. He said open the vault, open the vault."
Jody then crawled into an office where there are surveillance cameras. There she makes a gruesome discovery - Robert Hawkins on the ground.
"(Jody) Huh. Oh my gosh. It looks like the gun is laying over by Customer Service. There is an officer there now. I wonder if he..."
"(dispatcher) Customer Service on the third level?"
"(Jody) Correct. It looks like he might have killed himself."
"(dispatcher) Okay, you see him laying by a gun?"
"(Jody) I see him laying by a gun!" |
http://www.action3news.com/Global/story.asp?S=7463935&nav=menu550_2
There's so many edited and transcribed versions of this phone call out there already.
The 911 call was made by Jodi Longmeyer, Von Maur's HR Manager.
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conspiracy analyst
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| Posted: Fri Dec 07, 2007 3:26 pm Post subject: |
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Xmas is coming.
Mall shopping is the only activity left.
Does the fear of being shot at a mall deter people away or does it make ending shopping as we know it the fear itself?
Only time will tell how they spin this.
Either which way shop till you drop takes on a a new deadly meaning.
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rodin
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| Posted: Fri Dec 07, 2007 7:35 pm Post subject: |
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| conspiracy analyst wrote: | Xmas is coming.
Mall shopping is the only activity left.
Does the fear of being shot at a mall deter people away or does it make ending shopping as we know it the fear itself?
Only time will tell how they spin this.
Either which way shop till you drop takes on a a new deadly meaning. |
Nice turn of phrase
http://judicial-inc.biz/7u_omaha_mall_massacre.htm
The Bolshevicks want to disarm civilian populations (except Israel's of course)
WRH readers page had a thing about Israelis selling trinkets at Malls month or so ago. Parallel was drawn with 'art students'.
Google for more
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Fri Dec 07, 2007 9:43 pm Post subject: |
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You may have heard the term "going postal".
This term has become used as a generic reference to apparently random acts of mass murder that are termed "spree killings".
"Going postal" was coined as a result of a mass shooting by a certain Patrick Henry Sherrill, who was a US postal worker that shot 14 of his colleagues before shooting himself.
Patrick Henry Sherrill "went postal" on 20.8.1986
7777 days before Robert A Hawkins allegedly chose to do the same.
_________________
The Medium is the Massage - Marshall McLuhan.
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rodin
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| Posted: Sat Dec 08, 2007 1:58 am Post subject: |
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| Mark Gobell wrote: | You may have heard the term "going postal".
This term has become used as a generic reference to apparently random acts of mass murder that are termed "spree killings".
"Going postal" was coined as a result of a mass shooting by a certain Patrick Henry Sherrill, who was a US postal worker that shot 14 of his colleagues before shooting himself.
Patrick Henry Sherrill "went postal" on 20.8.1986
7777 days before Robert A Hawkins allegedly chose to do the same.
You will definitely remember the Beslan School Siege of 1.9.2004
Robert A Hawkins followed Beslan by 1190 days.
and was the 33rd week and 3rd day of Cho Seung-Hui at Virginia State Tech
Probably just coincidences . . . |
Probably
Here's what the moral and aware minority in the US are thinking/doing
http://goldismoney.info/forums/showthread.php?t=207382
I know it's alien to us UK softies, but interesting that Israel also has an armed populace.
and, I think, Switzerland?
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Sat Dec 08, 2007 1:39 pm Post subject: |
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CBS News
| Quote: | (CBS/AP) The gunman who killed eight people in a mall shooting "just snapped," he said in a suicide note released Friday that combines love for his friends and family with contempt for his random victims.
"I know everyone will remember me as some sort of monster but please understand that I just don't want to be a burden on the ones that I care for my entire life," the 19-year-old wrote. "I just want to take a few pieces of (expletive) with me."
Police released the three-page, handwritten note Friday after The Associated Press made a Freedom of Information Act request.
Also released were three surveillance pictures showing Hawkins in the minutes before he murdered eight people and wounded five others in an Omaha shopping mall before taking his own life.
Hawkins left the note Wednesday at the house where he lived, before he went to the Westroads Mall and opened fire in the Von Maur store, fatally wounding eight people before taking his own life.
The first page of the note was for his friends: "I love all of you so much and I don't want anyone to miss me just think about how much better you are off without me to support."
In the second page, addressed to his family, he wrote, "I've just snapped I can't take this meaningless existence anymore I've been a constant disappointment and that trend would have only continued."
He added, "I love you mommy. I love you dad," and expressed love for several other people.
The third page was his will: "I'm giving my car back to my mom and my friends can have whatever else I leave behind."
The surveillance photos show Hawkins walking into the mall - at first unarmed, wearing glasses, a black zippered sweat shirt over what appears to be a black Jack Daniel's T-shirt.
In another image recorded six minutes later, he returns and strides through an entrance decked with holiday decorations, an apparent bulge under his clothing.
In the third picture, he is shown with his sleeves rolled up, aiming the AK-47 to fire.
The images appear to contradict earlier reports that the gunman had a military-style haircut and entered the mall wearing a camouflage vest.
Out of respect for the victims and their families, the mall remains closed until Saturday, but no word on when Von Maur will reopen.
Families are now planning funerals.
56-year-old Gary Joy worked in Von Maur's department store.
"I have seen tragedy before and they are all more or less alike," Lorraine Hedman, the victim's aunt, said. "You hurt and there is not a thing you can do about it."
Though he is being labeled a monster, Hawkins' best friend is still defending him.
"He wasn't a monster, he was a good person," Hawkins' best friend Craig Kovac said, though he also admitted, "I can t justify what he did.
"I feel really sorry for the victims," he added.
And there are new questions about why the 19-year-old high school dropout was released from state custody, according to CBS News correspondent Jennifer Miller.
Hawkins was put in a series of treatment centers, group homes and foster care after threatening his stepmother. State officials are defending their actions to let him go last year.
"This tragedy was not a failure of the system to provide appropriate quality services for youth that needed it," said Todd Landry, director of Nebraska Health and Human Services' Division of Children and Family Services.
After he was arrested and fired from his job in the last few weeks, Hawkins - in his own words - wanted to go out in style.
Meanwhile, another Nebraska teenager has been charged with threatening a girl who made statements the teen didn't like about Hawkins.
Five charges were read Friday against 17-year-old Davis S. Horvath of Bellevue, including one of intimidation by phone call. The other charges were for unrelated, prior incidents.
Horvath entered no plea.
Audio Of Call To Omaha Police During Mall Shooting
Bellevue Police Chief John Stacey says statements the teenage girl made about the gunman offended Horvath, who says Hawkins was his best friend.
Stacey says Horvath called the girl late Wednesday and threatened her life.
Police found a rifle and two shotguns at Horvath's house when it was searched Thursday. |
So how do these images square with Police Chief Warren's statement:
| Police Chief Thomas Warren wrote: | | He re-entered the store, appeared to be concealing something, balled up in a hooded sweatshirt. |
The 3 CCTV pictures released are here:
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rodin
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Sat Dec 08, 2007 4:11 pm Post subject: |
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Sky News has the release video surveillance footage here:
http://news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30200-1296249,00.html
Notice that when Hawkins first enters the mall, the camera zooms in quite deliberately.
At this point he is said to be unarmed.
This zoom must be why Chief Warren said that "he aroused suspicion"
Then, it is reported that Hawkins leaves, re-enters, this time apparently concealing a 34 inch AK47
CBS aired CCTV footage also here on You Tube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjOLlhD1-0E
_________________
The Medium is the Massage - Marshall McLuhan. |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 11:58 am Post subject: |
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Omaha Word Herald
| Quote: | The footsteps of a killer: Investigators slowly piecing together shooter's path
From following a trail of spent shell casings and victims' bodies, a clearer picture is beginning to emerge of Robert Hawkins' deadly path through Von Maur.
Robert Hawkins is shown on a Von Maur video surveillance camera peering down the barrel of an AK-47 before he opened fire.
After stepping out of a third-floor elevator with an assault rifle, Hawkins shot four victims on the sales floor, law enforcement sources say. Three died.
Looking down the store's wide circular atrium, he rained death on two men on floors below.
He turned the customer service desk into a gruesome killing zone, fatally shooting three and seriously wounding two others.
He fired the final bullet into his head, ending the rampage that killed eight and wounded three by gunshot - an event that will go down as one of the darkest in Omaha history.
While still only days into their work, investigators say no evidence contradicts their belief that Hawkins acted alone.
And while investigators are offering no theories on what prompted Hawkins to end his killing spree, it was chillingly fortunate that he did.
He had rounds left in his AK-47-style semiautomatic rifle. At least 15 people, most of them gift-wrappers, huddled in a room not more than 50 feet away. There was nowhere to go had Hawkins come through the freely swinging double doors.
Hawkins' likely pathTo view a map of Von Maur showing Robert Hawkins' likely path through the third floor of the store, click here.
The one question law enforcement officials may never answer is why.
Law enforcement sources say it is virtually impossible to know the thoughts going through the head of the troubled 19-year-old - not that there could ever be a rational explanation for his unthinkable act.
"We may never get that," said Lt. Alex Hayes, the Omaha police detective directing the investigation day to day.
Answers can't come soon enough for Heidi Cvilikas, one of the Von Maur employees who is haunted by the events of Wednesday afternoon.
