Mass shooting at Fort Hood- Killeen

[4forMe]

I had thought the crimes committed on bases are pretty much under the jurisdiction of the military.

He still is entitled to his right to counsel.

I am not sure if it is any different outside of the military though. Is the appeals process different and do they have the dealth penalty in the military?

Yes, the death penalty is available as an option in military court yet used rarely.

Here is an article suggesting the military may have a hard time getting the death penalty in this case:

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/hotstories/6711846.html

 

[agnes!]

...I'm appalled at the media. There has been a lot of speculation and innuendo. I heard the media was saying it was post-traumatic stress syndrome, but the shooter hadn't been deployed. I think he has only been to MD and TX? Our media is part of the problem. No responsibility in reporting anymore.

Yeah, a whole lot of speculatin' goin' on. And hey...Maryland and Texas are really stressful places to be...

One of the soldiers that was killed went to high school with my daughter.

I am so sorry, so sorry for your community's loss.

Just found out today that one of my son's classmates father was killed in this shooting. They were all sort of shocked that she was in school today. How awful for her, she is just 14.

Christine - Please PM me if there's anything I can do. Again, so so sorry.

I read an article this morning about it. Truly sad and disheartening that the issues were raised prior to the shooting and nothing was done.

"...According to The Washington Post, Major Nidal Malik Hasan was supposed to make a presentation on a medical topic during his senior year as a psychiatric resident at Walter Reed Medical Center.

...

Instead, Hasan lectured his supervisors and two dozen mental health staff members on Islam, homicide bombings and threats the military could encounter from Muslims conflicted about fighting against other Muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan.

A source who attended the presentation told the paper, "It was really strange. The senior doctors looked really upset."
...

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,573547,00.html

I sure hope there that all the doctors who heard that presentation are doing some soul-searching. I imagine everyone that this murderer encountered during his military career who knew something about his beliefs?... is having a hard time these days.

I have to wonder if this lecture was part of his licensing requirements or if he already had passed his boards and held a medical license at this time. Does anybody know? Was this lecture a formality along the way or could it have been used as a device to keep this murderer from becoming a doctor...


I keep seeing on the front page of the papers that photo of the one woman being talked to by a soldier...

It's all so very sad.
agnes!

 

[Jennasis]

Sad that we always manage to see the red flags after the fact. Sad for Jayce Dugard, sad for the Ft. Hood victims. Vigilent people...always vigilant.

 

[PixieDust32]

I hope the military is not trying to blame all in the musilm, Koran etc, and not on the PTSD.

 

[dismom2]

If you are going to willingly join the United States military, unless you are totally ignornat, you have to know there is a chance you may be sent off to war--its not like you have a choice in the matter. So, if you are are completely against going to war, especially involving a middle eastern country, and you are of middle easter decent and have serious issues with that, you have no business joining to begin with. If this man reenlisted, he knew what he was doing--and I have to question his intent. I also wonder what he was saying to his patients. Everything I read leads me to believe he was a ticking time bomb waiting to go off. People don't like profiling, and I can understand why, but sometimes it's very relavent. It's not always safe to be PC in this day and age--that's the bottom line.

 

[BeachGirlFLA]

If you are going to willingly join the United States military, unless you are totally ignornat, you have to know there is a chance you may be sent off to war--its not like you have a choice in the matter. So, if you are are completely against going to war, especially involving a middle eastern country, and you are of middle easter decent and have serious issues with that, you have no business joining to begin with. If this man reenlisted, he knew what he was doing--and I have to question his intent. I also wonder what he was saying to his patients. Everything I read leads me to believe he was a ticking time bomb waiting to go off. People don't like profiling, and I can understand why, but sometimes it's very relavent. It's not always safe to be PC in this day and age--that's the bottom line.

Yeah, I thought about it more last night. Muslims should be let out as conscientious objectors only with a general discharge under honorable conditions (which is different from an honorable discharge and means you aren't eligible for most veterans' benefits.)

 

[Mermaid02]

I hope the military is not trying to blame all in the musilm, Koran etc, and not on the PTSD.

You really think this is PTSD?

And no- it is NOT the Koran's fault and it is NOT the fault of the Muslim religion- it is the fault of this man and his radical beliefs.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

I hope the military is not trying to blame all in the musilm, Koran etc, and not on the PTSD.

