It's been more than two weeks since the tragic shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, and finally someone has come forward to claim shooter Adam Lanza's body. The man responsible for killing 27 people, including his own mother, school staff, and some 20 children, will now be buried. So who cares enough about a murderer to see that he's put to rest with some dignity?
It may have been Peter Lanza, his father. May have been, of course, because right now Adam Lanza's benefactor -- for lack of a better term -- has chosen to remain anonymous, and no one is talking. No one, that is, beyond an anonymous source that's claiming it's Peter.
The state medical examiner's office will only say that Lanza's body has been claimed. The funeral home that handled the body of his mother, the late Nancy Lanza, isn't answering any questions about whether they are involved with burying the 20-year-old. And, of course, there's nothing out of Peter Lanza himself or the rest of the members of the family.
But if it really is Dad, why the secrecy? Is it fear? Is it the knowledge that in this country, people often allow their anger to rule their actions, that people shoot first, ask questions later?
It's a sad commentary on our society if the person who claimed this man's body has to hide behind anonymity for fear of retribution. Whatever happened to compassion? Don't the mourning deserve to bury their dead in peace? Should they really need to hide?
We can all recognize that Adam Lanza was a monster, a man whose unspeakable acts in that elementary school shook, to the core, a nation.
But before he strapped himself with firearms, before he shattered the calm of a Friday morning, before he murdered innocent children, Adam Lanza was a son. He was a brother. He was a grandson, a cousin, a nephew ...
And after, now that he's dead, now that his DNA is in the hands of scientists who are trying to ascertain -- wrongly or not -- what made this mass murderer tick, Adam Lanza is still that son, brother, grandson, cousin, nephew.
His family will forever bear the weight of what he's done, forever be marked by horror, by tragedy, but his sins are not theirs. And they deserve the right to grieve, the right to find closure, the right to set to rest their beloved and find a means to move on.
It's sad that ours is a country where too few respect that right.
What do you think of someone claiming Adam Lanza's body? Did you expect he'd be destined for Potter's Field?
Image via ABC
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Comments 15
They also have the right to PRIVACY. Which is exactly why they're not sending out a press release. DUH.
It's all so sad.
I actually feel that he almost has it worse than the parents of the little ones. He lost a child too, but he has to live with, rightly or wrongly so, a responsibility of these little ones' deaths... Just because he is the killers father.
He will have a harder time being able to mourn his childs death because who is going to have the heart to listen about a murderer? The other families can grieve openly and publicly...
I don't know. Sad all around!
Poor man the father. I don't blame him at all. He also has the right to mourn the loss of his son, even if he was not the boy he wanted him to be. And he can't really cry on any one's shoulder. I doubt many would listen. He deserves his privacy, and his right to bury his son. I also don't blame the secrecy because many make try to disturb the grave later.
Taking this in a new direction - not that I think they will, but suppose they do find an "evil gene" - should all of this guy's relatives be sterilized to ensure they don't pass it on? Should they all be executed to prevent them from doing something just as evil?
Discuss.
I would hope that if they found an "evil gene" they could do something better than executing or sterilizing innocent people. (No snark at all, I'm genuinely hoping this.) Lots of people carry things in their genes, but it doesn't necessarily mean that gene will manifest or that anything will happen because of it. Supposing they do find something genetic, would that mean that preventative measures could be taken early on?