Harrison County crime scene report indicates
that the body was found beneath a sign written in blood
that read "stop the violence."
The deceased, Leonard Gray, a 17 year old white male
was found on the third floor in
the before mentioned school.
An exit wound was found in the left rear quadrant
of the upper skull, the bullet having traveled
through the brain.
The wound is consistent with the subject's having
placed the muzzle of the gun in the mouth
and fired the weapon.
Body position is consistent.
- Everything all right? - Thank you.
- Audio video.
- Yes, I'm doing a story on school shootings
for LA Times magazine.
I'm particularly interested in people involved in
the Madison High School shooting back in 99.
Cameron Porter his last address
in the area was on Lucas Street.
Yes, I tried contacting his parents but they declined.
Great, I'm staying at the Hyatt room 234.
That would be great, I look forward to hearing from you.
Thank you, okay bye.
- You're all set, ready to go.
Thank you very much.
- Good afternoon, I'm Detective Henry.
A tragic shooting took place as classes were beginning.
And, what we know at this point is that one gunman
arrived early at the school and opened fire
killing one student and wounding six others
who have been taken to the hospital.
The shooter was killed as well.
We have two other suspects in custody
that are being held for questioning.
- I don't know, I was walking to my econ class
and I saw a guy get shot.
It's a guy that I have a history class with.
I think his name is Brad and he got shot and he fell.
And, as soon as I saw him fall I ran.
That's all I know.
- How many shots were fired?
- I think just one.
Just one, it got Brad and--
- Its 10:30 in the morning, October 24th.
This morning I'm interviewing Cameron Porter
who was a senior at Madison High in Harrison County
during the shooting incident last April 22nd.
Is that correct?
- Yes, sir.
- And, do you understand that these interview tapes
are not going to be privileged, that they can
be used for any subsequent legal action?
And furthermore, you've agreed to be interviewed
in an effort to cooperate with the analysis team
and you signed a waiver to that effect.
- Yes, sir.
- Why don't you tell me your parents names
and tell me sort of work they do.
- My father's name is Norman.
He works for Quality Control for DynaRide Industries.
They manufacture heavy equipment.
Mother's name is Elizabeth.
She works for an office supplies company.
- You an only child?
- Yeah, yes sir.
- No, yeah is fine here.
What kind of a relationship do you have with your parents?
- We have a good relationships, we're okay.
- Cameron, I'm not trying to suggest that you
don't have a good relationship with your parents, okay?
I know that's the cliche that everybody wants to drag out.
But, what I'm trying to do is to get to know you.
Okay? - Okay,
I'm an average kid, an average guy.
- You don't have an average IQ.
You've been tested in the 140 range,
that's very high.
I scored 15 points lower on that same test.
- That doesn't mean anything.
At least, I don't think it means anything.
My father said you could have a high IQ
and still be stupid, so.
- When did you become friends with Leonard?
- My sophomore year, I was trying out for
the basketball team and he would always
come and watch the tryouts.
I didn't make the team and I felt pretty bad about it.
I was walking home with him and he was putting me down
but it wasn't in a mean way.
I wouldn't have made the final cuts and I wasn't
on the team and my father found out.
He started really putting me down,
but Leonard wasn't like that.
- So, your father was upset that you didn't make
the basketball team?
- You make it like it was a big deal,
it wasn't a big deal.
- I'm sorry. Why don't you tell me about it.
- My father played basketball in the Army
and after that he played professional ball in Europe.
He's strong and that was his game.
He'd muscle you to the basket and then hack the shit
out of you and tell you how you play like a girl.
I mean, I don't know, that was his game.
- How'd that make you feel?
- How you think it made me feel?
How should it make me feel?
- Obviously, it didn't make you feel good.
- You're trying to fit me in, right?
I either a ballplayer, or a loner, or what, right?
You really need me to fit in someplace.
- No, no, no I'm just trying to figure out who you are.
It's okay if you don't fit into any category.
You seen Leonard's father since the incident?
- No.
- According to the report you had an unpleasant
experience at one of Mister Gray's civic organizations.
- Len pretty much laughed it off, too.
He asked me if I wanted to go shooting with him
and his father.
I thought it sounded cool, so I said okay.
About five miles, six miles away there was
these white guys who talked about guns
and how the country's gone soft.
How they keep letting all these immigrants in
and that type of thing.
It was a camp as well as a shooting range.
