Posted on 04/21/2007 10:11:41 AM PDT by Cinnamon
Though it's unclear if he told anyone about his plans to stage a shooting rampage at Virginia Tech, from childhood, Seung-Hui Cho showed an appetite for brutality, according to a new report.
The Washington Post reports that while Cho was unusually quiet as a child — according to relatives, he refused to respond to greetings and didn't want to be hugged — when he fought with his older sister, Sun-Kyung Cho, his actions spoke volumes. Relatives say he punched her with shocking force.
Despite signs of trouble, Cho's mother didn't seek treatment for him because he did well in school, the Washington Post reports.
But in their first public statement since the massacre, on Friday, Cho's family said that their son "has made the world weep" and that they are now "living a nightmare."
The statement, released to the Associated Press by Sun-Kyung Cho, says the family feels "hopeless, helpless and lost," after the 23-year old Va. Tech senior took the lives of 32 people.
"We are humbled by this darkness," wrote 25-year old Sun Kyung Cho. "This is someone that I grew up with and loved. Now I feel like I didn't know this person … My brother was quiet and reserved, yet struggled to fit in. We never could have envisioned that he was capable of so much violence."
anyone here not like being hugged as a kid, or fight with their siblings? yep you sir.gal are a potential mass murderer.
Cut 'em a little slack, eh ? They aren't making excuses for him and are mortified at being related to the scumbag.
They were supposed to predict he'd be a mass murderer ?
I feel first for the victims' friends and relatives, then for the victims, but also for this family. You'd want to crawl into a hole and die.
Please. This kid spent his childhood in near total silence. He clearly wasn’t wired right from day one. The only strange thing is that it took him this long to blow.
If one of my sons punched their sister, or any girl for that matter, with “shocking force” they know they would be punished, lovingly, with shocking rapidity. Consequently, they have grown into fine young gentlemen.
While I believe that early diagnosis and treatment would have done a lot of good, I have to agree with your assessment.
Most of them do as kids.
Leni
mildly autistic?
aspergers's syndrome?
One common thread in many violent killers is that they were violent to animals growing up. I’m not talking about going hunting and shooting Bambi. I’m talking about finding stray cats, dogs, etc. and killing them in painful, torturous ways to watch them suffer and die. The boy gets pleasure out of watching the animal’s obvious fear and pain. They also get a sense of power knowing they can look the animal in the eye and decide whether and how much it will suffer.
It isn’t long before they decide to try that with people instead of animals.
Most of those, however, wind up being serial killers (multiple victims killed individually spread out over weeks, months or years) as opposed to “spree” killers (multiple victims killed in a relatively short time span, often concluding with the killer’s own murder/suicide).
My point is that childhood incidents *can* help identify potential mass killers.
That’s what he sounds like to me.
Sounds a little like something out of the autism spectrum.
I know boys like this.
Let’s not pop a diagnosis on this. Far too many cases of “Lack of parental attention” are given a diagnosis and a pill.
I really expected to read something in regards to how he brutalized animals when he was a kid. Move on, nothing here.
They should have made his college education conditional on his getting treatment. Going to college is a privilege, not a right. School is expensive, what with dormitory and meals (which they were paying for, I'm assuming). They could have said, if you don't get treatment, you don't go to college. Why didn't they do that? You can't let good grades excuse bad behavior.
Cho seems to possibly have had an autistic disorder - but it had to have been combined with something else.
My son has Asperger’s and I am getting really concerned that people are going to think he’s a threat, especially when he goes off to college and people don’t know him.
I have met many people with autistic disorders and Cho was NOT typical. He would have stood way out from any young autistic men I have seen.
It’s not the Koreans that have to worry about a backlash; it’s the autistic.
Mrs VS
I’m sorry I read this thread.
What? Even little old Auntie knew the kid was nutso years ago before they immigrated. And the excuses start...
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David Gearheart, who also attended middle school with Cho, said he talked to Cho once or twice, but that talking to him was just that -– talking to somebody rather than with somebody.
"He had a lot of crazy writings in his notebook and stuff, how he hated Americans," Gearheart said.
Linton said Cho was once reported to the principal for writing down the names of people he was supposedly planning to kill.
"It was like a hit list," Linton said. "They found one in his locker."
Linton said people "constantly" talked about how Cho might be the type of person that would one day attempt to kill someone. http://www.cavalierdaily.com/CVArticle.asp?ID=30192&pid=1583
Very well said.
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