[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 164 (Wednesday, December 19, 2012)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1951-E1952]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




            IDENTIFY TROUBLED YOUTH NEEDING HELP AND SUPPORT

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. MARCY KAPTUR

                                of ohio

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, December 18, 2012

  Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, in our continuing efforts to turn the tragic 
events at Newtown to high purpose, I include two articles from the USA 
Today newspaper, one entitled ``A Boy Lost in the Shadows'', and 
another, ``Newtown Puts Mental Services in Spotlight.''

[[Page E1952]]

  These articles remind me of a conversation a few years ago with a 
caring grade school teacher from my own district who became quite 
frustrated with the local school system's inability to help her manage 
the behavior of a child in her elementary classroom. The child, several 
times a day, became uncontrollable, moving about the classroom, 
throwing tantrums, screaming loudly, often falling to the floor, thus 
causing great confusion in the class. Despite the teacher's repeated 
attempts to help the child, it became obvious professional help was 
needed. A complicating factor became family members who were in denial 
that anything out of the ordinary was actually occurring with the 
child, despite the constant disruption, acting out, anger, and anti-
social behavior the child was demonstrating. After repeated attempts 
that took three years, and let me emphasize three years, the teacher 
was able to have the child referred to behavioral specialists and 
placed in a more appropriate learning environment. That situation alone 
made me wonder about the manner in which we as a society make help 
available to children who exhibit destructive behaviors that are 
harmful to themselves and potentially to others.
  Mr. Speaker, as a society, we seem to lack the methods to identify 
troubled youth and put them on a proper path to healing, if healing is 
possible. Too often, a child is left floundering due to our collective 
inabilities to help them find a constructive path forward. For example, 
many of our local boards of education often are not properly equipped 
to identify and assist children who are uncivil or who are completely 
alienated from their surroundings. Some families, too, seem unaware of 
their child's behaviors as unusual or potentially destructive. As the 
article I inserted in the Record yesterday reports, some parents are so 
overwhelmed in caring for children with special behavioral conditions, 
they simply don't know what else to do. Then again, too often there is 
no one to call to help.
  Through the Commission President Obama proposed be formed to address 
the conditions that led to Newtown's tragedy, surely that Commission 
should invite a cross section of Americans to share their knowledge 
about what led to the mass killings that have harmed so many in our 
nation over the past decade, and what we must do as a society to 
prevent future tragedies. We can all envision a future where the 
incredible intelligence and goodwill of the citizens of our nation can 
lead us to a better day if we provide a forum to listen carefully to 
the voices among us who grapple with these challenges daily.

                  [From USA Today, December 17, 2012]

                       A Boy Lost in the Shadows

             (By Donna Leinwand Leger and Yamiche Alcindor)