We all lined up in a row and they called it a skirmish.
15 feet in front of us there were these pop up comics,
like these bad guy comics with guns.
Pop up and you had to shoot 'em, it was fun.
And, there were these women with like grocery bags
and they would pop up and you're not supposed to shoot 'em.
It was like it was about thinking quick.
Then, Martin Luther King popped up with a gun
and everybody shot him.
- That supposed to be a joke?
- I guess.
- That's pretty rough.
- I mean, I didn't agree with it but you don't
have to agree with what everybody does.
- So, as a black man it didn't bother you
them shooting at Doctor King's image?
- I didn't like it. - Why?
- I guess 'cause I felt like I was
putting me being black on the sideline
and I couldn't.
- That had to be painful.
- You're not black.
- No, but I've had to put aside who I was before.
And, every time I put my own self or my own feelings
aside it's painful.
- I told my dad about it, he said it was
the way business was done, so.
- What did he mean by that?
- He said people test you to see if you can stay focused
on the business or if you're gonna go on some
Civil Rights kick and throw away the business.
- And, you said?
- Nothing, you don't argue with my father.
- If you could argue with your father
what would you have said?
- Maybe that I was ashamed.
- Ashamed?
- I think I feel like that a lot of the time.
- You feel like that now?
- A little bit.
- You and Len had a club of some sort, right?
That paper made a big deal about that, what was that?
- Order Sagite, yeah.
The papers played on the fact that they said
we all had high IQs and all went dark.
I mean, it wasn't true.
- Well, tell me about it.
- The Order of the Arrow, I liked it.
There was no rules, no oaths,
you know, no initiation.
It was just me Len and Carla and we were
gonna do things together.
It pretty much broke up after, but for a while
for maybe two weeks he was all about it.
One time in English class Miss Clift was
talking about MacBeth and how great Shakespeare was
and right in the middle of it Carla raised her hand
and says, "Did you know that Shakespeare was dead?"
And everybody in class started laughing.
Miss Clift said, "The great works of authors
"make them immortal."
Carla says, "No," she says, "They're not immortal.
"They die like they're supposed to.
"And, we should appreciate their work and move on."
It was the ways he said it was so serious
and so dry that it shook Miss Clift, do you know?
I was impressed, that's why I told Len about it 'cause--
- You said that Len and Carla had a falling out.
- Yeah, right after the turtle thing.
- Okay, what's the turtle thing?
- He said he wanted us to go shoot with him
at this place he knew.
He said he would set up targets.
It would be like a combat type thing.
He said he'd put the targets out the night before.
There were six of them.
The goal was to shoot all six and get out of there
before someone heard the gunshots and came to see
what was going on.
And, I think it was a test, more or less,
with me and Carla.
Anyways, we found them and we shot five.
They were in these orange bags hanging from trees,
hanging from these trees.
Right away I had a bad feeling about it so I asked Len,
I said "what was in the bags."
And, he said, "Don't worry about it,
"they were just targets."
I guess Carla had a bad feeling about it too,
because when we got to the last one she walked up to it.
She was like 10, maybe five feet away from it
and Len shot at it.
And, she didn't even stop.
She went right up to the tree and took the bag down,
opened it up.
She walked right past us to the car.
They were turtles, turtles you could buy at a pet store.
Four in each in bag, Carla was really pissed.
She said, "Len should have told us what was in the bag."
He said that he had told us they were targets.
That was it, then we went back and no one said anything,
that was it. - God.
How'd that make you feel, shooting the turtles?
- I mean, I didn't feel good about it, I felt bad.
And then, Carla got on case she said
I was worse than Len because yeah Len was weird
but that I was a lackey.
I knew about it and didn't do anything about it,
that I wouldn't say anything about it.
- Did that make you feel differently about Len?
- It made me think that maybe he wasn't,
he was a different guy than I thought he was.
- Oh come on, wait a minute Cameron, are you telling me that
up to this point you didn't realize that Len was,
I don't know, what did you say different?
- Him shooting the turtles was different
'cause they were alive.
And, maybe it was just that he didn't tell us
what was in the bags.
That made it bad.
- There was an incident at the school that resulted
in Len getting suspended, do you remember that?
- Yeah, it started over nothing.
There was this girl
she had a fast mouth.
I mean, she never really had anything to say
except for putting people down.
I guess that day she felt like being on Len's case.
So, he wore this hat a lot and so she started
getting on him about the hat.