I don't think they are trying to blame a specific religion, however they are justifiably looking at his background as it is possible that though he acted alone, he may have been on behalf of his religion. This is not the time to ignore his past out of political correctedness.

Seriously though--mass shootings of strangers are not a typical outcome of PTSD.

Timothy McVeigh did not have PTSD--but he acted under some misguided belief system to do what he did.

 

[BeachGirlFLA]

It would be pretty hard for Hassan to have PTSD considering he'd never been deployed (unless of course he'd been through some other traumatic event himself.) It comes from actually going through a traumatic event yourself and avoidance of things that remind you of the event and hypersensitivity to things in everyday life are the normal symptoms, not going out and shooting more than two dozen people. I have it (due to serious abuse by an ex-boyfriend and going through the experience of having to physically fight him as he held a loaded gun to his head and threatened to shoot) and I tend to avoid anything that reminds me of him, have nightmares about him from time to time and hate when someone suddenly touches me, especially from behind.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

It would be pretty hard for Hassan to have PTSD considering he'd never been deployed (unless of course he'd been through some other traumatic event himself.) It comes from actually going through a traumatic event yourself and avoidance of things that remind you of the event and hypersensitivity to things in everyday life are the normal symptoms, not going out and shooting more than two dozen people.

ACtually--not to defend him, but no it isn't.

PTSD can be ANY trauma and the inability to remove oneself from that trauma.

I've never been to war and I have it. Some people do fine with trauma and others have issues.

Since he is/was a psychiatrist and likely treated hundreds of soldiers for their own PTSD or other psychiatric issues, he need not necessarily go to war to suffer the trauma of the war.

I have PTSD and I often find the diagnosis silly as I have never had anything major occur in my life that I would consider traumatizing. In fact, the trigger event, I thought i had been long long over and evidently I wasn't as it was deep within my subconcious and actively having a negative impact on me for over 30 years. And we went through tons of scenarios before I would work on that one b/c I alwasy thought it had to be something else. And it wasn't.

Again--I am not defending him in the least. But one need not go to war to unfortunately have PTSD. It's just every time we think of it, especially within the military--we associate it with someone having been through war. And that is not a criteria of PTSD.

I'm not sure if he had it or not--we do not have enough information to come to that conclusion. However, even if he did--that is not why he shot those people.

Sadly-since he is a psychiatrist, he may have a means to manipulate his resposnes to questioning to make it seem like he had it even if he did not. Pretty scary.

That is why his past is VERY VERY critical to the investigation as it gives more of a motive to his actions than a convenient diagnosis of PTSD.

 

[BeachGirlFLA]

Lisalovespooh, that's why I added "unless he had another traumatic event in his life." There HAS to be a trigger event in order to be diagnosed with PTSD (the event could seem minor at the time, as in your case.) That trigger event does not have to be a war, although I had to explain that to a friend of mine who was sure that it did after my diagnosis. I could see him having some other anxiety disorder from counseling soldiers who HAD been deployed but not PTSD.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

Lisalovespooh, that's why I added "unless he had another traumatic event in his life." There HAS to be a trigger event in order to be diagnosed with PTSD (the event could seem minor at the time, as in your case.) That trigger event does not have to be a war, although I had to explain that to a friend of mine who was sure that it did after my diagnosis. I could see him having some other anxiety disorder from counseling soldiers who HAD been deployed but not PTSD.

It simply could have been his job and his duties.

But that is neither here nor there. His history suggests that his plans had nothing to do with a Trauma that occurred, but rather something he wished to avoid that hadn't occurred yet.

 

[Magic Mom]

I hope the military is not trying to blame all in the musilm, Koran etc, and not on the PTSD.

I haven't seen anyone in the military blame all Muslims or the Koran. I'm happy about that. But it seems like there is more evidence pointing to a terrorist act than PTSD. You can call this terrorism and not be guilty of condemning an entire religion.

 

[DawnCt1]

I hope the military is not trying to blame all in the musilm, Koran etc, and not on the PTSD.

WHAT PTSD? He is a Jihadist.

 

[DawnCt1]

Lisalovespooh, that's why I added "unless he had another traumatic event in his life." There HAS to be a trigger event in order to be diagnosed with PTSD (the event could seem minor at the time, as in your case.) That trigger event does not have to be a war, although I had to explain that to a friend of mine who was sure that it did after my diagnosis. I could see him having some other anxiety disorder from counseling soldiers who HAD been deployed but not PTSD.

