Note: Official story now says Adam wasn't wearing a bulletproof vest and Nancy didn't work at any school at any time of her life. Yes, they said 3 guns found, when official story says 4, but the 4th one was seized from Adam's car during the evening time of the 14th and the media was unaware of it for a little while.
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NewsTranscript
00:00Senseless, unthinkable, inconceivable, there are no shortage of words to describe the tragedy
00:07that struck at the elementary school right here in Newtown, Connecticut today.
00:12But we've heard one word repeated over and over again.
00:16Why?
00:17ABC's chief investigative reporter, Brian Ross, has spent the day uncovering details
00:21about the 20-year-old shooter.
00:23Brian?
00:24Well, Cynthia, he was armed to the teeth with legally purchased guns and went from obscurity
00:29to infamy.
00:30Until today, Adam Lanza was known mostly in his neighborhood as someone who did not play
00:34well with others.
00:37Adam Lanza was a child of an affluent Connecticut town and the child of divorce.
00:42A family friend, Barbara Frey, told ABC's Jim Atholaw that the son was trouble and the
00:48mother was demanding of him.
00:49He was not connected with the other kids.
00:53My son played with him when they were young, and in her home, I know she was very particular.
00:59I just think she maybe had too high of standards or something, or focused overly too much for
01:10whatever reason.
01:11So was there conflict?
01:13Was there some kind of tension between the two of them?
01:16The parent and child?
01:17The parent and child?
01:18Not that I know of, but I think the fact that the parents were divorced must have contributed
01:21to it.
01:23Adam Lanza said Adam's brother, Ryan, and his father, Peter, a GE tax lawyer, were questioned
01:27by the FBI and police in New Jersey, looking for clues as to what led the youngest member
01:32of the family to kill.
01:35Someone believed to be Ryan Lanza left the station tonight without comment.
01:38I think the most important thing to point out with this kind of an individual is that
01:44he did not snap just this morning and decide to act out violently.
01:49These crimes involve planning and thoughtfulness and strategizing in order to put the plan
01:56together.
01:57So what may appear to be snap behavior is not that at all.
02:02After first killing his mother at the family home, authorities say the young man headed
02:07to the Sandy Hook Elementary School wearing a bulletproof vest.
02:12Authorities say he was armed with a semi-automatic assault rifle and two high-powered pistols
02:18Like these.
02:19Police say both his mother and his father legally owned a number of guns of the same
02:23kind.
02:24A relative said Adam was obviously not well.
02:27We'll go backwards as far as we have to go in this investigation and hopefully we'll
02:32stumble on answers.
02:33But what even the crime profilers are having a hard time trying to figure out tonight is
02:38why the attack on the children, most of them killed on the spot, according to authorities.
02:44The only theory is based on reports that his mother, divorced three years ago and unemployed,
02:49may have worked as a teacher's aide at the school.
02:52The children didn't harm him, but they were associated with his mother.
02:56And his mother, I believe, may be the real focus of all of this, that the anger and rage
03:01and resentment has built up in him over a number of years.
03:06And he decided, I've been powerless all this time and now I'm going to empower myself.
03:12But so far, it is only a theory, following a day of confusion and misinformation about
03:17the tragedy, starting when state and federal authorities first identified the shooter as
03:22Adam's older brother, Ryan, now a New York accountant.
03:26That led to Ryan posting messages on his Facebook page.
03:29It wasn't me.
03:30I was at work.
03:31It wasn't me.
03:32But when Ryan arrived at his home in Hoboken, New Jersey, police took him into custody for
03:37questioning.
03:38Police want to know if Ryan or anybody else in the family had any idea Adam was threatening
03:43to become violent.
03:44Typically, I've heard people say, yes, he said that, but I didn't take him seriously.
03:50Yes, he said that.
03:51I thought he was joking.
03:53I couldn't believe that anyone would do that.
03:55I just ignored him.
03:57It's not known if Adam Lanza made any such threats.
04:00In the end, he apparently killed himself at the school after killing so many others.
04:05What crime profilers say is the expected outcome in cases like this one.
04:11Every one of them, either they know when they go that they're going to die at the scene,
04:15either by the hands of the police or they kill themselves.
04:20Police know in horrifying detail what happened inside that school, but they don't yet have
04:24any idea what happened inside the damaged mind and broken soul of Adam Lanza.