There were some jocks standing close by
so she said right in front of Len and
she started talking about how she's not scared of Len
and stuff like that and all the jocks started laughing.
And she got right up in his face, right up in Len's face.
Len said something to her and some spit came out.
He said he didn't mean
to spit on her, but he did.
So, she slapped him and then he slapped her back
and then two of the jocks came up and started punching him,
beating on him and the teachers came and broke it up.
Then, the girl's boyfriend Brad, I guess he'd heard
about it, said he was gonna beat up Len.
- Brad Williams?
- Yeah. - Okay.
- Later on they surrounded us and they started
calling us names and they started slapping us.
But, I mean they didn't slap us hard or anything
like that, I guess just to show that they could.
Then, they told us to get on our knees
and beg for mercy.
We didn't, so they forced us to.
Some girls came and saw and told 'em to let us up.
Some other girls came and laughed.
Then Mister Anders walked in
and they started walking away, the jocks
started walking away.
One turned around and pointed at us and said
that we were trying to have sex with them.
And, Mister Anders knew it wasn't true, but
he didn't say anything 'cause he's a baseball coach.
And anyway, the jocks can do whatever they want.
I mean, they do whatever they want anyway.
So, after school we went to the football field
there was line nine of 'em.
Len was wearing his long coat, looked like
a cowboy or something.
And then Brad showed up, Brad grabbed Len around
the collar and Len just smiled.
So, Brad slapped him and Len just kept smiling
and standing there.
I could tell Brad didn't really know what to do after that.
And, one of his friends pushed me towards Len,
started talking shit, got in my face talking shit.
I just turned and looked at him, turned to face him.
I could tell he wasn't really sure whether
he could take me or not.
We're kind of the same height, the same weight.
- Did he actually hit you?
- I think he wanted to but he didn't.
He just stood there and called me a punk.
And Brad told Len he wasn't worth his time
and me and Len just ended up walking back to the car.
When we got to the car Len said,
"thank you for coming with me."
When we got in the car he asked me if I knew why
he thanked me.
And I said, 'cause if I hadn't come he would
have got jumped or something.
And he said, "No, if you hadn't come I would
"have to have killed Brad."
And then, he opened up his coat and showed me the Ruger.
I think Len really played it cool, though.
I think he handled it well.
- He showed restraint, but Len was clearly thinking
about shooting Brad at that time.
- And Brad was clearly thinking about beating Len up.
- How did it make you feel that Len had a gun?
- It was okay. It gave him a sense of power.
I mean, even if he didn't use it, I mean.
- Come on, Cameron, you're an intelligent young man.
You and I both know that in a civilized society
guns are not a source of real power.
- Okay yeah, you can say that.
And, it makes sense, but it makes more sense on paper.
If someone punches you in the face 'cause they can,
I mean that's not real power but when they're standing
in front of you it sure feels like it.
Someone sits behind you they keep kicking the back
of your chair, they keep kicking the back of your chair
and you don't feel like turning around 'cause
you don't wanna look them in the face.
I mean, for a second there that can feel,
that could feel like real power.
That's a kind of power, and that's real.
Guns are power.
If they weren't we wouldn't be here.
- Len's not here.
- But Len also didn't really wanna be here.
- Len talk about not wanting to be here?
Come on, Cameron, Len talk about suicide?
He said that it was the ultimate power.
It was like being God.
- Elaborate on that.
- That's what it was.
You want some comic book conversation.
It wasn't like we were sitting around having
a dark conversation, it was what it was.
It came up. - Cameron,
when we look at Len's behavior a pattern emerges.
I mean, there's reason to believe that he went
to school that day expressly to die.
In other words, it was an elaborate way to commit suicide.
You ever think about suicide?
- Before the shooting
sometimes I would think about it, but
now I think about it a lot.
Only because I think
if I could pull it off
it would make my parents happy.
I think they could get through it.
I cost them a lot of money.
I don't wanna die, I just want it to get over with.
I don't,
maybe that's why I don't mind
answering these questions because
I don't think it's going to make a difference.
It's not gonna bring anybody back to life.
- If you could reverse things, go back in time
so to speak, where would you start?
- I don't know.
I'm just really sorry about all of it, I screwed it.
I really screwed everybody up.
- It's okay to show your emotions, Cameron.
Crying's no big deal.
It's just another way that humans have
of expressing their selves.
What did your parents say?