Head of the first-floor cosmetics department, she was friends with many of the victims and was with Gary Joy moments before he fell.
"I know some people don't want to know anything about it. But I need to know how it unfolded. Dianne (Trent) was one of my dear friends, and Gary, just the vision of his last moments. I won't forget. I want to know what happened."
Investigators are weeks or even months from completing their probe of the holiday-season massacre that shocked the nation and added Omaha to the grim roll of cities scarred by gunmen bent on mass murder.
It is probably one of the most extensive investigations ever conducted in Omaha, with a wide-ranging crime scene covering all three floors of the department store.
It took dozens of investigators and crime lab technicians from Omaha, Douglas County and the FBI more than 30 nonstop hours to gather evidence, Hayes said. Police collected 145 pieces of evidence from the store.
Officials caution that some of their conclusions at this point amount to their best theories and could change as more is learned.
But through interviews with those law enforcement sources, the words of eyewitnesses and publicly released information such as tapes of 911 calls and store surveillance videos, a clearer picture is coming into focus.
Here is what is known about key elements of the investigation:
Hawkins' movements
Videotapes from first-floor security cameras captured Hawkins, clad in an unzipped, dark hooded sweat shirt over a black Jack Daniels T-shirt, making a brief, 12-step casing of the store's south entryway.
Six minutes later, he returned. Obscured by an oversized holiday garland, he headed straight for the elevators. A hand was clutched to his abdomen, as if the rifle were concealed inside his clothes.
Technical problems have kept police from piecing together complete video of his movements on the third floor. One still image released shows him coming off the elevator, peering down the barrel of his rifle.
Even without the video, it's possible to put together Hawkins' most likely path by following the trail of shell casings ejected onto the store's marble walkways, along with the locations where the victims fell.
Law enforcement officials caution, however, that nothing is certain. Given the high-powered rifle he wielded, he was capable of hitting some victims from many different points during the rampage.
The shell casings suggest that he headed for the store's central atrium, then veered to the left into the children's clothing department.
That's where Angie Schuster, the department's 36-year-old manager, and Maggie Webb, the energetic 24-year-old store manager, both fell. Co-workers say Webb didn't typically work that area but had been helping out.
Jeff Schaffart, a 34-year-old shopping for a dress for his 2-year-old daughter, was wounded in the arm while in the department. He was able to escape the gunman's sights and hide in a back room.
It appears that Hawkins then turned back toward the atrium. Two victims were found below, next to escalators: Gary Scharf, 48, of Lincoln, on the second floor; and 56-year-old Gary Joy, a housekeeping worker, on the first.
Much of Hawkins' apparent path followed the circular atrium, sources say, so it's hard to determine from shell casings at what point he fired those shots. Floor plans and photo images of the store suggest a likely spot would have been a side away from the escalators, where views downward would not be as obscured.
One witness on the second floor said she saw Hawkins reach out over the atrium railing to shoot Scharf. Investigators say there were shell casings found on lower floors.
Hawkins' path next took him by the gift area. It was in that department that saleswoman Janet Jorgensen was shot, while in an entryway against a back wall that opens to the employee locker area.
Evidence suggests that she either crawled or was pulled into that back area, dying before emergency personnel could reach her.
The area where Jorgensen was shot is almost directly across from the elevators, making it possible that she could have been hit early. However, one store worker said her work area was so filled with holiday gifts and decorations, it seems more likely the shot came from closer range.
Evidence suggests that Hawkins then headed for the customer service desk.
Emergency records indicate that Dianne Trent phoned 911 after hearing shots. She described "a young boy with glasses" coming toward the counter. Her call came 35 seconds after the first 911 call indicating trouble. With shots ringing out, her call ended abruptly 38 seconds after it began.
Trent, 53, was one of four customer service workers Hawkins shot behind the counter. Trent and gift wrapper Beverly Flynn, 47, suffered fatal wounds. Fred Wilson, the department's 61-year-old manager, and Micheale Oldham, 65, suffered serious wounds but are expected to survive.
Hawkins shot and killed 65-year-old customer John McDonald, who had been hiding with his wife behind a chair in the corner of the department. They had been awaiting a gift being wrapped on the other side of the counter.
It appears Hawkins never went over the counter. While the terror for those hiding around the store would continue, the killing ended when he shot himself in the head 4 feet in front of the counter.
Timeline
Police investigators offer no estimates of how long Hawkins' shooting spree lasted beyond the six minutes that elapsed between the first 911 call and the first officer's arrival at the store.
Video images from the third floor, once investigators get them together, will provide the clearest answer.
The first 911 calls, depending on how soon they were dialed after the shooting started, suggest that Hawkins could have reached the customer service area in a little over a minute. The entire length of his apparent path covered about a football field, a distance that could be walked without stops in about that period of time.
Shots fired
There was no more clear estimate Saturday than the more than 30 shots suggested by police officials on Thursday. But Hawkins was firing rapidly. In the first 911 call, 25 shots can be heard in just over a minute.
Hawkins' gun was armed with two ammunition clips capable of holding a total of 60 rounds. It's not known if they were full. He did have an undisclosed number left.
Investigators cataloged and collected all the shell casings found but have yet to count them.
Motives
It does appear Hawkins acted alone.
"From all aspects, it appears to be a single individual, not part of any conspiracy of any kind," said Douglas County Attorney Don Kleine.
He and other authorities are offering no theories on whether Hawkins targeted Von Maur, perhaps the city's most elegant department store.
While his suicide notes offer some indication of his mind-set, much work remains before a true profile of the killer will emerge, Kleine said.
He and other investigators also would not speculate on why Hawkins killed himself when he did. Among possible reasons: hearing the approaching sirens, getting spooked or nearing the end of his ammunition.
No matter, Renee Toney is simply glad it ended when it did.
The Von Maur worker, who fled from behind the customer service counter just before Hawkins arrived, was among those quietly huddled in a back room, only 40 to 50 feet from where the killer fell.
"The whole time we were peering through those swinging double doors, praying that he didn't come through," she said. "We are very, very lucky to be alive." |
So, the video that Jodi Longmeyer, Von Maur's HR Manager, claims to have been watching in real time from the control room, is now suffering from technical problems.
_________________
The Medium is the Massage - Marshall McLuhan.
Last edited by Mark Gobell on Sun Dec 09, 2007 12:13 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 12:05 pm Post subject: |
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Omaha World Herald
| Quote: | Published Sunday | December 9, 2007
Robert Hawkins: His life a tragic tumble down
BY KARYN SPENCER, CINDY GONZALEZ AND PAUL HAMMEL
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITERS
Robert Hawkins had been in therapy, on medication and hospitalized for depression — by the age of 6.
Interviews and divorce records from Sarpy County District Court shed light on a fractured family that struggled with Robert's psychiatric problems almost his entire life.
The Rev. Mark Miller of Faith Presbyterian Church in La Vista was a counselor and minister to Robert Hawkins' father, Ronald Hawkins, and his second wife. Robert lived with them from age 4 until he went into foster care for psychiatric problems at age 14.
"The family did the best they could under the circumstances," Miller said.
Ronald Hawkins and Robert's former stepmother, Candace Hawkins, have declined to comment. Robert's mother, Maribel "Molly" Rodriguez, and former stepfather, Mark Dotson, have not responded to messages.
"I just hope there's some support left for the family of Robbie," said one of his elementary school teachers. "They're victims, too."
Ronald Hawkins, an Omaha native, met Rodriguez while stationed with the Air Force in San Angelo, Texas, where she had been born.
Robert Hawkins' life:
Born May 17, 1988, at an Air Force base near London
1990, Nearly age 2: Parents separate; moves with dad and older sister to La Vista
1992, age 4: Both parents remarry
1995, age 7: Robert has four half sisters and brothers
1997, age 8: Mother and stepfather divorce
2002, age 14: Robert sent to Missouri treatment center after threatening to kill stepmother
2003-2004, age 14-16: As a state ward, lives in Omaha-area group homes
2004-2005, age 16-17: Lives at a foster home and attends school in Fort Calhoun. Charged twice with dealing marijuana
Late 2005, age 17: Moves home with father, who is getting divorced
2006, age 17: Drops out of Papillion-La Vista High School
2006, age 18: Moves in with family near Bellevue
2007, age 19: Kills eight people and himself at Westroads Mall
They were married there in 1983, when he was 20 and she was 16. Rodriguez may have dropped out of high school as a junior, but court records are contradictory.
They lived around the world as their family grew.
Their first child was born in Athens, Greece, in 1984. Robert was born May 17, 1988, at Royal Air Force Lakenheath, a military base near London.
The Hawkinses later lived in Winchendon, Mass., their last stop before Ronald Hawkins moved in 1990 to La Vista — with his children but without his wife.
The father and children moved into an apartment in the Parkview Heights area. Robert Hawkins was almost 2 years old; his sister, 6.
Ronald Hawkins, a technical sergeant assigned to Offutt Air Force Base, filed for legal separation and later divorce. He was on active duty in Saudi Arabia before the divorce became final in 1991.
In a court affidavit, he alleged that Rodriguez smoked marijuana and drank excessively at times, affecting her ability to parent. He was awarded custody.
The family tree soon branched out.
