A state police spokesman called it "unfortunate" Monday that details of a state police official's presentation on the Sandy Hook shooting investigation, which suggested the shooter may have planned the massacre well in advance, leaked out before it had been shared with the victims' families.
But in a written statement, Lt. J. Paul Vance did not take issue with specifics of the report that Sandy Hook Elementary School shooter Adam Lanza planned the massacre in obsessive detail on a 7-foot-long, 4-foot-wide spreadsheet.
The spreadsheet chronicled many other such crimes, down to how many people were killed and which weapons were used -- with research worthy of a doctoral dissertation -- according to a report in the New York Daily News.
Existence of the spreadsheet, which was said to essentially be a "score sheet" that Lanza hoped to put his name at the top of, was first reported by Mike Lupica of the Daily News after someone who attended a law enforcement meeting in New Orleans last week shared details of a Connecticut state police colonel's presentation on the Sandy Hook shooting investigation.
The column suggested it was evidence that Lanza might have planned the crime for much longer than previously thought.
Lupica's column cited an unnamed law enforcement source who was there when Connecticut state police Col. Danny Stebbins spoke at the International Association of Police Chiefs and Colonels mid-year meeting in New Orleans last week.
"We were told (Lanza) had around 500 people on this sheet," Lupica quoted the source as saying. "Names and the number of people killed and the weapons that were used, even the precise make and model of the weapons. It had to have taken years. It sounded like a doctoral thesis, that was the quality of the research."
Stebbins is deputy commissioner of the state police.
Vance said the families of the Sandy Hook victims "continue to be a priority in this investigation" and "it is unfortunate that someone in attendance chose not to honor Col. Stebbins' request to respect the families' right to know specifics of the investigation first." But the town's chief elected official said she was aware of no current efforts to brief families after the fact.
First Selectwoman Pat Llodra said she has been to several such briefings in the past couple of months, but has not been made aware of any new effort to meet with families.
In past briefings, however, "there hasn't been any new information" released, Llodra said. State police have been adamant and clear that "there's not going to be incremental" releases of information and that all the investigators' conclusions will be in a final report.
"I find it really surprising that Stebbins would do anything like that," Llodra said, referring to talking about key details of the case in front of law enforcement officers from all over the country, "because he's been very careful."
Lanza, 20, shot his mother four times in the face as she lay in bed on the morning of Dec. 14, 2012, then drove to Sandy Hook Elementary School, armed with four guns. He brought three of them into the school, including a Bushmaster AR-15 semiautomatic rifle.
About 9.35 a.m., he shot his way through the glass windows at the school entrance, immediately fatally shot Principal Dawn Hochsprung and school psychologist Mary Scherlach and went on to kill a total of 26 people; 20 first-graders and six educators.
The rampage took just a few minutes.
"The whole thing was chilling and riveting," the source, who Lupica identified only as a "tough career cop" and a "career law enforcement" veteran, said of Stebbins talk. "The fascination (Lanza) had with this subject matter, the complete and total concentration. There really was no other subject matter inside his head. Just this: Kill, kill, kill.
"It really was like he was lost in one of his own sick games. That's what we heard," he said.
The source told Lupica, "They don't believe this was just a spreadsheet. They believe it was a score sheet. This was the work of a video gamer, and that it was his intent to put his own name at the very top of that list," he said. "They believe that he picked an elementary school because he felt it was a point of least resistance, where he could rack up the greatest number of kills..."
Connecticut investigators "have pictures from two years before, with the guy all strapped with weapons, posing with a pistol to his head. That's the thing you have to understand: He had this laid out for years before," the source told Lupica.
Vance would not comment on details of the column. In the past he has pointed out when published information was wrong.
"The Connecticut state Police is not releasing further information in regards to the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings at this time," Vance said in a written update.
The seminar Stebbins spoke at "was designed for law enforcement professionals only," Vance said.
"Law enforcement sensitive information was discussed dealing with tactical operational approaches by first responders on the day of the shootings," he said. "Officer safety and public safety along with lessons learned from the incident were discussed.
"Following each tragic mass murder incident in this country it is customary for law enforcement to share their lessons learned from the investigation so that other law enforcement agencies can learn,'" Vance said.
He said that "the families of the victims continue to be a priority in this investigation" and "it is unfortunate that someone in attendance chose not to honor Col. Stebbins' request to respect the families' right to know specifics of the investigation first."
Vance said the final state police investigation report "is still several months away." He would not comment further.
Copyright 2013 - New Haven Register, Conn.
McClatchy-Tribune News Service
