Adam Lanza's Father Speaks Out: He Would've 'Killed Me In A Hearbeat'

[DonViejo]

CATHERINE THOMPSON – MARCH 10, 2014, 6:58 AM EDT

Speaking publicly for the first time, the father of the Sandy Hook Elementary School gunman said he's sure his son would have killed him too.

“With hindsight, I know Adam would have killed me in a heartbeat, if he’d had the chance. I don’t question that for a minute," Peter Lanza told the New Yorker in a profile published Sunday.

"The reason he shot Nancy four times was one for each of us: one for Nancy; one for him; one for Ryan; one for me," he added, referring to the boy's mother and brother.

Adam Lanza killed his mother on Dec. 14, 2012 at their home before moving on to the Newtown, Conn. elementary school, where he fatally shot 26 students and staff before killing himself.

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http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/newtown-gunman-adam-lanzas-father-speaks-out

[Bonobo]

1. SO WTF did he have access to guns in the house!? nt

[chrisa]

2. Since his father wasn't living there and was estranged, he wouldn't know.

[elehhhhna]

3. I guess estranged for the mom means ignoring the kid?

Too bad he wasn't involved. May have prevented this. Mom was clearly codependent and Dad was on to the next thing/life/new family whatevs...

[chrisa]

4. We don't know the actual situation.

The knee-jerk reaction in the media of blaming the father was ignorant. It's easy for us to claim we would have made a difference when we know nothing about what was going on. As usual, Americans want the blood of someone living, no matter how unreasonable the anger is.

This man lost his son and ex-wife, and people want to torment him further.

[klook]

5. Thank you. (n/t)

[smokey nj]

9. You didn't read the article, did you?

[Lurks Often]

6. You did read the article didn't you?

Peter Lanza said "in hindsight" he felt his son would have shot him. Peter Lanza also stated that no one saw the violent tendencies the little monster kept hidden from his family and mental health professionals.

[Brickbat]

7. Heartbreaking.

All parents want their children to belong. As a parent, this paragraph broke my heart.

All parenting involves choosing between the day (why have another argument at dinner?) and the years (the child must learn to eat vegetables). Nancy’s error seems to have been that she always focussed on the day, in a ceaseless quest to keep peace in the home she shared with the hypersensitive, controlling, increasingly hostile stranger who was her son. She thought that she could keep the years at bay by making each day as good as possible, but her willingness to indulge his isolation may well have exacerbated the problems it was intended to ameliorate.

[Lurks Often]

8. The three biggest things I took away from the article

Were that both parents tried very hard to take care of their son.

Their son refused to recognize that he needed help

That just maybe both parents should have tried to force the issue a little harder then they did.

I can't imagine what they went through trying to raise their child and while it is very easy to criticize them in hindsight, the article is clear to me that both of them loved their son and mostly made decisions that they thought were the best choices for their son.

It is also notable that neither the parents or the medical professionals that they took their son to, ever saw any signs of violence.