- My dad was
my dad was so pissed that
he grabbed me and pushed my head against the wall.
He clenched his fist like he was gonna hit me
and he just held me there, for a long time.
My mom as just yelling, asking him not to hit me.
He said,
he said he was ashamed to have me
as a son.
- Did your father ever hit you?
- No, sometimes I,
sometimes I dreamed he would.
- You dreamed he would hit you?
Did you want him to hit you?
- Sometimes, I thought maybe
maybe if he hit me I could take it and
it'd be over with, you know?
Rather than him getting on my case and telling me
how he thinks I'm crap.
They talk about how he's working all the time
to support my sorry ass.
He said I should play him one-on-one and if I win
he'll pay for my college.
I was so mad
that I grabbed the ball and we went out to the Lincoln park.
I mean, he's good but I feel like if it was a fair game
I could have had a good chance. You know?
But, he kept beating on me.
He kept beating on me and elbowing me.
I wanted to hit him back, but I couldn't.
I just couldn't.
I had a bruise on my face.
- What happened then?
- I stayed in for two days.
And Len came by one of the days,
my face was still messed up
and I told him what happened.
Then, he told me about his plan, how he was gonna
put a stop to the silence.
- Stop to the silence?
- I asked him what he meant by that and he
he said everybody had agreed to keep the violence quiet.
Mister Washington, the teachers, the coaches.
He said they didn't mind keeping it quiet because
it made it easier to deal with.
Just let the kids suffer and hopefully
they'll make it out all right.
He said he was gonna break a hole in the wall
of silence so big that it couldn't be fixed.
And, he asked me if I wanted to be involved.
- What did you say?
- I said I didn't know.
Then, he told me all he was gonna do
was write "Stop the Violence" in blood.
He said that was all he was gonna do.
- Did you know that Carla had started
talking to Len again?
- All the boxes that you need
are right over there.
Let me know if you need anything.
- Thanks.
- Carla, you signed the Miranda statement and
you do understand that we're here to further
the investigation into possible future threats
to students and other personnel in Harrison County?
- Yes.
- Carla, my name is Franklyn Bonner.
I'm a psychologist and the president of a company
called Spectrum Group.
We specialize in threat assessment.
Our job is to analyze events and make predictions
about the possibility of future events.
Are you okay?
- Yeah, I'm fine.
- To begin our interview today can tell me something
about your home life?
I understand you live with a foster family.
- Yeah, that's right.
- Why do you live with this family?
- My folks split when we moved to Saginaw
and so I lived with my mom with a while
and then that wasn't cutting it so
I had to move in with my dad in his creepy trailer.
And then, I had some trouble there
and so I moved in with an aunt out here.
And then, I stopped going to school on a regular basis
so they just threw me in with a foster family, case closed.
- What was your relationship like
with your mother?
Did you get along?
- Oh yeah, we have a lot in common.
I'd say we're more like sisters than anything else.
But, she just doesn't have a lot of confidence
in herself, you know?
I mean, after my dad left her she had
these boyfriends and they messed her over pretty good.
She kind of lost it, so she didn't really
need me around causing her trouble.
- And, what kind of trouble did you cause?
- Just being around, mostly.
I mean, she could barely take care of herself.
- Which means?
- Which means I had to run things half the time.
We got evicted from the place we were renting.
And, she wanted to move back to Chicago where she's from
in with her brother and his wife
and I didn't wanna do that.
So, I moved in with my dad.
- And, what was that like?
- He was a loser.
- Can you elaborate on that?
- Just he had nothing going on really, just kind of
floating around, bouncing from job to job
and blowing all of his money in bars,
that kind of thing.
- And, you didn't like living with him?
- Well no, I was like his fricking maid half the time.
I mean, I couldn't stand how dirty his place was.
So, I just tried to stay away from him.
But, he didn't care, all he cared about
was his next beer.
- So, it's fair to say that you didn't particularly
like your dad.
- No, it's not fair to say that.
I didn't like him or not like him.
He was just there.
- How old were you at the time?
- 12, I guess, maybe 13.
I'd just gotten my period.
- All right, you were a student at Madison High for
a fairly short amount of time.
Would you say that your tenure there was positive?
- Would I say what?
- Were you happy at Madison High School?
- Oh, it was okay I guess.
- How did you first meet Leonard and how did you
first meet Cameron?
- Well, I met Cameron first.
He was really nice and I like black guys.
