Killer dreams of 'molesting again'

A MAN who laid siege to a one-room Amish schoolhouse, killing five girls, told his wife shortly before opening fire that he had molested two young relatives decades ago and was tormented by "dreams of molesting again," authorities said last week.

Charles Carl Roberts IV may have planned to molest the girls at the Amish school, but police have no evidence that he actually did, State Police Commissioner Jeffrey B Miller said.

He said Roberts had sexual lubricant and flex-ties with him when he took the students hostage, and that he chained the girls together in a line at the blackboard after sending the boys and adults away. Roberts also had the weapons and supplies for a long stand-off, he said.

"He states in his suicide note that he had dreams about doing what he did 20 years ago again," Miller said.

Miller said police could not confirm Roberts IV's claim about molesting young relatives when Roberts would have been a just a child himself, and he said Roberts' family members knew nothing of molestation in his past.

Note and a checklist

Roberts left one note for his wife, one for each of his three children and a note and checklist in his truck, Miller said. The note to his wife talked about his anguish over the loss of the couple's newborn daughter, Elise, in 1997, Miller said.

"The note that he left for his wife talks about the good memories together, the tragedy with Elise, it focuses on his life being changed forever over the loss of Elise, his hatred toward himself, his hatred towards God as a result of that event, and he alludes to this other reason for this anger but he can't discuss it with her and it happened 20 years ago," Miller said: "Later in the note he talks about having dreams for the last couple of years about what he did 20 years ago and in those dreams he says he wants to do those things again."

When his wife spoke with Roberts by mobile phone from inside the school before the shooting started, he "told her he had molested two minor relatives 20 years prior and that was how she put all of that together," Miller said.

Earlier yesterday, two more children died of wounds from the shootings, raising the death toll to five girls plus the gunman. Five children remained hospitalised after Monday's school shooting, the nation's third in less than a week, in a bucolic area of Lancaster County. Roberts shot himself as police stormed the schoolhouse, which sat on a patch of grass amid pastures and farm fields, authorities said.

A nine-year-old girl who had been taken to Christiana Hospital in Delaware died at about 1am Tuesday, hospital spokesman Spiros Mantzavinos said. "Her parents were with her," Stranges said. "She was taken off life support and she passed away shortly after."

Roberts, a 32-year-old father of three from the nearby town of Bart, was not Amish and did not appear to be targeting the Amish specifically, police said. He seemed bent on killing young girls and apparently figured he could succeed at the lightly guarded schoolhouse, authorities said.

"Roberts' actions were scripted, meaning they were preplanned. He had a mental script that he had already gone through in his mind and plans for what he was going to do until the time that the police arrived," Miller said.

He had with him a stun gun, two knives, a pile of wood and a bag with 600 rounds of ammunition, police said. He also had a change of clothing, toilet paper, bolts and hardware and rolls of clear tape, police said.

Of the five still in hospitals, a six-year-old girl was in critical condition and a 13-year-old girl was in serious condition at Penn State Children's Hospital late Monday morning. The names of the children were not being released.

Three girls, ages eight, 10 and 12, were flown to Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, where they were in critical condition Tuesday after hours of surgery Monday, spokeswoman Peggy Flynn said.

According to investigators, Roberts dropped his own children off at their school bus stop, and later pulled up at the Amish school, which had about 25 to 30 students ranging in age from six to 13.

Meanwhile, following a rash of school shootings, US President George W Bush will next week bring together law enforcement authorities and education officials to try to determine what the federal government can do to stop the problem, the White House has said.

(irishexaminer.com)