Reflections on Sandy Hook: a Decade Later

On a cold December morning, approximately 10 years ago, the community of Newtown, Connecticut, was ground zero for a very public narrative on mass school shootings, mental illness, and mental health. While the content and nature of discussion vary between venues, a consistent theme in the narrative on gun violence has related to the reductionism inherent in focusing solely on the roles of mental illness and access to weapons. [...]we recommend that facilitated case discussions, using a two-pronged approach to holistically study mass shooters’ risk and personal profiles, be integrated into psychiatric training and continuing professional education. Yet, we are also left to wonder how this personal narrative could translate into a crime so horrible that it leads us to question the shooter’s humanity. [...]our attention must extend beyond the shooter’s risk profile and toward the way the shooter understood his world and his place in it.