- Why is that?
- Because, black guys don't have a lot of baggage, right?
Unless they're heavy into a get whitey thing.
I mean, they have who they are.
They have what they can do, but they don't have
a bunch of crap about who you have to be
or who they have to be.
I mean, you meet most black guys and
what you see is what you get.
But, Cameron was a little different 'cause
his folks had money and they loved to show it off.
But, I wanted to meet him because he seemed nice.
So, then I met Len and I told him
I liked Cameron because they were tight, Len and Cameron.
And then Len came onto me really heavy
and he could be really smooth.
Well, not smooth I guess, but sincere.
He could be really sincere,
made you feel like he needed you.
But one thing I liked about Len was he didn't
try to crawl into my pants right away.
Most guys just wanna get into bed without even
knowing your name.
- Have you been to bed with other boys?
- Sort of.
- Well, you can't sort of go to bed with a boy.
- Yes you can, you can sort of do whatever
you want with a boy.
- I'll take your word for that.
So, what happened when you were friends with both of them?
- We started hanging.
Len was dark and Cameron was getting there.
And, I don't know, I just liked 'em both.
- And, why do you like boys who are,
how did you put it, dark?
- Because that's what I was.
I mean, I wasn't exactly rolling with the band, man,
in case you didn't notice that by now.
- Describe Len and Cameron to me.
- Describe them?
Cameron is open. He's kind of gentle.
He's built nice and cute in a young kind of way.
But, he's really sweet.
He's not like a rapper or anything like that.
If I looked him in the eyes, if I went up to him
just looked at him in the face
he would smile at me.
I like that in guy.
- And Leonard?
- Len was cool.
You always got the impression there was something
spinning around in his head.
He knew people, man.
And, one day I was having a really lousy day
my day was going down hill in a hurry.
I was sitting in the cafeteria by myself
and Len comes over with a cup of tea,
and just puts it down next to me and walks away.
I mean, he just knew I needed some tea with lemon
and not no freakin' conversation.
He just put it down and walked away.
That was Len.
- But, eventually you had a falling out with him.
- Yeah. He knew how to hurt, too.
He was pretty good at that.
- He posted some information about you on the net.
Can you tell me about that?
- No, I will not tell you about that.
That's personal information and I'm not gonna
go there with you.
That's between me and my shrink.
- Carla, I need to understand the impact.
Of all the incidents that lead up to the tragic events
of April 22nd.
I'm trying to be as fair to everyone as possible.
Now, I understand in your case that there is
some history of molestation.
- Excuse me? Do you speak English?
Do you understand what I say when I'm saying
I'm not going there?
- Fine. Fine.
Can you tell me what happened on the days leading up
to April 22nd?
- I just stopped going to school,
turned away from all that crap.
People were making remarks and what not.
I talked to Cameron once or twice.
He called to see if I was okay.
He was pretty pissed at Len for putting that crap
about me on the internet, too.
I didn't have a major conversation with him or anything.
I was taking tranqs to mellow out.
- Tranquilizers? These were prescribed?
- Some were some weren't?
Anything you need you can pretty much get at Madison.
So, then Len calls me.
And, I'm thinking to myself,
"It's outrageous that you even have my number
"in your brain.
"Get my number out of your fucking brain."
He basically apologizes for the violence
he had laid on me.
- You had a physical confrontation with him?
- No, just talking about putting my business
in the streets.
He said he was sorry and he knew he shouldn't
have done it.
- Did you believe that?
- Yes and no, but he laid it down like violence
against me, which it was.
When I first started going to that clinic
to talk about what happened to me
they told me it was about me being attacked.
Even though there wasn't any hitting or fighting involved
I was still being attacked.
And, that's when I learned that violence is just
as much about what happened
as it how it happened.
You know what I mean?
- Yeah, I do, I do.
Did you accept Leonard's apology?
- Well, he didn't sound like he was bullshitting me.
And, I kind of have this thing about confrontations.
I just feel like if I don't confront people
about stuff, if I just don't talk about it
that I can just get past it.
I can put it out of my head.
So, whenever someone messes with me and they say
they're sorry I usually just go for it.
Not for them, but mostly for me.
So, I was definitely gonna put some distance
between me and Len and he was gonna be
jerking my chain.
I was gonna jerk his, too.
- So, what happened then?
- So, Len was laying this rap about how he's sorry
for the pain he put me through, rapping about
how there's so much crap in the world.
