WHEN I FIRST PROPOSED this book to my editor, it was the winter of 1998 and nearly seven months since the last shooting — Kip Kinkel’s May rampage in Springfield, Oregon. That tragedy had followed close on the heels of another, in Jonesboro, Arkansas (March 24, 1998), which had followed West Paducah, Kentucky (December 1, 1997), Pearl, Mississippi (October 1, 1997), and Bethel, Alaska (February 19, 1997). Like many Americans struggling to grasp five shootings in fifteen months, I wanted to understand why these mass murders had occurred and what could be done to prevent them.
After fine-tuning what would be appropriate to cover in a work of fiction whose goal must also be to entertain, I began researching this novel. One Monday, while wrapping up weeks of interviewing, I asked an expert if he believed that the rash of incidents indicated a new trend in juvenile behavior. While this point is controversial, the man did not hesitate to answer. “Absolutely,” he said. “As for future shootings, the question is not if but when.”
The very next day, Littleton, Colorado, joined the sad list of shot-up schools in a scope and scale that was staggering. I watched the news clips, and like people all around the world, I gave my thoughts and prayers to a community I had never met.
Each time one of these shootings occurs it is heartbreaking, but as Supervisory Special Agent Pierce Quincy tries to explain in the following pages, it does not have to be hopeless. With each tragedy, we have learned and are learning. In addition to Littleton, Springfield, and Jonesboro, there is Burlington, Wisconsin, where police responded to an anonymous tip in time to arrest three teenage boys plotting to assassinate a target list of “in” students, and there is Wimberly, Texas, where concerned students contacted police in time to foil a plot by five eighth-grade boys to blow up the junior high. People are learning to listen, and it does work.
In the end, I believe we owe an enormous debt of gratitude to each of the communities that has suffered this tragedy. By sharing their experience with us, and their sorrow, they are teaching us to be better people, students, families, and neighbors. May there come a day when white lilies and red roses are not piled against schoolyard fences. May there come a time when we are not haunted by the image of teenagers signing farewell notes on white caskets. May there be a future when our schools once again know peace.
The following people helped me tremendously with my research. I appreciate their help and patient explanations. Of course, all mistakes are mine, and some facts are subject to artistic license.
Dr. Gregory K. Moffatt, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology, Atlanta Christian College
Thomas Grisso, Ph.D., Professor of Psychiatry (Clinical Psychology), Director of Forensics Training and Research, University of Massachusetts Medical School
Steve Ellis, Officer, Amity Police Department
Rudolf Van Soolen, Chief of Police, Amity Police Department
Jonathan McCarthy, Paramedic, New Orleans Health Department
Amy Holmes Hehn, Senior Deputy District Attorney, Juvenile Division, Multnomah County
Stacy Heyworth, Senior Deputy District Attorney, Multnomah County