       Sandy Hook, Conn. Adam Lanza left only the faintest 
     impression on classmates, neighbors and the people of Newtown 
     before he killed his mother and shot his way into Sandy Hook 
     Elementary, where he killed 20 children and six teachers 
     before turning the gun on himself.
       Lanza, 20, skulked through the hallways of Newtown High 
     School in over-sized button-down shirts, eyes perpetually 
     downcast. His name appears a few times on the honor roll 
     published in the weekly Newtown Bee, but his picture is 
     absent from The Newtown Nighthawk yearbook.
       ``He was very withdrawn,'' said Tracy Dunn, 20, who 
     graduated from Newtown High School in 2010, Lanza's class.
       Dunn, a junior at Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and 
     Health Sciences, said she never saw him talk with anyone or 
     hang out with friends. He spent time with computers and 
     cameras in the technology room and belonged to the Tech Club.
       ``He would always have his head down walking to class with 
     his briefcase--kind of scurrying.'' she said. ``He never sat 
     down or said anything to kids at this locker. He was just 
     there in the background.''
       Andrew Lapple, who sat next to Lanza in homeroom their 
     senior year at Newtown High, told the Hartford Courant that 
     Lanza ``never really talked at all'' and walked the corridors 
     at school clutching his laptop.
       ``He walked down the halls, against the wall almost like he 
     was afraid of people,'' Lapple said. ``He was definitely kind 
     of strange, but you'd never think he'd do something like 
     this.''
       Lanza grew up in Sandy Hook in a sprawling colonial house 
     with his parents, Nancy and Peter, and an older brother, 
     Ryan, 24. His parents divorced in 2009 after a long 
     separation, and his father has remarried. Family friends and 
     relatives say much of his education was home schooling by his 
     mother.
       He attended Reed Intermediate School for sixth grade and 
     appears in a 2003 yearbook photo. In the a 2005 yearbook for 
     Newtown Middle School, he's listed with the seventh grade 
     without a picture under ``camera shy,'' but he isn't listed 
     in the eighth-grade class the next year. His name surfaces at 
     Newtown High School in 2008 as a sophomore.
       Marsha Moskowitz of Sandy Hook drove the school bus that 
     took Lanza to Newtown Middle. She remembers him as ``quiet, 
     shy and reserved.''
       His mother clashed with school officials and eventually 
     removed Adam from public school and home-schooled him, her 
     former sister-in-law, Marsha Lanza of Chicago, told a CBS 
     News affiliate.
       Lanza had trouble with her youngest son for years, and her 
     friend Louise Tambascio, owner of My Place Pizza & 
     Restaurant. He was diagnosed with a disorder on the autism 
     spectrum called Asperger syndrome, she said. Psychologist 
     Elizabeth Laugeson, an assistant clinical professor at the 
     University of California-Los Angeles, had no knowledge of 
     Adam Lanza's case but said, ``There really is no clear 
     association between Asperger's and violent behavior.''
       Nancy Lanza stopped into My Place once or twice a week but 
     rarely talked about her younger son, Tambascio said. Ryan, 
     the older son, bused table at the restaurant for two years. 
     He is outgoing and personable, she said. The brothers haven't 
     spoken in two years, she said.
       ``Ryan who was the complete opposite of his brother,'' she 
     said. Adam ``always had his face down. He would never look 
     you in the eye.''
       Police say the three guns used in the massacre were 
     purchased legally and registered to Nancy Lanza, whom friends 
     described as a gun and shooting aficionado. Tambascio said 
     shooting was ``a hobby.''
       She ``had nothing to do with what her son did. She's a good 
     person, goodhearted. She would do anything for you,'' 
     Tambascio said.
       Nancy Lanza ``liked the single-mindedness of shooting,'' 
     her landscaper, Dan Holmes told The Washington Post, Holmes 
     said she mentioned taking her son to the firing range to 
     practice. Holmes never entered the house or saw her son, but 
     she did once bring an antique rifle outside to show him, he 
     told the Post.
       The shooter's father, Peter Lanza of Stamford, said the 
     family is ``in a state of disbelief.''
       ``We, too, are asking why,'' he said in a written 
     statement. ``Like so many of you, we are saddened, but 
     struggling to make sense of what has transpired.''
       The Lanzas' neighbors on Yogananda Street say it's puzzling 
     that on such a close-knit block where residents throw 
     barbecues for newcomers, so few of them knew Adam Lanza or 
     had ever seen him.
       ``It's a mystery. Nobody knows them, which is odd for this 
     neighborhood,'' Len Strocchia said. ``Everyone knows each 
     other through the children, the school bus. The community 
     here is kids.''
       Neighbor Dave Lapp said he had little to tell the FBI and 
     State Police when they called on Friday night. ``We walked by 
     their house with the dog every day, and we don't know them. 
     We've never even seen them,'' Lapp said.
       Dunn, Adam Lanza's classmate, fears that may have been at 
     the root of the problem.
       ``Maybe if someone had tried to reach out to Adam--maybe he 
     needed a friend. Maybe this wouldn't have happened,'' Dunn 
     said. ``He's just one kid who slipped through the cracks.''
                                  ____


                  [From USA Today, December 17, 2012]

                Newtown Puts Mental Service in Spotlight

                             (By Liz Szabo)

       Families and doctors who treat the mentally ill say they 
     hope Friday's tragedy in Newtown, Conn., will refocus the 
     nation's attention on improving mental health services.
       Police have not released details about the motives or 
     mental state of shooter Adam Lanza. But perpetrators of 
     similar mass shootings--at Virginia Tech, Northern Illinois 
     University and an event in Tuscon for former congresswoman 
     Gabrielle Giffords--all had serious mental health conditions.
       ``We wait for things like this to happen and then everyone 
     talks about mental health,'' says Priscilla Dass-Brailsford, 
     an associate professor of psychology at Georgetown University 
     Medical Center. ``But they quickly forget.''
       There are hundreds of multiple-casualty shootings a year, 
     says forensic psychologist Dewey Cornell, director of the 
     Virginia Youth Violence Project. People have become so 
     desensitized that they pay no attention, he says, yet mental 
     illness contributes to domestic violence, child abuse, drug 
     addiction, homelessness and incarceration. Investing in 
     mental health care could help prevent tragedies, he says.
       ``Mental health has shrunk down to the level of short-term 
     crisis management,'' Cornell says. ``We can't think about the 
     gunman in the parking lot and what to do with him. We have to 
     get involved a lot earlier.''
       Schools and communities ``have cut their mental health 
     services to the bone. We're paying a price for it.''

                          ____________________