And then, he say he knows this woman artist
named Kiera something, I don't remember.
But, she did these paintings in blood, real blood.
And, he said what he was gonna do was go to
the school and write, "Stop the Violence"
all over the school in his own blood.
- Well, that's rather dramatic.
- Yeah, I know, but I thought he would write it
maybe once, or he'd have to write it really small.
Because, I mean, how much can you bleed?
You have 10 pints of blood in your body.
I looked it up on the internet.
And, it's not like you're gonna be writing a book.
So, I was supposed to be the one to fix the door.
- Fix the door?
- Well, they lock all the doors of the school at night.
And, they don't unlock 'em again until five minutes
before school starts, except for the front door.
So, I was supposed to get to school early and bang on
the back door until someone came and I was gonna
tell them that I had to go to the bathroom.
Of course, the girls' bathroom is on the first floor
right near that door.
So, I was supposed to push the little button on the door
that makes it stay unlocked.
I was gonna bring in some paint to for Len
and Cameron and leave it in the bathroom.
Then, as soon as school started I was supposed
to meet them in the library.
I called Cameron and Cameron said that Len
had called him and said the same thing
and he wanted to come along, but Cameron
was kind of worried about it because it seemed like
a big step and they could both get kicked out
of school for doing something like that.
- Cameron was worried about that?
- Yeah, but I wasn't 'cause I wasn't really
planning on going back to school anyway.
So, I got the paint.
I asked for blood red and the guy gave me vermilion.
And, I talked to Len that morning and he sounded
a little weird.
I thought he was just high or something
like he'd been smoking.
And, he asked me if I was still coming
and I said yes.
And then, he started bashing on Cameron because
he said he thought Cameron was backing out.
And, I was like, "Ease up on Cameron, because this
"is just your show and we're just helping you."
So, he eased up on Cameron
and he told me that he would meet me at the school.
So, I was driving my stupid
Chevy Cavalier that's like 109 years old.
The belt whistles and slips and squeaks
and you could hear me coming down the street.
So, I'm supposed to get to school at like 7:30.
The first bell rings at 8:05.
But, by the the I get to Felson's my car's overheating
and I have to wait for it to cool down.
So, I put water in the radiator.
It's ready to boil over any minute.
So, by the time I get to school it's like
10 to eight and I go to the door and I try it
and it's already unlocked.
So, I go in, there's a maintenance guy there
reading into his paper and drinking coffee
and he doesn't see me.
So, I slip up into the staircase and I start going up
the stairs to go to the third floor.
But, before I can get to the third floor
I start hearing all this noise, all this freaking
commotion and stuff.
And then, I get to the third floor
I saw Cameron, he looked all bug eyed and crazy
like he was really freaked out about something.
And, I saw he had a gun.
And, I'm like, "What the hell is going on?"
And then, I looked to Len and he has ammunition
strapped all around his body.
I just knew that something big was gonna happen.
So, I looked back to Cameron
to ask him what the hell is going on
and the window next to me just like explodes.
And, there's glass falling everywhere
and I'm running and I'm half being dragged by Cameron.
And then, I hear some more shots, but it's louder
than at the shooting range and I'm really scared.
Cameron's pulling me and I'm fighting him.
And, we're going down the stairs and I bang my knee
on the railing in the staircase and Cameron's
still pulling me.
Then, I hear Len scream something.
And, I wanna go back to help him because I feel like
someone's after him.
And Cameron is screaming something but
just too scared to think straight, I guess.
I don't know what he was saying.
Then, he pushed me into a closet
in the audio visual room.
All I remember after that is just sitting there
shaking and crying.
Oh yeah, I peed all over myself.
Then, I just waited.
Some SWAT guys came, they opened the door,
they took me out.
They had Cameron handcuffed, they handcuffed me
and that's it.
I didn't even know what else had happened
until they told me later that night.
- What do you think of all this, Carla?
If you had to sum this up, what would you say?
- I've thought about it, naturally.
And, the thing is that everybody is just looking
at what happened that day.
But, when you think about it what happened that day
is just the result of a bunch of other stuff.
I don't think things would have went down
the way they did if a bunch of other stuff
hadn't pushed Len to where he was.
I mean, I haven't seen anybody looking into the other stuff.
- Well, we are trying to get a complete picture.
Hey Carla, one last question.
On balance,
just you and me think you actually like Leonard?