Each parent remarried in 1992, and each had two children with the new spouses. Rodriguez married another airman, Master Sgt. Dotson, in Okinawa, Japan. He eventually was assigned to Offutt.
Dotson's brother, Eric, met Robert once when the boy was 4.
"He was a real rascal then," Eric Dotson said last week.
Robert's mother filed a list of allegations against his father in an attempt to get custody nearly three years after the divorce.
In her court affidavit, she said that Robert, then 6, had developed behavioral problems, including hitting, biting and kicking his teachers.
He had been hospitalized for depression at the Richard Young Center, a psychiatric hospital. Robert was in therapy and on medication.
Rodriguez also alleged that the stepmother had physically disciplined and been verbally abusive to the children.
She also complained about her daughter's long hair being cut, visitation problems and other matters.
During the custody dispute, the judge ordered psychological evaluations of the children.
He also ordered both parents to prevent the children from watching violent movies.
In the end, the judge ruled that Ronald Hawkins could continue to have custody and ordered Rodriguez to get individual counseling to improve her parenting skills.
Over the years, Rodriguez has been a housewife and worked as a receptionist, telemarketing clerk and runner for a law firm.
She and her second husband, Dotson, divorced after nearly five years of marriage.
Dotson had said in a 1998 court affidavit that Rodriguez was using marijuana, cocaine and other drugs in front of their children, then ages 5 and 3.
The couple had had joint custody of those two children, but a judge awarded Dotson sole custody after Rodriguez missed a hearing on the subject.
Two former teachers at Robert's elementary school, Parkview Heights in La Vista, didn't recall him being aggressive.
They remember him as a quiet, scrawny student who sometimes was picked on.
"He did some quirky, silly kids thing to draw attention to himself," said a former physical education teacher. "I think that was his defense mechanism."
They were shocked that Robert became a mass killer.
"I can remember more students who you'd say 'That didn't surprise me.' This did surprise me," said Robert's fifth-grade social studies teacher.
Ronald Hawkins and his second wife were raising their two children plus Robert and his older sister.
The Rev. Miller said the couple tried to set up a "healthy home environment."
"They struggled and struggled for years," he said.
In 2002, the day after Robert's 14th birthday, he was admitted to a Missouri juvenile psychiatric treatment center after he threatened to kill his stepmother. He had been hospitalized for psychiatric problems twice by then.
He stayed at that treatment center for nine months, after which he was made a state ward to cover the expense when his father's insurance through the military refused to pay more.
When he became a state ward, Robert had been diagnosed with an unspecified mood disorder — a term often used when problems have been identified, but a specific diagnosis such as bipolar disorder or depression hasn't been developed.
His diagnosis also included attention deficit disorder and oppositional defiant disorder, which is a persistent pattern of defying authority.
Robert spent three years in group homes and a foster home while getting counseling and drug treatment.
His father attended every juvenile court hearing, sometimes accompanied by his wife.
Two former staff members at the Cooper Village residential treatment center in Omaha remember Robert's happiness when his father would visit.
"I just remember Robbie getting excited when he got to go on a pass and his dad was the one to pick him up," said Jamie Heimann, a youth care worker who helped supervise Robert.
He remembered Robert as a smart kid who had a small following — a couple of tight-knit friends who shared his interest in skating and video games.
"I don't want to say he liked being there, but he had friends and staff there who gave him attention," Heimann said.
Robert's close friends looked up to him, Heimann said, because he knew how to play the system; he knew, for example, how to get a special pass for an activity.
"The friends looked at him like he was the smart kid," Heimann said. "That probably made him feel good."
Other youths at the facility, however, looked at Robert as an easy target.
"People would say he got picked on. After bottling up, he'd lash out a bit. But out of the type of population we worked with, they were much more physically aggressive than he was."
Another former Cooper Village employee who counseled Robert remembers him as a shy guy who kept largely to himself.
Robert was sad that his parents weren't more involved with him, said the former staffer, who didn't want his name used because he still works with troubled youths.
"That's the thing that stood out," he said. "He always wanted to be with his parents."
In 2005, Robert's mother re-entered his life after a 2½-year absence, which was unexplained in court records. Robert's foster family that year said his mother visited him regularly.
While Robert continued to have problems, his older sister excelled. She received a Presbyterian college scholarship to the University of Tulsa, which is given to students who are in the top 10 percent of their class and noted as leaders by their pastors. Through friends, she declined an interview request.
School didn't interest Robert, administrators have said. He went to court for getting into fights and selling marijuana at school.
He dropped out his junior year and got his GED.
The juvenile court ended its jurisdiction over Robert in August 2006.
Sandra Markley was the deputy county attorney for most of the case.
"I don't know what we could have done differently with him," Markley said. "I really don't. This is such a tragedy, you want to see if you can learn from it, learn how we can serve these troubled kids . . .
"We had no indication, certainly, that he was capable of this."
In December 2005, Robert moved home with his father, who was getting divorced. The juvenile court ended its jurisdiction. .
The deputy county attorney noted that Robert had had no new legal problems for more than a year — until he was ticketed on alcohol charges two weeks before his rampage.
About the time his juvenile court cases ended, Robert moved in with a friend's family.
His friend's mother, Debora Maruca, was under the impression that he had been kicked out of his home, she said the day of the shootings.
She said Robert rarely had talked about his upbringing. She knew he had emotional problems and had been in foster care, but apparently did not know details of his psychiatric issues.
"He always thought the world was against him," said Maruca's father, Francis Maruca, 81, who said Robert often visited his nearby home.
In a note he left before the shootings, Robert told family members, one by one, that he loved them, including his former stepfather. His "mommy" came first. His former stepmother was left off the list.
He apologized to his family for being a constant disappointment and a burden to them. |
| Chief Thomas Warren wrote: | | The suspect has been positively identified as Robert Hawkins, white male, 19 years of age, we have a date of birth of May 18th 1987 |
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The Medium is the Massage - Marshall McLuhan. |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 12:21 pm Post subject: |
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Omaha World Herald
| Quote: | Published Thursday | December 6, 2007
Bush visit allowed quick police action
BY KAREN SLOAN AND LYNN SAFRANEK
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITERS
President Bush's visit to Omaha on Wednesday resulted in a quicker and more organized police response to the Westroads Mall shootings, said the head of the Omaha Police Department's SWAT team.
Members of the SWAT team and other police personnel had been assembled Wednesday morning to provide security for the president's visit to a south Omaha medical clinic and a fundraiser for Republican Senate candidate Mike Johanns.
Bush's plane left Omaha close to 1 p.m., about 45 minutes before the shooting began.
Although some of the extra officers had been dismissed when the first call for assistance came in, many were still nearby and raced to the mall, said Sgt. Tim Carmody, who heads the SWAT and bomb teams.
"Based on what we know," he said, "I don't think (Bush's visit) could have prevented what happened, but it allowed us to respond faster, and we were able to efficiently clear out the mall."
It was unclear Wednesday evening how many officers responded, but Carmody said emergency agencies across the metropolitan area were involved.
Personnel from the Douglas County Sheriff's Office, the La Vista Police Department, the FBI, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and the U.S. Marshals Service were among those who assisted at the scene, he said.
Carmody was among the first to enter the mall.
"It was a lot of chaos," he said. "There were people with fear in their eyes, but our officers did a good job of telling people what to do."
Officers swept through the mall, clearing people out of stores. That was made more complicated by the fact that people had hidden behind clothing racks, ducked into dressing and storage rooms and crouched behind counters, he said. Officers led people to designated areas such as J.C. Penney, where their names and contact information were collected by police.
Carmody did not have an estimate of how many people were in the mall at the time of the shooting.
Mayor Mike Fahey's chief of staff, Paul Landow, said police had not reviewed the 911 tapes of the calls for help as of Wednesday evening but would do so.
Police said the first call about a shooting at the mall came in at 1:42 p.m., and the first officers arrived six minutes later.
Carmody said that the department has plans in place to respond to such an event and that officers followed those procedures at the Westroads.
In July, the Omaha Police Department's emergency response unit staged a training scenario involving a shooter at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. That training was in response to the April shootings at Virginia Tech and was useful in Wednesday's situation, Carmody said.
Additionally, SWAT members and some other Omaha officers have "active shooter" training, meaning they are trained to respond to gunmen.
"Things came together extremely well for a chaotic situation," Carmody said, "but that's the last thing that families' members (of people who were killed or wounded) want to hear."
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The Medium is the Massage - Marshall McLuhan. |
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rodin
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Posts: 2224
Location: UK
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 12:33 pm Post subject: |
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Mark thanks for collating all these news reports. I would be interested in your analysis of the event. Mine is that he was induced by mind control/hypnosis to carry out the shoot.
MO
Find a likely candidate under a care order or with some obvious dysfunction (like Hamilton)
Get them shrinked and drugged up
A clockwork assassin.
The Key? Held by the usual suspects.
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 12:39 pm Post subject: |
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Omaha World Herald
| Quote: | Published Thursday | December 6, 2007
In the end, Hawkins made good on threats
BY KARYN SPENCER
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER
Mall gunman Robbie Hawkins had threatened to kill people as long as five years ago and as recently as two weeks ago.
The day after he turned 14, Hawkins was sent to a group home after threatening to kill his stepmother, court records show.
