According to several newspaper accounts, on May 20, 1988, a young woman named Laurie Dann went on a rampage at Hubbard Woods Elementary school in Winnetka, Ill., killing an 8-year-old boy and wounding five other children. She fled to a nearby home where she wounded a man, then killed herself.
Whoa.
shareHere's the full info on that:
Laurie Wasserman Dann (c. 1958 - 20 May 1988) was an American murderer. Dann grew up in Glencoe, an affluent northern suburb of Chicago. She was the daughter of accountant Norman and Edith Wasserman.
In 1985 she was suspected of attacking her husband Russell Dann in his sleep, by stabbing his chest with an icepick. The case was dropped, and the couple divorced in the same year. In 1988 she started to make nuisance phone calls that turned into death threats to an ex-boyfriend she dated 18 years earlier. She was already under investigation by the FBI for extortion as she was demanding money in return for halting the phone harassment.
Shortly before going on a shooting spree which ended in her suicide, she delivered marshmallow and rice cereal snacks tainted with arsenic to Alpha Tau Omega and Psi Upsilon fraternity houses at Northwestern University in Evanston. Attached to the snacks was a note that read, "To the ATOs, from your little sisters."[1] Several students were treated for poisoning.
On 20 May 1988, the 30-year-old Dann walked into a second-grade classroom at Hubbard Woods School in Winnetka, Illinois carrying three pistols and began shooting children, killing an eight-year-old Nicholas Corwin and wounding five others before fleeing. She entered a nearby house where she shot and wounded a 20-year-old man before killing herself.
Also before killing herself, she traveled to Ravinia Elementary School in Highland Park, Illinois where she left an incendiary device. The bomb was found and prevented from detonating.
Dann had long suffered from obsessive-compulsive disorder and other mental illnesses. Subsequent blood tests revealed that at the time of the killings, Dann was using lithium and anafranil, generically known as clomipramine.
There were also reports that, just before the shootings, Dann mailed as many as 24 packages of tainted food and juice to friends and acquaintances in Wisconsin and California and several suburbs north of Chicago. (United Press International - May 26, 1988)
A made-for-TV movie, Murder of Innocence, was broadcast by CBS on November 30, 1993. The movie was based on the book of the same name by Eric Zorn, but the names of the characters were changed. Valerie Bertinelli was cast as Laurie Wade, a character based on Laurie Dann.
This movie was VERY accurate.
I grew up in the Chicago area, I'll never forget that day. I don't know how someone so sick was able to buy a gun, but glad for at least one thing, the laws were changed after what Laurie Dann did.
Here is a link with a whole bunch of news stories from when it happened:
http://www.theawarenesscenter.org/lauriedann.html
THERE'S NO SAFE AMOUNT OF ALCOHOL YOU CAN DRINK WHEN PREGNANT-IT'S NOT WORTH TAKING THE CHANCE
Sadly the laws have not changed enough. A good friend mine had a son who had serious mental problems from the time he was a young child. He had been in and out of mental health clinics. He was 23 when he bought a gun. He had passed the gun check required by the state. He killed himself with the gun. His parents were surprised he was able to get a gun. But he had never broken any laws. He saw doctors regularly and was on antidepressants.
While this man wasn't nearly as sick as the woman in this film he was mentally ill and on disability due to it. I don't think gun laws would have saved him. I mean if you want to kill yourself you will find a way.
But his parents point out it would be nice to have some gun laws in place for mentally ill. I mean if he can't function in the work place maybe he shouldn't be allowed to buy a gun. I don't know.
If you look though there are still mentally ill people who buy guns and harm others.
Unfortunately, we clearly need our guns laws change to allow for a thorough background check before handing them a gun and ammunition to ANYONE let alone someone with a long history of mental health issues. But, even then it still might not matter. We had a very disturbed young man living in our neighborhood who had a long history of mental illness. He talked to people who weren't there, had visual delusions, couldn't keep a job and I'd say most of the neighbors had a great deal of sympathy for his family. One summer, we had a block party and as families started bring out food and drinks he offered them help in carrying them outside. It is believe then was where he noticed that he saw a neighbor had a gun. No one thought anything about it. The party went on and everyone had a good time. About 8 months later, the family that owed the gun, home was broken into and some jewelry, a small amount of collectables and the gun was taken. Police investigated the break-in, they got good finger prints but no hits in the system.
On Memorial day weekend, he took the gun, shot two of his neighbors dogs and went inside the house, luckily they were out. He left the house and walked down the street and went to the local park that was filled with families picnicking and celebrating the holiday and the start of summer. He sat under a tree all day watching people coming and going. As it got darker the crowds started to form in anticipation of fireworks display. In the middle of the fireworks he started yelling. When people looked he was holding a gun to his temple, shot and killed himself with small children watching. When people heard the first shots at the killing of the dogs, they believed it was fireworks. He may have been severely mentally ill but he was great at manipulation. He seemed to have planned it all. They found a hidden area in his basement where the items that were stolen from numerous burglaries in the neighborhood. Two dog collars and 3 cat collars from pets that went missing. The owner of the gun had purchased it legally under the state and federal codes, it was registered but never used by him or his family members.
So, since mentally ill man didn't own a gun and chose to steal one instead.
I attended a school 2 or 3 blocks from Hubbard Woods Elementary and was in the same grade as the kids who got shot. That day will forever be etched in my mind. The younger brother of the man she wounded at the house she took hostage was in our school.
I remember seeing this movie years later when I lived in a different country and just staring like wow how freaky!