The Pharmacology of School Shootings--Common Bond or Unusual Circumstance?
Gunman's Contradictions Confound Police
By ASHLEY M. HEHER and CARYN ROUSSEAU
The Associated Press
Sunday, February 17, 2008; 7:16 AM
DEKALB, Ill. -- Steven Kazmierczak had the look of a boyish graduate student _ except for the disturbing tattoos that covered his arms. Professors and students knew him as a bright, helpful scholar, but his past included a stint in a mental health center.
Many saw him as happy and stable, but he had developed a recent interest in guns and was involved in a troubled _ possibly abusive _ on-again, off-again relationship.
What people initially told police about the Northern Illinois University shooter didn't add up, and now investigators are searching for answers to what triggered Thursday's bloody attack, in which five students were killed and several more injured before Kazmierczak committed suicide.
. . . One person who knew the couple, who spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity, said the couple's relationship was on-again, off-again and "…