Lanza parents' divorce offers no clues about gunman

Legal documents report no mental health issues for Adam over parents' 2009 split

Published December 17, 2012 5:07PM (EST)

Adam Lanza        (AP)
Adam Lanza (AP)

Scrambling to make sense of the Newtown school massacre, investigators and reporters are searching for clues in Adam Lanza's life that might help explain his horrific actions last Friday. The 2009 divorce of Lanza's parents gives no such explanation.

As CBS reported Monday, legal documents from the divorce of Nancy and Peter Lanza "offer no hints of an acrimonious split and make no mention of any lingering mental health or medical issues for the then-teenage boy."

Adam Lanza shot his mother four times in the head at the Newtown home where had lived his entire life, before going to Sandy Hook Elementary School where he killed 20 children and six adults before taking his own life. As Salon noted earlier, Nancy Lanza kept a large collection of guns as a part of a survivalist mentality.


By Natasha Lennard

Natasha Lennard is an assistant news editor at Salon, covering non-electoral politics, general news and rabble-rousing. Follow her on Twitter @natashalennard, email nlennard@salon.com.

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Adam Lanza Connecticut Guns Nancy Lanza Newtown School Shooting