Two weeks ago, he threatened to kill a 16-year-old girl and her family after accusing her of stealing things from his car, the girl said today.
"He said, 'I'm going to kill you, I am going to kill your family and I'm going to burn your house down,'" she said.
The girl, a neighbor, shrugged off the threat because Hawkins was known for "shooting his mouth off."
"I never really thought that he would follow through with something like this," she said.
Interviews and court records from Sarpy and Washington County courts detail the troubled childhood of the 19-year-old responsible for Wednesday's killing spree at the Westroads Mall.
Hawkins was a foster child through Sarpy County Juvenile Court for about four years. Judge Robert O'Neal handled the case.
Hawkins was in the custody of his father, Ronald, in LaVista, when he became a foster child in 2002. Hawkins' parents divorced when he was 3.
Hawkins was earning about $800 a month working at this nearby McDonald's.
Hawkins had been hospitalized twice for psychiatric problems before being admitted on May 18, 2002, to Piney Ridge Center in Waynesville, Mo., for "homicidal threats he made to his stepmother."
At the time, he had been diagnosed with an unspecified mood disorder — a term often used when problems have been identified but a specific diagnosis such as bipolar disorder or depression hasn't been developed.
Hawkins' diagnosis also included attention deficit disorder and oppositional defiant disorder, which is a persistent pattern of defying authority.
Four months later, he was made a state ward because his health insurance would not pay to continue his care. The center's staff said he should not be released.
He stayed at the Missouri facility for at least another month before moving to group homes, including several Cooper Village facilities, and at least one foster home in Omaha.
In 2003, while living at Cooper Village, Hawkins told police that his roommate grabbed his crotch and offered to perform oral sex on him. Another time, the roommate punched him several times, he said.
The roommate was arrested on suspicion of misdemeanor assault and sexual misconduct but was never charged.
Hawkins later lived with foster mother Marty Glass in her home near the Douglas-Washington County line.
Her son, Ben Glass, 31, remembered Hawkins as an average kid who enjoyed video games. "He was a quiet kid," Ben Glass said.
While in foster care, Hawkins got into legal trouble.
Hawkins was charged in Sarpy County Juvenile Court with third-degree assault in connection with an October 2003 fight at Papillion-La Vista High School and with unlawful tobacco use by a minor at the school in September 2004.
He was ordered to serve 50 hours of community service.
He got into trouble several times in Washington County in 2005 when he lived with Glass.
Hawkins was charged in March 2005 with possession of marijuana with intent to deliver. The case was sent to Sarpy County to handle along with the pending foster-care case.
Judge O'Neal ordered Hawkins to abstain from alcohol and drugs; complete chemical dependency and mental health treatment through a day treatment program at Cooper Village; and attend Alcoholics or Narcotics Anonymous nce a week.
Hawkins was ticketed Oct. 7, 2005, for disorderly conduct after getting in a fight near the school in Fort Calhoun. He later was arrested for not paying the $100 fine.
He later was charged with possession of marijuana with intent to deliver and two counts of contributing to the delinquency of minors, ages 12 and 14, on Oct. 24, 2005. Those charges later were dismissed.
In March 2006, Hawkins dropped out of Papillion-La Vista High School, Principal Jim Glover said.
Hawkins was disciplined for skipping classes but never showed anger toward the staff or students, Glover said. "He was pretty low-key, laid-back," he said.
Soon after Hawkins dropped out, the judge ordered him to get his GED and work 20 hours a week. A friend said Hawkins got his GED.
Hawkins' mother, Maribel Rodriguez, sought visits with her son in July 2005. She had not had contact with him for 2 1/2 years.
The juvenile court's jurisdiction ended in August 2006.
Earlier this year, Hawkins' father asked for help from neighbor John Hubbard, a captain with the Douglas County Department of Corrections.
Ronald Hawkins asked if Hubbard would take the youth on a tour of the jail to help set him straight.
Hubbard said the jail has a policy against such tours.
Just after Hawkins' court cases ended last year, he moved in with his friend Will's family in the Quail Creek subdivision in Bellevue, said Will's mother, Debora Maruca. She said Hawkins had been hopping between friends' homes.
"He was like a lost pound puppy nobody wanted," she said.
The night before the shooting, Hawkins and her sons showed Maruca an AK-47-style rifle. Previous reports from police and Maruca identified the gun as an SKS semi-automatic military rifle.
She didn't think much of it — it looked too old to work. The boys liked to target- and skeet-shoot at her family's cabin.
Hawkins took the weapon to the mall Wednesday afternoon.
"I think, 'Why didn't I do something?" Maruca said. "What could I have done?'"
During his first few months with the family, Hawkins seemed nervous and withdrawn, sometimes curling into a fetal position.
He was mannerly, expressing appreciation and asking how her day had been.
"We were eating like vultures," she said, "and he's saying, 'Please pass this,' and thanking me for every meal.'"
She thought his life had started to come together.
Hawkins was earning about $800 a month working at a nearby McDonald's restaurant and had started to pay rent.
He had gotten his driver's license in July, and on Nov. 28 he registered a 1995 green Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo.
"I really thought he was doing better," Maruca said. "He had a little spark in his eye."
Then in the past two weeks, Hawkins broke up with his girlfriend.
He was ticketed Nov. 24 in Sarpy County on suspicion of contributing to the delinquency of a minor and two alcohol charges.
About 1 p.m. Wednesday, an upset Hawkins called Maruca's son, and Maruca got on the line.
Hawkins thanked the family members for everything they had done for him. He said the family wouldn't have to worry about him any more.
She asked if he had been fired. He said he had.
He said he had been accused of stealing $17 from his till. McDonald's management has declined to comment about his employment.
They told him, Robbie, it's not that bad. Just come home. It'll be OK, Maruca said.
"He must have felt like everything he touched turned to nonsense," she said.
After the call, they checked his bedroom and found his note, which said things like, "I'm a piece of *, but I'm going to be famous now."
They had gotten a call like this from him once before and worried he was going to commit suicide. They didn't think he would hurt anyone else.
Maruca's son Will went looking for Hawkins. Maruca called Hawkins' mother, who picked up the note and took it to the Sarpy County Sheriff's Office.
Maruca, not knowing what else to do, went to work. She is a nurse at the Nebraska Medical Center.
There she heard news reports of the mall shooting.
"I just got this sick feeling," she said. "I thought, 'Oh, my God, I hope this is not Robbie.'"
When Hawkins' mother arrived at the Sheriff's Office, she did not know about the mall shooting that had occurred about 30 minutes earlier, Capt. Rolly Yost said.
Twenty to 40 minutes before the shooting, an ex-girlfriend of Hawkins received a text message from him describing his plan, according to a 16-year-old girl who had been threatened in the past.
"He said that he wanted to die," she said. "'I just want to shoot a whole lot of people at the mall and kill myself.'"
Maruca said she had no idea why Hawkins picked Von Maur.
"They're completely innocent victims," she said of those he shot. "He had no connection."
Wednesday night, authorities searched the homes of Maruca and Hawkins' mother in Bellevue for evidence and possible explanations.
Among the news media trucks and split-level homes in her hilly subdivision, Maruca and a woman hugged and sobbed.
"That was Robbie," she said.
"I can't believe it," they kept telling each other.
"I can't f-ing believe it." |
_________________
The Medium is the Massage - Marshall McLuhan. |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 1:38 pm Post subject: |
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MSNBC have a video on this page titled 'I heard the last shot'.
This video contains eye witness testimony from Tina Olson who is the owner of another store in the Westroads Mall called The Enchanted Castle.
Extract from Tina Olson's statements:
| MSNBC wrote: | | Tina, at that point did you fear for your own life? |
| Tina Olson wrote: | Um. Yeah. Only because we understood there was a second shooter.
We thought there was somebody. . . |
| MSNBC wrote: | | So there was some misinformation already flying around. |
| Tina Olson wrote: | Right. Right.
There were people that said that, you know, the shooter was in green, the shooter was in black and so they fully believed there was a second shooter in the mall. |
| Tina Olson wrote: | | and the SWAT team was all over, I saw people up on the second level, guns drawn in centre court, which is right outside of my store and they were lined up around my front display window and my gate |
KETV quote Tina Olson thus:
| Tina Olson wrote: | | Tina Olson is a manager at the Enchanted Castle store a few doors away from Von Maur. Olson said she couldn't believe how quickly police arrived at the mall after the first screams she heard. |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 2:39 pm Post subject: |
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The "weapon" was originally reported as being an SKS.
It then changed into an AK47
It is currently a GP WASR10.
According to the video on this MSNBC page titled "The gunman's weapon".
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 2:42 pm Post subject: |
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Omaha World Herald
Funerals for all victims take place on Monday and Tuesday.
| Quote: | Published Sunday | December 9, 2007
Memorial services for shooting victims
Beverly Flynn - Omaha - Family will be receiving friends from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. and have a time of sharing at 7 p.m. Monday at Glad Tidings Church, 7415 Hickory St. The funeral service is at 11 a.m. Tuesday at Glad Tidings Church.
Janet Jorgensen - Omaha - A funeral Mass is at 10 a.m. Monday at St. James Catholic Church, 9025 Larimore Ave. Visitation will be from 2 to 4 p.m. today at the West Center Chapel, 7805 West Center Road, and will continue after 6:30 p.m. at St. James. A vigil service will take place at the church at 7:30 p.m.
