Question: Where does an unemployed, introverted medical school student get the training to deploy sophisticated booby traps, tactical body armor, weapons systems and more? Certainly not in graduate school!
All this leads to an obvious third party influence over all this. Someone else taught this guy these skills and funded the acquisition of the equipment.
The Black Bloc crew at the Seattle WTO riot were all very well equipped, curiously so.
“Question: How does an unemployed medical student afford $20,000 in weapons gear?”
Those are good question. Maybe just follow the money.
YouTube.
This ain't rocket surgery.
The questions are based on false assumptions. First I see no facts to back an estimate of $20K in weaponry. An AR-15, a shotgun, a couple of pistols, magazines, surplus body-armor and gas-mask, and ammunition (including that used in the shooting and the booby traps probably cost $5K tops. (Sophisticated? really? A trip-wire-triggered gun-powder, flammable liquids and loose ammunition room-sized IED is sophisticated?)
A grad student who got an NIH grant could easily have a spare $5K — even without that, science grad students generally get paid full tuition plus a stipend as TAs or research assistants and can take out fat student loans if they feel short of cash, so even though he was dropping out, he probably had leftover money from his
first year in grad school.
Generally folks who even make it into doctoral programs in the sciences (esp. ones which are ‘hot’ like neuroscience and therefore have lots of applicants) are really smart, that and the internet will get you the training to do a hell of a lot of stuff without anyone backing you.
Personally, I suspect he’ll turn out to be schizophrenic (early to mid 20’s is typical time for onset) and his dropping out and going on the murder spree were both occasioned by insanity, which, alas, didn’t rob him of his intelligence and ability to plan.
http://www.officialstarwarscostumes.com/adult-star-wars-costumes.html ~ $30 to $70 ~ http://www.amazon.com/s/?ie=UTF8&keywords=gas+masks+for+sale&tag=googhydr-20&index=aps&hvadid=7364330964&hvpos=1t1&hvexid=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=1508575385200182541&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=b&ref=pd_sl_3g8y7kfguv_b ~ Gas Masks ~ $21 ~ http://www.buycheapr.com/us/result.jsp?ga=us13&q=ar15+accessories ~ $20 on up ~ depends on what you want ~ and the AR15 itself? Go to any reputable firearms dealer ~ depends on what you want. But it’s not a $10,000 firearm ~
1) Student loans and grants
2) The internet
I think that if he was with any group, it would be the occupoopers’ anarchy division. He was raised in a liberal city in our most socialist state. His church is liberal. He attended marxist universities and his major - neuroscience is populated with Marxist idealists out to create the perfect socialist man through science. At the time he was around his socialist peers in college, Bush Derangement Syndrome was all the frothing California rage.
He could learn anything he wanted to know from the Internet and he’s smart enough to find the information and materials and apply it all by himself.
It sounds to me, from what I have read about the material he had for the operation, like someone pulled the $20,000 number out of their hinney for this article. I read he was taxpayer funded-living on unemployment checks. He may have inherited money or saved it up. He did not come from a poor family.
Maybe he had some credit cards. I've heard stories of people having those things in the past.
He was not unemployed the whole time in Colorado. he worked for the school. "As a grad student you have an opportunity to work for the university in the research program for the programs that you're studying," university spokeswoman Jacque Montgomery said. "He worked in the neurosciences program. It is a paid position." http://www.cnn.com/2012/07/20/us/colorado-theater-suspect-profile/ He also worked the part time at McDonalds the year prior to Colorado, saving money for his PhD because he couldn't find work after he received his bachelors degree, he was said to be depressed over that and that is why he went for even more school at that time.
Question: Where does an unemployed, introverted medical school student get the training to deploy sophisticated booby traps, tactical body armor, weapons systems and more? Certainly not in graduate school!
The internets...
He had an NIH grant, according to his school.
Through student loans, of course. We borrow the cost of living too. He would have just had to borrow more and spend less, and he would have a net pretty quickly.
Though I don't know if he's still a medical student or how far out he was; I haven't been following.
THe alleged value of his weapons and gear keeps going up with every post. By the end of the day, I expect to read that the value was $50,000. By next Wednesday, the value will exceed the national debt.
Two Glock .40s -- $1200. One Remington 870 -- $400. One Colt AR-15 .223 -- $1400. Total = $4000.
300 12g shotgun shells -- $70. 3000 rounds of .40 -- $900. 3000 rounds of .223 -- $1200. Total = $2170.
Grand Total (before body armor) = $6170.
I read somewhere that he wasn't wearing body armor, but rather a Blackhawk tactical vest ($100). But even body armor can be purchased for under $300. Same for gas masks. Throw in a couple of smoke bombs and tear gas canisters and we're talking $7500 tops and even that's a stretch.