The "trigger" was the crazy Imam that he had been in communication with and his beliefs. He would have not been in a combat situation but in a supportive role supporting those who were fighting Jihadists....just like him.

 

[BeachGirlFLA]

Dawn, ITA. I was just trying to explain why I don't think that PTSD is going to come into play here at all.

 

[pansmermaidzlagoon]

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/11/11/texas.fort.hood.investigation/index.html


Fort Hood, Texas (CNN) -- People who knew and studied Maj. Nidal Hasan say he was a loner who had no luck finding a wife, and a criminal profiler said the Fort Hood shooting suspect fits the profile of a mass murderer better than that of a terrorist.

Investigators are searching for any missed "red flags" that might have prevented last week's fatal shooting, which left 12 soldiers and one civilian dead and 40 other people wounded. However, the FBI has said its investigations indicate the "alleged gunman acted alone and was not part of a broader terrorist plot."

"A lot of people are jumping to the conclusion because this man spouted violent Islamic ideology that this is a terrorist attack," criminologist Pat Brown said.

Brown, who profiles killers, said Hasan's profile is that of a loner.

"He was simply a lone guy who had issues, problems, psychopathic behaviors that escalated to the point where he wanted to get back at society, and he took it out on his workmates like most of them do," he said.

A cleric at the Dar al-Hijrah Islamic Center in Falls Church, Virginia, where Hasan attended when he lived in the area, said Hasan seemed to become "somewhat withdrawn" after the death of his mother in 2001.

"Some individuals said that their experience with him, that he changed after his mother passed away," Imam Johari Abdul-Malik said.

Another cleric there, Shaikh Shaker Elsayed, said efforts to find a wife for Hasan were unsuccessful.

"Well, we were not successful in matching him with somebody," he said.

Hasan, a 39-year-old psychiatrist, came under investigation last year when his communications with radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki were intercepted by terrorism investigators who were monitoring al-Awlaki, a federal law enforcement official told CNN.

But an employee of the Defense Department's Criminal Investigative Services, assigned to the Joint Terrorism Task Force, decided to drop the investigation after reviewing the intercepted communications and Hasan's personnel files.

A senior Defense Department official said the task force's ground rules prevented that information from being transmitted outside the task force, although others disputed that.

"I find it hard to believe that they would just say, 'OK, we're not going to share any of this information with the military,' " HLN law enforcement analyst Mike Brooks said. "I mean, that's why you have a person from the military, from different military branches, on the task force to be the liaison."

A former counterterrorism official said the information about Hasan's communications with the imam should have been shared with the military unless the FBI specifically forbade it.

Still, one source familiar with the investigation said Hasan's communications with al-Awlaki appeared innocent in nature.

Another federal source familiar with the investigation said Hasan's actions give no indication he was following the guidance in al Qaeda's terrorist handbook in the weeks before Thursday's attack.

That handbook directs jihadists to conceal their religion, mask their beliefs and blend in. Instead, Hasan frequently appeared in public in traditional Muslim clothing and prayed daily at the local mosque, making no attempt to hide his religion or conservative beliefs, the source said.

Hasan remained hospitalized Wednesday in stable condition and has not been formally charged with any of the 13 deaths in last week's shooting. His civilian attorney, retired Army Col. John Galligan, said he has spoken with his client, but that he was heavily sedated.

"I think the closest thing that indicates that there's a court-martial in the works is last night about 8 I did receive an e-mail from the prosecutor at Fort Hood indicating to me that the pass privileges and leave privileges of Maj. Hasan had been revoked," Galligan said.



from what I could tell, this had not been posted yet...sorry if it has......

 

[OceanAnnie]

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/11/11/texas.fort.hood.investigation/index.html


Fort Hood, Texas (CNN) -- People who knew and studied Maj. Nidal Hasan say he was a loner who had no luck finding a wife, and a criminal profiler said the Fort Hood shooting suspect fits the profile of a mass murderer better than that of a terrorist.

Investigators are searching for any missed "red flags" that might have prevented last week's fatal shooting, which left 12 soldiers and one civilian dead and 40 other people wounded. However, the FBI has said its investigations indicate the "alleged gunman acted alone and was not part of a broader terrorist plot."

"A lot of people are jumping to the conclusion because this man spouted violent Islamic ideology that this is a terrorist attack," criminologist Pat Brown said.