Gary Joy - Omaha - Visitation is from 2 to 4 p.m. today at Kremer Funeral Home, 6302 Maple St. The funeral service is at 1 p.m. Monday at Kremer Funeral Home. Joy will be buried in Bloomfield, Neb.
John V. McDonald - Council Bluffs - Funeral Mass will be at 10 a.m. Monday at St. John Church on the Creighton University campus. A wake will be at 4 p.m. today at Cutler-O'Neill-Meyer- Woodring Funeral Home, 545 Willow Ave., Council Bluffs.
Gary Scharf - Lincoln - Funeral service will be at 2 p.m. Monday at the First United Methodist Church in Curtis, Neb.
Angie Schuster - Omaha - Visitation is from 2 to 4 p.m. Monday at John A. Gentleman Mortuary, 14151 Pacific St., and will continue after 6:15 p.m. at St. Robert Bellarmine Catholic Church, 11802 Pacific St., with a wake beginning at 7 p.m. A funeral Mass will be at 10 a.m. Tuesday at St. Robert.
Dianne Clavin Trent - Omaha - A wake service is scheduled at 7:30 tonight at St. Leo Catholic Church, 1920 N. 102nd St. Visitation is from 2 to 4 p.m. today at Heafey-Heafey-Hoffmann- Dworak & Cutler mortuary, 78th Street and West Center Road, and after 7 p.m. at St. Leo. Funeral service is at 10:30 a.m. Monday at St. Leo.
Maggie L. Webb - Omaha - Visitation is from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. Monday at Esterdahl Mortuary, 6601 38th Ave., Moline, Ill. The funeral Mass will be at 10 a.m. Tuesday at Christ the King Catholic Church, 3205 60th St., Moline, Ill. Burial St. Mary's Cemetery, East Moline, Ill. |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 2:55 pm Post subject: |
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Many reports, including some of our own UK repeaters have claimed that Hawkins was not on SSRI's, or that he was, but had stopped taking them.
Hawkins' friend Shawn Sanders says different:
| Quote: | | SHAWN SANDERS, FRIEND OF ROBERT HAWKINS: I'm not sure to the level of his depression. I just know he was on antidepressants for the last couple of months. And I guest -- I guess it was just getting worse over time, with the loss of his job. And I guess he had issues going on with a girlfriend at the time. |
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0712/06/acd.01.html
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 5:26 pm Post subject: |
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Omaha Police Department
| Quote: | 07/11/07 Active Shooter Training for Omaha Police Officers
Omaha Police Department and UNO Conduct Active Shooter Training
The Omaha Police Department, in partnership with the University of Nebraska at Omaha (UNO), will conduct a day-long training session on the campus of the University of Nebraska at Omaha, today, Wednesday, July 11, 2007.
Police officers from the Emergency Response Unit will conduct scenario based training in an effort to prepare for and respond to “Active Shooter” incidents. More than 20 police officers will spend the day at UNO.
“We have a great, long-standing relationship with the Omaha Police Department,” said Paul Kosel, assistant manger for UNO security. “Having them train on campus is a positive for the police and the university.”
UNO security officers meet with the Omaha Police Department several times each year. The spring meeting took place April 17, the day after the Virginia Tech shooting incident that left 32 people dead.
The tragedy at Virginia Tech highlighted the need for awareness and training for everyone in higher education, Kosel said.
The Omaha Police Department’s Emergency Response Unit trains on a continual basis. Scenario based training is an excellent tool to utilize in the effort to prepare for many of the incidents that occur. This training should assist in recognizing the best possible approach in the UNO campus atmosphere in responding to an “Active Shooter” incident.
A media briefing will take place at 1 p.m. in the Strauss Performing Arts Center. |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 6:08 pm Post subject: |
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deleted
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Last edited by Mark Gobell on Thu Jul 08, 2010 8:49 am; edited 1 time in total |
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TmcMistress
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Joined: 15 Jun 2007
Posts: 392
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| Posted: Mon Dec 10, 2007 7:45 am Post subject: |
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Not to distract too much from the topic at hand (which I think is more than a little silly and reading into conspiracies that just aren't there), I have to say, that's a very charming forum you've linked to, rodin. Nice to see gun rights forums are still letting the racists and misogynists run amok...
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Mon Dec 10, 2007 7:54 am Post subject: |
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Omaha World Herald
| Quote: | Eyewitness accounts from inside the mall during the shooting
EYEWITNESSES
Alan Mason, at the checkout counter on the third floor of Von Maur: He heard pops in the corner opposite the elevator area. "It sounded like something blowing out. Like fuses popping. After I saw (the gunman), I knew it was shots. . . . A guy come out from the elevator area. He had a rifle." Mason's wife, Teresa, was browsing a few racks down from the register and also heard the noises. "We turned around to see what the noise was. It's a gun, let's go! We ran."
The Masons, two other adults and a young boy barricaded themselves in an area behind the dressing rooms for about an hour until police came. They used file cabinets to block the door and searched for things that could be used as weapons if necessary. "We didn't know what was going on. It was pretty scary."
Mason didn't realize until later that one of the three bodies he saw was that of the young man who had held the rifle. The Masons were questioned by police officers and allowed to go home at around 4 p.m. On Wednesday night, they spent time with their children, 7 and 13. Later in the evening, after attending his son's basketball game, Mason said he was "still processing everything." He was watching the news, "decompressing. . . . and thinking of how fortunate I was."
* * *
Christine Schomer, works in the Von Maur gift-wrapping department: She was in the back room and heard shots. She started out toward a hallway and saw a man shooting up at the ceiling in the children's department.
The shooting was constant — at least 20 times that she counted.
IN VON MAUR
Carol Padon, shopping in the second-floor men's department: She heard what sounded like 15 to 25 shots and hid. "The shots wouldn't stop. I was so busy praying that it's really hard to tell the details." As police escorted her from the store, she saw a man who appeared to be in his 40s on the floor with a serious gunshot wound.
* * *
Kim Skar, shopping for jeans: She was in the first-floor dressing room when she heard gunfire.
"As I walked into the dressing room, I heard, 'Pow, pow, pow.' It sounded like it was coming from the second floor. And then there were more shots. It continued. It didn't stop. Then I knew something wasn't right. I was scared to death."
She and another woman ran out of the store to the parking lot and crouched behind a Ford Explorer. They decided they wouldn't be safe there, so they ran into David's Bridal, which is across the street. Store employees there locked the doors.
* * *
Jim and Kathy Hegarty of Plattsmouth, shopping in the men's department: Kathy said she heard at least three sets of shots, with about three shots each. Jim said he heard a total of 15 or so. They saw a victim, a man, at the top of the escalator on the second floor. They hid in the men's dressing room with some other people.
The Hegartys called 911, were told police were on the way, and then waited for about 30 minutes before calling 911 again. The dispatcher told them to wait until someone came to lead them out. They were led out, with their hands raised, by police.
* * *
Trudy Barry, 58, Council Bluffs, on the third floor: "I told people checking me out to run." She ran to a break room where about 15 people were hiding behind pop machines. She saw two people who had been shot, shell casings and "blood from the third floor down the stairs all the way."
* * *
Michaela Hopkins, eating in the third-floor lunchroom: Hopkins and about 15 others huddled quietly behind three vending machine and four refrigerators in a lunchroom. Some prayed the Lord's Prayer and the 23rd Psalm.
Others whispered with friends or family on cell phones.
"The scary part was not knowing if he'd come through the door at any moment," said Hopkins.
Hopkins, who manages the women's designer apparel department, known as Expressions, was about midway through her hour long lunch break with colleagues Jennifer Jensen and Viva Hood when they heard a popping sound.
They joked that something fell and broke. It happens this time of year.
Then they heard the sound again and moments later two female shoppers burst into the room yelling, "He's got a gun! He's shooting!"
The lunch room crowd — only two men among them — stepped out into the fitting-room area but quickly retreated when they heard more shots. The gunman appeared to be 10 to 15 feet away, in or near the women's lounge.
After 30 or 45 minutes, a knock came at the door.
Law enforcement officers, guns drawn, announced themselves and ordered everyone to hold up their hands.
* * *
Jane Urbanski, shopping on the third floor: Urbanski, who was pushing her 16-month-old son, Lucas, in his stroller, dropped to the floor when she heard gunfire. She quickly pushed the stroller toward an employee exit, scared because she didn't know if it would lead them to safety.
"I just grabbed him and ran," she said.
* * *
Heidi Cvilikas, a cosmetics department manager: At first no one knew what was making the loud noises, but the realization came soon.
"Everyone stopped and everyone was trying to digest what was going on," Cvilikas said. "Then everybody dropped and started screaming."
As Cvilikas ran through the store, her high heels fell off. "I almost called in sick today," she said less than an hour after the shooting, standing on the cold parking lot with only black pantyhose covering her feet.
In the midst of the chaos, her mind turned to Columbine High School, she said. "I thought we were going to die."
* * *
Beth Pepitone, shopping in the jewelry department: Pepitone had about an hour to devote to Christmas shopping before picking up her 8- and 10-year-old children from school. She decided to stop by to look for a gift for her grandmother.
