WHY ?

Question
Why would the shooter at Virgina Tech have wanted to file the serial numbers off of the guns he used ?  He had no need to hide anything.

Thanks,
AL

Answer
Hello Al.

First you need to understand that most violent criminals are mentally or emotionally disturbed, unusually stressed, drunk, drugged, and/or motivated in some way that they often act in an illogical manner.  So you can't look at the facts of a particular crime and expect them all to make sense to normal healthy law-abiding citizens.  The investigation may reveal many facts which provide background information and give us some ideas about why a particular criminal acted the way that they did, however we will never really know for sure why these things occur.  Depending on your point of view and your interpretation of the facts you might conclude that the person was evil, influenced by the devil or some other supernatural force, out of control on drugs, emotionally or physically abused, uneducated, threatened, hateful, greedy, jealous, or maybe they just had a special motive which remains hidden to all of us.

As far as filing serial numbers off, there are many facts which could make this seem like a completely logical or illogical action.  First is that your personal identity is verified and recorded with each firearm purchase.  Records are kept on file at the dealer regarding the make, model, and serial number of every firearm you buy, and your identity including name, address, drivers license, and thumb prints.  Whenever the firearm is used in a crime or a particular suspect is being investigated, the federal government contacts the firearms dealer(s) and retrieves those records for review as needed.

Mr. Cho apparently identified himself properly and purchased at least one of the firearms legally so his identity was already on file and associated with the particular firearm(s).  As a result he might have wanted to remove the serial numbers from the firearms so that they could not be traced back to him if they were ever used in a crime by himself or others.  Mr. Cho probably did not realize that most modern firearms have serial numbers recorded in numerous places, some of which are hidden or very difficult to remove, and that modern forensic techniques can recover the serial numbers in some cases even after they have been filed off.  Some states also require a fired cartridge casing to be kept on file from each firearm sold, so even without a serial number it is possible to match the shell casings found at the scene to a particular firearm, and then match those to the shell casing that is on file from the sale.

We also don't know for sure yet which firearms were used in this specific shooting, by whom, and how they were obtained.  The facts will eventually come out in the investigation but regardless of where the firearms came from I think it is safe to assume that the shooter(s) were not behaving in a completely logical manner thus some of the facts just won't make sense to us no matter what.

My heart and prayers go out to the victims and even to the criminal(s) involved in this incident.  They have all paid a terrible price needlessly due to the evil that exists in the world.  I also am totally against the media hype surrounding this and other sensational cases which regularly make the headlines.  The news trends create the impression that these incidents are common place or widespread when in fact they continue to be very rare, and I believe in some cases the media frenzy actually plants ideas in the minds of unstable or criminal individuals that may later take action based on the media hype they observed from a previous event.

Now I am not blaming the media for this or any other crime, nor am I blaming the firearms, school, students, parents, families, or the victims.  The actual shooter(s) are the only ones responsible for this and they will pay in many ways.  I just think the media hype is over-blown, unnecessary, and harmful to society in general.  This is why I rarely watch television or listen to the news on the radio.  I prefer to get my news via unbiased and factual sources on the Internet, and in many cases I disregard the hype on cases such as this since they are isolated incidents which aren't worthy of all the time and attention that they receive.  Heart disease kills roughly 1,400 people every day of the year yet we see so little information about this in the news even though there are a lot of research items, preventative measures, and potential cures out there which people should know about.

Hope this helps.

Bob