Brown, who profiles killers, said Hasan's profile is that of a loner.

"He was simply a lone guy who had issues, problems, psychopathic behaviors that escalated to the point where he wanted to get back at society, and he took it out on his workmates like most of them do," he said.

A cleric at the Dar al-Hijrah Islamic Center in Falls Church, Virginia, where Hasan attended when he lived in the area, said Hasan seemed to become "somewhat withdrawn" after the death of his mother in 2001.

"Some individuals said that their experience with him, that he changed after his mother passed away," Imam Johari Abdul-Malik said.

Another cleric there, Shaikh Shaker Elsayed, said efforts to find a wife for Hasan were unsuccessful.

"Well, we were not successful in matching him with somebody," he said.

Hasan, a 39-year-old psychiatrist, came under investigation last year when his communications with radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki were intercepted by terrorism investigators who were monitoring al-Awlaki, a federal law enforcement official told CNN.

But an employee of the Defense Department's Criminal Investigative Services, assigned to the Joint Terrorism Task Force, decided to drop the investigation after reviewing the intercepted communications and Hasan's personnel files.

A senior Defense Department official said the task force's ground rules prevented that information from being transmitted outside the task force, although others disputed that.

"I find it hard to believe that they would just say, 'OK, we're not going to share any of this information with the military,' " HLN law enforcement analyst Mike Brooks said. "I mean, that's why you have a person from the military, from different military branches, on the task force to be the liaison."

A former counterterrorism official said the information about Hasan's communications with the imam should have been shared with the military unless the FBI specifically forbade it.

Still, one source familiar with the investigation said Hasan's communications with al-Awlaki appeared innocent in nature.

Another federal source familiar with the investigation said Hasan's actions give no indication he was following the guidance in al Qaeda's terrorist handbook in the weeks before Thursday's attack.

That handbook directs jihadists to conceal their religion, mask their beliefs and blend in. Instead, Hasan frequently appeared in public in traditional Muslim clothing and prayed daily at the local mosque, making no attempt to hide his religion or conservative beliefs, the source said.

Hasan remained hospitalized Wednesday in stable condition and has not been formally charged with any of the 13 deaths in last week's shooting. His civilian attorney, retired Army Col. John Galligan, said he has spoken with his client, but that he was heavily sedated.

"I think the closest thing that indicates that there's a court-martial in the works is last night about 8 I did receive an e-mail from the prosecutor at Fort Hood indicating to me that the pass privileges and leave privileges of Maj. Hasan had been revoked," Galligan said.



from what I could tell, this had not been posted yet...sorry if it has......

That sort of thing tends to get people's attention especially when there is gunfire. The article is like reading from the twilight zone.

 

[DawnCt1]

From the article;

A former counterterrorism official said the information about Hasan's communications with the imam should have been shared with the military unless the FBI specifically forbade it.

Still, one source familiar with the investigation said Hasan's communications with al-Awlaki appeared innocent in nature.

Another federal source familiar with the investigation said Hasan's actions give no indication he was following the guidance in al Qaeda's terrorist handbook in the weeks before Thursday's attack.

That handbook directs jihadists to conceal their religion, mask their beliefs and blend in. Instead, Hasan frequently appeared in public in traditional Muslim clothing and prayed daily at the local mosque, making no attempt to hide his religion or conservative beliefs, the source said.

How does one have an "innocent" communication with al=Awlaki? He isn't just any Imam. He is an al Qaeda Imam! Because he was a loner, didn't follow the exact directions of jihadists to blend in, doesn't make him NOT A TERRORIST. He didn't have to hide his relgion. He was embraced by the politically correct. He could openly discuss decapitations of infidels at grand rounds and everyone was afraid to react. Why should he bother hiding? 60% of Americans believe this guy was a terrorist. I am with the majority and the psychobabble is just that.

 

[OceanAnnie]

From the article;

How does one have an "innocent" communication with al=Awlaki? He isn't just any Imam. He is an al Qaeda Imam! Because he was a loner, didn't follow the exact directions of jihadists to blend in, doesn't make him NOT A TERRORIST. He didn't have to hide his relgion. He was embraced by the politically correct. He could openly discuss decapitations of infidels at grand rounds and everyone was afraid to react. Why should he bother hiding? 60% of Americans believe this guy was a terrorist. I am with the majority and the psychobabble is just that.

The PC spin on this is scary. Truly scary.