She had been at a jewelry counter about 10 minutes when she heard "pop, pop, pop, pop" in quick succession.
What was that? Pepitone asked. The two employees behind the counter speculated that it was hammering from construction in the mall.
Then came more popping sounds, these much louder. Everyone looked up, puzzled by the source of the sound. By the time Pepitone heard the third round of pops, she knew what it was.
As she bolted out the east door of Von Maur, she shouted to incoming customers. "Gunshots."
Pepitone met up with Kim Skar, a complete stranger, outside the FW Bank branch in a nearby parking lot. The two grabbed hands and ran for their lives, finding refuge at David's Bridal.
* * *
Whitney Allbery, 15, shopping at a makeup counter: Allbery, her sister, Alex, and friend Brittany Locke said they crouched down behind the counter when they heard what they thought were gunshots.
At first, Locke said people told them, "What are you doing? You're acting like you think it's a shooting. It's not."
But the girls then heard screaming and running coming from upstairs.
Thoughts of becoming a victim raced through Whitney's mind.
"The only thing that crossed my mind was I had so many people to say goodbye to."
Whitney said the shooter was firing at people from the third floor.
"We are so thankful we are alive," Whitney said.
* * *
Kevin Kleine went to the Westroads Wednesday to do Christmas shopping for her father and husband, heading out in the afternoon at midweek to beat the crowds.
"That was a mistake," Kleine said.
Kleine, whose father is Douglas County Attorney Don Kleine, said she and her 4-year-old daughter, Emily, were on the second floor of Von Maur, looking at women's jeans and coats, when Kleine "heard a pop-pop-pop, and then lots more."
The Kleines and several women barricaded themselves in a storage room.
"We kept hearing shots, maybe 30 or 40 — they had to be shots, they were loud, sounded like they were right there."
At first Emily was very scared, Kleine said. "I just said, 'Emily, there is a guy out there with a gun. You have to be quiet. I told her to say your prayers and Grandpa will be on his way."
They waited in there for 30 minutes. Kleine called her father and brother.
Don Kleine said he was frantic when his daughter called him at his Douglas County Courthouse office.
He told her to "stay low and stay covered and be calm."
He then raced down Dodge Street, arriving at the mall after police and rescue squads.
For Kleine, who has prosecuted dozens of killers and detailed dozens of crime scenes, the event was a gut-wrenching glimpse of what victims' families go through.
"You just don't know what to think," Kleine said. "You're in shock. Your mind's racing."
As he pulled into the parking lot, his daughter called him again. She and Emily were in a rescue squad — shaken but safe.
"It was very emotional," Kleine said. "It was just a huge sense of relief."
* * *
Mickey Vickroy, working in gift-wrapping: Vickroy and her co-workers were busy wrapping gifts when they heard gunshots. They sounded close.
"We heard this 'pop, pop, pop, 10 or 12 shots," said Vickroy, 74. "Someone yelled 'Gun!' And we all ran and hid in the back."
Twelve employees squeezed into a storage room where cleaning supplies are kept. They closed the door. They prayed, some on their knees. Vickroy especially prayed for a friend who had left the gift-wrapping area for a break just before the shooting.
"It seemed like an eternity that we were in there, waiting to hear something, a helicopter, sirens, some sign of help," Vickroy said.
Finally, there came yelling.
"Omaha police! Come out with your hands in the air!"
Vickroy and her co-workers did so. Heavily armed police escorted them out of the store. Their route went past the Von Maur customer service counter, around a trail of blood.
"They said not to look, but you couldn't help looking," Vickroy said. "These were people you knew, people you work with."
Her manager lay on his side. A female co-worker was on her back. Another woman was crumpled. A young man — a boy, to Vickroy's eyes — lay flat on his back, pale and motionless in front of the counter.
Police shepherded the survivors to J.C. Penney. Eventually, Vickroy learned her friend on break had survived — standing on a toilet seat in a bathroom stall so her feet wouldn't show. Vickroy also learned that it wasn't an eternity they were in the storage closet, but about 30 minutes. She knew that because her friend had looked at her watch while hiding in a toilet stall.
"She told me," Vickroy said, "that if she was going to die, she wanted to know what time she was dying."
Another hour after the police came for the gift-wrappers, Vickroy finally could leave the mall. She walked out of J.C. Penney into the arms of her waiting daughter. They embraced across yellow crime scene tape.
* * *
Roxanne Philip, working at the customer-service desk: When she heard gunshots, it seemed so close, it sounded like it was right next to her. She took cover and was scared "because I thought I would be next."
She said she never saw the shooter. But as she left the store she saw a woman on the other side of the customer service counter who had been shot and appeared to be dead. She also believed her boss had been shot because she heard him moaning.
* * *
Larisa Starchenko, 40, and Lyudmela Yegudkina, 56, working in the alteration room: The pops they heard sounded more like a hammer hitting metal, they said.
Two customers ran into the room to hide, however, and the pair realized what was happening.
"After that, we were scared," Starchenko said. "Nobody knows this guy, what he will do next."
So they prayed.
Both stood outside Von Maur for several hours after the shooting without coats to keep warm or keys to start a car.
Even for Yegudkina, a native of Siberia, the weather was cold. She stood with a bystander's coat wrapped around her waist and a blue Von Maur garment bag around her head and shivering shoulders.
* * *
Chuck Wright, working on the second floor: Wright said he heard harrowing stories from co-workers after they were evacuated from the store.
One was coming out a door near the customer service area when she heard the shooting break out and people running. She saw what appeared to be a customer who had been shot and heard a co-worker in customer service yelling for help.
Someone yelled, "Hold on, Fred, we'll get to you."
Another Wright co-worker described standing on the second floor near the escalator and looking up towards the commotion. She then saw a man with a gun lean over a rail from the third floor and shoot a man standing right next to her in the head.
Wright said employees and customers were hiding wherever they could, in storerooms and other rooms off the shopping floor.
He hid in a storeroom with a co-worker when a police officer came up the escalator, telling them to come out with their hands up. They r
IN WESTROADS MALL
Julie McGlade, 42, Council Bluffs, optical manager at J.C. Penney: "Three people ran by and said, 'He's got a gun.' I thought, 'We've got security.'" She opened the door to the doctor's office and told him they needed to take cover. They locked the door and went to the back of the office.
They decided to leave and, as they opened the door, saw a chaotic scene. "All these people were running by, almost like animals. Like a herd."
She went to the Classy Gourmet in Clocktower Village, across the street from the mall, and waited. Some Penney's co-workers crouched in a glass walkway between buildings.
* * *
Carol Rubeck, 50, Blair, shopping at J.C. Penney: She was trying on clothes for her office Christmas party.
"I came out of the dressing room and saw a lot of officers with guns and walkie-talkies. I was just kind of confused. . . . All of a sudden the officer told us to leave, and everybody started going this way (east)."
Police closed the doors to the store. She went to a store at Westroads Pointe, north of the mall.
* * *
Megan Brooks, works at the Priority One Communications kiosk near Von Maur: "I heard about three or four gunshots, and I looked up and there was dust and people running out of there." Brooks and her mother, Shannon Brooks, who works at Scooter's Java Express nearby, went to J.C. Penney. They banged on the door to be let into the store.
"They got us into Penney's and then locked everybody in, and then we were told we needed to evacuate."
The women took refuge in Salon Tino, across from the mall. From there, they watched as a group of police officers moved toward the Penney's garage entrance.
* * *
Ka'Shayla Abraham, employee of J.C. Penney: A woman came from the front entrance of the store and ran by, saying "Somebody's shooting in Von Maur!"
At first people in the store didn't panic. Then a woman in a burgundy shirt came running by yelling "Get out! Get out!" and people followed her toward the entrance near the catalog department, on the east side of the building.
When they got there, someone said, "No, get back! Get back in!" because the shooter might be outside.
She and other employees and customers stayed in the store and were released after questioning.
* * *
Dan Kelly and his wife, Kim Crossfield, Nebraska City: Had shopped in Von Maur for a party dress, then took a break at the food court. They had just sat down with their Runza and a chicken sandwich when a large man appeared with a shotgun and told them to leave. They learned about the shooting when they turned on their radio as they sat in their car.
* * *
Sharon Robinson, Chaussure shoe store employee: A mall security guard said there was an emergency. She locked the door, turned off the lights and took her sole customer — her aunt — into the backroom. At 3:30 p.m., they still were hiding — talking to the store owner and relatives on the phone, checking the Internet for updates on the shooting and occasionally peeking around the corner.
At one point, she heard what may have been a SWAT team member yelling but wasn't sure what was going on and stayed in back.
"I just didn't come out. I'm not sure whom to trust. . . . I'm still nervous and shaken up." She is prepared for thefts and similar crimes, but random violence is something different. "This reminded me of the Columbine shooting and all of the other shootings they've had at the different schools. That's a scary thought. It happened to us now."
* * *
Suzanne Kleveter, shopping at Famous Footwear: Kleveter had just left Von Maur and was browsing shoes when she first heard shouting, then a noise like a nail gun.
She then realized it was someone shooting.
"You just don't want to believe something like that happens," she said.
* * *
Diane Larson, shopping at Famous Footwear: Diane Larson said she, daughter Nicole, and about 15 others ran to a Famous Footwear storage room when they heard gunshots coming from nearby Von Maur.
