11 March, 2014

Andrew Solomon: The Father of the Sandy Hook Killer Searches for Answers : The New Yorker

Andrew Solomon: The Father of the Sandy Hook Killer Searches for Answers : The New Yorker: I wondered how Peter had felt through this period. “Sad,” he said. “I was hurt. I never expected that I would never talk to him again. I thought it was a matter of when.” He asked, “How much do you accommodate the demands and how much do you not? Nancy tended to, as did I.” Peter added, “But I think he saw that he could control her more than he could control me.” Adam had also cut off communication with Ryan, whom he last saw two Christmases before the shootings. According to Peter, Ryan reached out several times, but Adam never responded. Peter and Shelley now suspect that Adam deliberately shut them out to hide his psychological decay. Peter said, “I didn’t understand that Adam was drifting away.”

[...]

As soon as she got home, they called Ryan and began the two-hour
drive to his place, in Hoboken. Ryan had also left his office early; by
the time he got home, the police had taped off his apartment building.
Adam had been carrying Ryan’s I.D., which had led to the confusion. Ryan
approached the police with his arms up and said, “You’re looking for
me, but I didn’t do it.” He was taken to a police station, so Peter and
Shelley headed there, too. They were questioned for a couple of hours
and were made to wait for two more before they were allowed to see Ryan.
They went to the home of an aunt of Peter’s to regroup; they were
shuttled to a hotel, then to Shelley’s family’s house and other safe
houses, with a canine unit supplied by the police for security; they
were interviewed by the F.B.I., the state police, and various local
authorities. “We didn’t even have clothes,” Peter said. “I had to borrow
my lawyer’s pants.” Eventually, they headed to New Hampshire to arrange
Nancy’s funeral, and had to evade a stakeout by news media, which
wanted to cover it. I asked what they had done about a funeral for Adam.
“No one knows that,” Peter said. “And no one ever will.”