"Everybody just scattered, and there was a lot of screaming," Diane Larson said.
About five or six children were among the group that crowded into the room. Larson estimated that they stayed in the room for close to an hour, until a police officer escorted them to the J.C. Penney store, where they were questioned by police about whether they had seen the shooter. By that time, most people were calmer, Larson said.
"I won't be shopping in a mall for a long time," she said.
* * *
Roxanne Andrlik, working in the Younkers fragrance area: Like everyone else locked into Younkers, Andrlik heeded the orders of a store manager and exited the mall quickly.
It all had happened so fast: The quick stroll she took through Von Maur for some nylon knee-highs and a look at sweaters for her husband; her return to Younkers followed by a sudden announcement on the public address system of "an incident at the mall," and "lockdown," and "closing all their doors."
She called her daughter on a store phone — her cell phone was charging in the car.
Someone with a gun was at Von Maur. They were closing the doors to Younkers.
Of all things, this, she thought. What is the world coming to?
Andrlik watched the glass door slide into place and saw police snipers position themselves just outside near the escalators, rifles pointed toward upper levels. Employees were trying to reach a Von Maur employee on cell phones but couldn't get through.
She prayed. Then a Younkers manager, with stricken face and raised voice, told people to leave the store.
Andrlik followed the stampede of screaming people out the west doors, walking straight to the car dealership across the street.
Then it hit her: Here I am.
* * *
Theresa Czarnecki, with her children at a Westroads playground: Czarnecki and a friend were playing with their children — five of them, ages 7 weeks to 4 years — in a third-floor playground at Westroads. A lot of other moms and tots were there, too.
"We had gone to see Santa at lunch and were playing in the forest," Czarnecki said.
Then somebody told a mother in the play area that there was a shooting.
"Everybody started getting out of there," Czarnecki said.
Security or police officers materialized and escorted the parents and children into Dick's Sporting Goods. They hid in the back of the store.
A while later, Czarnecki didn't know how long, a heavily armed Omaha phalanx of police officers — holding up shields and bristling with rifles — took the families from Dick's to J.C. Penney.
They had to stay there for more than an hour. And they left without coats — but glad to be able to load shivering children into minivan car seats and put the mall behind them.
OUTSIDE THE MALL
The Rev. Harry Buse, pastor of St. Leo Catholic Church: Buse headed to Westroads when he heard about the shootings because he considers the mall part of his parish at 102nd and Blondo Streets. "I went there to see if there was any possible need for any spiritual assistance." Every entrance was blocked and officers had rifles aimed at all possible exits. He parked across the street, walked to the parking lot and approached an officer, who told him to get away. "They were in crisis mode." So he handed out business cards and left.
* * *
Simone Parker of Omaha, waiting outside the Hampton Inn: She was looking for her aunt, Magnolia Smith of Omaha, who works on the third floor of Von Maur in the alterations department.
"It's real emotional in there," she said of the Hampton Inn, where victims' families had gathered.
She found out later that her aunt had escaped unharmed.
* * *
Mary Wurtele, working at David's Bridal Shop: At least two women ran into the shop after the shooting, Wurtele said. They heard shots and ran from the shopping center.
"It's extremely somber and there's a feeling of disbelief . . . wanting to vomit, and we can't get enough information. I can't believe what the people who were in it went through."
* * *
Donna Rumley, whose daughter works on the second floor of Von Maur: A Bellevue Public Schools co-worker told Donna Rumley about the Westroads shooting out of concern for Rumley's daughter, Kim Rumley, who manages the petite women's section.
Donna Rumley tried to get her daughter on the phone but couldn't and drove to the Westroads.
"I was upset. I told them my daughter works at Von Maur," she said.
A police officer let her wait near the mall entrance. Eventually, she was sent to the Hampton Inn, where police were matching people from the mall with relatives.
For several hours, she learned nothing.
"I just want to know that she's safe," she said outside the motel. "I'm spiritually steadfast, so I know that the Lord is working. I just want to know that she's OK."
By 5 p.m., she and her daughter had been reunited at the motel. She said her daughter was fine but saw a man shot in the head on the escalator.
Kim Rumley said she was about to go to lunch but decided to do one more thing in her department first. Had she gone to lunch then, she might have been on the escalator when the man was shot.
* * *
Van Argyrakis, son of a Von Maur tailor: Argyrakis ran up to his 71-year-old father, Andy Argyrakis, in Von Maur's parking lot, gave him a fierce hug and cried tears of relief. The son then placed a leather jacket around his father's cold shoulders.
Van Argyrakis was one of many family members of Von Maur employees who came from their homes to check on relatives.
"I heard about it from the mailman," Argyrakis said. "He said, 'There's a shooting at the Westroads Mall.'"
Andy Argyrakis has been a tailor at Von Maur for four years. He said he heard the gunshots from his working room, but saw little else.
"I called your mother," he told his son.
* * *
Kent Donnelly, whose 21-year-old daughter works on the third floor of Von Maur: He stood shivering in the parking lot south of J.C. Penney, his eyes glued to the doors.
He received an e-mail at work saying people should avoid Westroads Mall that afternoon because of an apparent shooting at Von Maur. His heart raced. Heather was working Wednesday.
He couldn't reach her. She called from someone else's cell phone and indicated she was OK but still inside.
He borrowed a cell phone and sped from his office at 113th and Blondo Streets. He couldn't get through to the mall because the parking lot entrances were blocked. He parked as close as he could and ran three-quarters of a mile to get there and wait. And wait. And wait in the cold.
"My ears are cold. But the rest of me's fine."
About an hour and a half after he arrived, Heather emerged coatless and bleary-eyed from the south doors of J.C. Penney. She marched under police caution tape and into his arms. He draped her in his coat. |
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Mark Gobell
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| Posted: Mon Dec 10, 2007 8:00 am Post subject: |
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Omaha Worlf Herald
| Quote: | Published Friday | December 7, 2007
Fear, panic, gunshots heard on 911 tapes
BY KAREN SLOAN
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER
The first phone call from Westroads Mall came in to 911 dispatchers at 1:42 p.m. No voice was on the line.
Only silence punctuated by 23 gunshots.
In the next six minutes, the Douglas County 911 center received 48 more calls. Panicked people inside the mall and family members called as 19-year-old Robert Hawkins shot up the Von Maur department store.
Their frantic voices, desperate pleas for help and even their silence provide a chilling account of the chaos that reigned as Hawkins took the lives of eight people before ending his own on a day that will be remembered as one of Omaha's darkest.
Mark Conrey, director of the Douglas County 911 center, described the calls as "extremely disturbing."
Callers frantically dial from bathrooms and storage rooms as they flee from the hail of bullets.
In the second call to 911, a woman breathlessly relays the situation as she hides with six others in a sales associate area.
"I'm at Von Maur at Westroads Mall. There is gunfire in the building! Everybody is freaking out. There are shots nonstop. . . . There is a ton of them. There is a ton of gunfire."
The third call was from a woman who was close enough to give dispatchers a brief description of Hawkins and an estimate of the number of wounded.
"Oh my God! Maybe 10 or 15," she tells a 911 operator during her brief call. "Oh my God, there's a young boy. Oh my God! Oh my God! Please send somebody fast! He's a young boy, he's a young boy with glasses. Oh my God!"
The call ends with shots ringing in the background.
Perhaps the most remarkable call was placed at 1:50 p.m. by Jodi Longmeyer, Von Maur's human resources manager, who was on the third floor, where most of the carnage occurred.
For nearly a half-hour, Longmeyer remains on the phone with dispatchers, directing them to where victims are located and to the body of the gunman.
She comforts a victim as she offers a brief description of the shooter, who she guesses was about 5-foot-8, in his mid-20s, with an "automatic type of gun."
She even apologizes when she can't recall more information about the gunman.
"I can't think of anything. I'm sorry, I just — when I heard the gunshot, I got down as soon as possible because I have kids."
Longmeyer calls from a phone in the employee locker room. She transfers her 911 call to Von Maur's security office, which is inside the locker room. She locks herself in and monitors security cameras throughout the store.
Using the cameras, she describes the third-floor scene to the 911 operator, who relays it to emergency responders.
From the security office, Longmeyer sees a body on the floor and assumes it is the shooter. "I see him lying there by the gun," Longmeyer says as she bursts into tears.
"I don't want to look anymore. I'm not looking."
Police eventually make their way up to the security office, and Longmeyer leaves without even hanging up the phone.
The 911 tapes were released Thursday as a more complete picture of the shootings emerged, with authorities piecing together what happened with the assistance of video surveillance of Hawkins' movements.
Omaha Police Chief Thomas Warren said Thursday that Hawkins first walked in Von Maur's south entrance without a gun, perhaps casing the store. A store security guard thought he was acting suspiciously and perhaps intended to shoplift.
Hawkins left and returned minutes later with a gun concealed in a hooded sweat shirt. It had two ammunition clips holding 30 rounds each. He entered through the south doors, turned right and headed up the elevator.
The elevator popped open on the third floor of the festively decorated store. Out strode Hawkins with an AK-47-style assault rifle.
After several horrific minutes of gunfire, the troubled 19-year-old had killed eight people, wounded four more and shattered the holiday season for an entire city.
A fifth person was treated for a medical condition in the aftermath of the shooting.
The Douglas County 911 center was flooded with calls during the shooting, although as of Thursday afternoon, the total number wasn't clear, Conrey said. Seven operators and dispatchers struggled to field the onslaught of calls and had to put some callers on hold.
Some people in the mall reported that they were unable to get through to 911.
"It was a combination of our operators going from call to call to call, and the cell towers being overloaded," Conrey said. "Every cell phone in the world was going off in that area."
The 911 calls continued for some time because people were hiding in storage rooms, dressing rooms and other places, and they didn't know what was going on, Conrey said. Police eventually had to locate those people and escort them away.
Conrey said the situation hasn't been easy to cope with for the dispatchers who took calls during the massacre, but chaplains were on hand Thursday to talk to staff.
"They are doing their best to handle it," he said.
But it won't be easy to shake the memory of those desperate calls, some delivered in hushed and fearful tones — such as one that came in at 1:45 p.m.
"Von Maur," the voice whispered. "Can't talk."
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Mark Gobell
On Gardening Leave
Joined: 24 Jul 2006
Posts: 4529
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| Posted: Mon Dec 10, 2007 8:07 am Post subject: |
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Omaha World Herald
| Quote: | Published Thursday | December 6, 2007
Shooter lost his job Wednesday
BY KEVIN COLE
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER
The 19-year-old Sarpy County man behind the deadliest shooting spree in Nebraska in almost 50 years left a suicide note.
A Sarpy County law enforcement official identified Robert A. Hawkins as the man who shot and killed eight people and himself at Westroads Mall Wednesday afternoon.
His address is listed as 4302 McCarty Drive in the Quail Creek subdivision just outside of Bellevue.
He was fired from a job at a Bellevue McDonald's restaurant Wednesday after several months on the job, said Debora Maruca, whose family Hawkins had been staying with.
Maruca said Hawkins told her he was accused of stealing $17 from the restaurant.
A Papillion-La Vista Public Schools spokeswoman said Hawkins attended district schools since kindergarten but withdrew from Papillion-La Vista High School in March 2006.
Hawkins left a suicide note, which was found by Maruca's family. A woman brought the note to the Sarpy County Sheriff's Office about 30 minutes after the start of the shooting spree.
Sarpy County Capt. Rolly Yost said the woman was unaware that a shooting had taken place. Based on the contents of the note, authorities believe the person who wrote the note is connected to the shooting.
Hawkins' previous criminal history includes an arrest Friday in Sarpy County on suspicion of contributing to the delinquency of a child, being a minor in possession of or dispensing alcohol and being a minor in possession of an open alcoholic container.
He was also found guilty in 2005 of disorderly conduct and sentenced to seven days in jail. Also in 2005, he was charged with intent to deliver a controlled substance, but the charge was dismissed by prosecutors.
Charles Starkweather killed 10 Nebraskans in a multiday spree in December 1957 and January 1958. |
Did he write the suicide note before going to work at McDonalds on Wednesday?
| Quote: | About 1 p.m. Wednesday, Hawkins called Maruca's son, upset, and Maruca got on the line.
Hawkins thanked the family members for everything they had done for him. He said the family wouldn't have to worry about him any more.
Maruca asked if he had been fired from his job.
He said he had. He said he had been accused of stealing $17 from his till. (McDonald's management has declined to comment.)
They told him, Robbie, it's not that bad. Just come home. It'll be OK, Maruca said.
"He must have felt like everything he touched turned to nonsense," she said.
After the call, they checked his bedroom and found his note, which said things like, "I'm a piece of *, but I'm going to be famous now."
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Mark Gobell
On Gardening Leave
Joined: 24 Jul 2006
Posts: 4529
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| Posted: Mon Dec 10, 2007 8:54 am Post subject: |
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Omaha World Herlad
| Quote: | Published Monday | December 10, 2007
Families recount selfless acts of courage in Omaha mall massacre
BY ERIN GRACE
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER
• Minnesota store closes early after threat
Firing away, the killer entered customer service, where he would end the carnage.
Hiding 15 feet from him was a 65-year-old grandfather and retired natural gas company manager, who suddenly emerged from the spot that concealed him and his wife and came into plain sight of the killer.
According to a family member's account given Sunday, John McDonald stood and confronted the 19-year-old gunman. It was a spontaneous act of courage that soon cost the Council Bluffs man his life, although it's possible that he helped spare more than a dozen people who were hiding nearby.
It appears that McDonald was one of the last of eight people killed by Robert Hawkins Wednesday at the Von Maur department store in the Westroads Mall.
Police are still investigating Omaha's worst single day of violence and have not determined the order in which Hawkins' victims fell.
McDonald was found in customer service, where Hawkins killed himself. An undisclosed number of rounds remained in his AK-47-style semiautomatic rifle.
Police released no new details of the rampage, but accounts Sunday from the families of McDonald and two other victims paint three portraits of courage in the face of chaos and terror.
The second involved Dianne Clavin Trent, the 53-year-old customer service worker who stayed on the phone with 911, describing the gunman until he took her life.
The third was customer Gary Scharf, 48, of Lincoln, who was on the first floor when he heard gunfire, ran up the escalator toward the carnage and shouted at Hawkins a floor above, "I called 911!"
All three were killed.
Omaha police declined Sunday to comment on the relatives' accounts. A spokesman for Omaha Mayor Mike Fahey said the scope of the crime, the number of detectives involved and the forensic evidence were too great at the moment to piece together exactly what happened and when.
Dr. Joe Shehan of Omaha, married to the only daughter of John and Kathy McDonald, said he bases his account on a detail that his mother-in-law shared in the car on their way home from the mall that day. It was a detail he forgot in the fog of grief and shock, and it is one Kathy McDonald left out of subsequent accounts until an Omaha police detective told the family what a hero they had in John McDonald:
That he left the hiding spot that concealed Kathy. That he left whatever protection that waiting room chair could offer as more than a dozen Von Maur employees huddled in fear in a back room that had no locking door and no other way out, should the gunman enter.
The police detective told McDonald's family that he stood and faced Hawkins. The gunman hadn't seen the McDonalds hiding when he entered, firing into customer service.
Hawkins struck four workers there and killed two, including Trent. She was telling a 911 dispatcher that "a young boy with glasses" was coming toward the counter.
"Oh my God!" she cried.
Her call ended with shots ringing in the background.
"Why she didn't drop that phone and run, we'll never know," said her sister, Kellie Schlecht.
Deb Scharf said her parents asked the same question about her brother's actions Wednesday. People at his visitation service in Omaha told her that he pulled a woman off an escalator bound for the deadly third floor, dialed 911 and shouted at the killer.
His was the first 911 call made, she said, citing cell phone and 911 records. That call was logged at 1:42 p.m. No voice was on the line - just silence and gunshots.
Police told Scharf the trajectory of the bullet - grazing his chin and cutting into his chest - showed that her brother was facing up to the third floor.
"He took a bullet knowing what he was doing," she said. "My parents would say, 'Why did you have to do what you did?' Yet he did what he did."
And then there was McDonald.
Shehan said police have told him that surveillance video has not been fully reviewed. But according to witnesses, John McDonald stood, faced Hawkins and began to talk.
"They (police) thought - and I tend to agree - John had seen the senseless shooting occurring," Shehan said. "They thought he stood up to try to protect the other people behind the desk."
Shehan said it's unclear what the two said to each other, although witnesses told police that they heard Hawkins shout obscenities.
He then fatally shot McDonald and soon after shot himself.
Kathy McDonald called her daughter at work. A frantic Suzanne Shehan tried and tried to page her husband at his internal medicine practice across the street from the Westroads. Shehan heard sirens, called his wife and rushed to the scene, but was not allowed in.
An hour or more later, police dropped his mother-in-law at his clinic, and he drove her home. Kathy McDonald sat in shocked silence.
Then she told her son-in-law that John had stood and that she couldn't understand why. She didn't discuss that detail until later, when family members, who had heard what the detective said, pressed.
"That's what happened," she told them.
Kathy was worried that people would think her husband had taken an unnecessary risk, her son-in-law said.
Shehan saw it differently: "John was extremely heroic."
Shehan said John McDonald was a calm, compassionate problem-solver who shunned attention but helped where he could.
"If he would have felt somebody was in danger and he could do something about it," Shehan said, "I think he'd be the kind of guy that'd had to get up and have to try." |
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Mark Gobell
On Gardening Leave
Joined: 24 Jul 2006
Posts: 4529
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| Posted: Mon Dec 10, 2007 11:57 am Post subject: |
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http://digg.com/world_news/Shooting_in_Omaha_Nebraska_mall
| Quote: | | I just got home from there! I got off work early so I could do some Xmas shopping. I was stopping at the candy apple store on my way out cause my wife loves their candy apples when I heard the first shot. I'm in the Air Force so I've been around gunfire. I was in denial at first but when I heard more shots I just knew. I told the girls behind the counter what I thought it was then I hauled ass to the nearest exit. I think they stayed and locked the store down but I'm not sure. The shooting was on the other side of the mall from what I heard when I turned on the radio in my car. 2 confirmed dead and another 5 injured from what I hear locally. Suspect is a young black male in fatigues. |
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