- With Leonard I was part of something,
a little group.
Maybe that's better than actually liking someone.
- I don't see how that's possible.
If the group, like you say, if the group
is not functioning very well.
- Well, that's the difference.
Len understood it.
- What's that mean?
- Nothing.
- Would you have done anything differently.
- Not then, I guess.
But now, I guess I should find myself
a functioning group, huh?
- I think we can end out interview right there.
- Whatever.
- Hello? Yes.
Really, that's great.
You're sure it's Cameron Porter?
Great, this is great.
Yes, I do.
And this is his, his work or his home?
Okay, thank you so much. I really appreciate it.
Okay, you too. Bye.
- Mister Porter did you know there's a club on campus
right now called Order Sagite and from what
we can assess it has 30 to 40 members?
- Probably all the media.
Kids just probably wanna be a part of something.
- Is that what you wanted, to be a part of something?
- I guess so.
- So, why didn't you join the Boy Scouts?
- 'Cause it's lame.
- So, when you met on the morning of April 22nd
was that an organized meeting of the Order of the Arrow?
- We weren't even talking about that
when the incident happened.
- When you say incident are you referring
to the shootings? - Yeah.
- So, you refer to murder as an incident.
- Yep.
- You got along well with Len, didn't you?
- Yeah.
- Who was bigger? - I'm taller.
- Stronger? - Probably.
- Did you every wrestle or box?
- No, Len wasn't into anything physical so.
- What did he think of you?
- We got along.
- It's a little confusing for you to just get along
with somebody and then do the kinds of things
you and Len did together.
- He liked me.
I was straight up with him, he was straight up with me.
That was our relationship.
- And, you set yourselves apart from others.
- We were apart.
I don't think we set ourselves apart.
Even before I started hanging with Len I felt apart.
- You know that he broke into the clinic's offices
and stole Carla's records, is that right?
- After he told me.
- There's no way of knowing if you helped him or not.
- No, I didn't help him.
- So, Len wanted the records and he found a way
of getting them.
He abused prescription drugs, he found a way
of getting them.
Were you aware of the double prescription?
- Yeah.
- And, did you ever lie in your bed and think,
"Hey, you know what, my friend is doing something
"that could be dangerous to his health.
"Maybe I should tell somebody."
Did you ever think that?
- Honestly, no.
I knew he was doing things that were illegal
and I knew some of them were dangerous,
but I wasn't going to start ratting out.
- No matter how dangerous.
- I mean, if it was something really dangerous
I'm sure I would say something, but.
- So, if you were to find out that he was acquiring
automatic weapons what would you do?
- You know I didn't do anything.
- So, Len broke in and got Carla's records.
I read in your last interview that you
thought that was wrong.
Did you mean that?
- Yes, I did think that was wrong.
- What did you think of Carla?
- I liked her.
- Did you ever hit on her?
- Not like her like that, I mean I liked her as a friend.
- Look, both of you are young,
you're male she's female.
She's good looking. She's willing to hang out with you.
And, you're telling me you never thought you might
like to make out with her?
- I thought about it.
- Did you ever kiss her?
- Once. - Once?
- She was really down after the whole thing
happened with Len putting her information
out there in school.
And, I kissed her,
but I didn't push it
or anything like that.
- Did you feel her up?
- No, I didn't feel her up.
- Len's enemies list was never found.
Do you have an enemies list?
- No, I don't.
- You're just all sweetness and light, aren't you Cameron?
- Is this what you're going to do, you're going to
mess up everything I'm saying?
That's not what I was saying.
- No, what I'm trying to find out is who led who.
Did Len drag you to the shooting range
or did you use him so you could get to shoot?
Was he leading you or were you behind him
pushing him forward?
What do you think?
- I don't. We were friends.
I wasn't following him.
I don't think I was just following him
and I know I didn't push him to do anything
he didn't want to do, not really.
- Not really? Len didn't really hate anybody.
He just got very mad at people and claimed to hate them.
So, how do you explain his not really threatening
to shoot his teacher?
- He said he would, he said that a lot he said--
- Were you aware that there were a number
of other threats against people?
- But, there were a number of threats against us.
There were a ton of threats against Len
and he actually did.
He got beat up, smacked around all types of stuff,
and everybody knew it.
- And, you were pushed around, too.
How did you feel being pushed around, did you get mad?
- I wasn't mad, I was more disappointed
that I didn't do anything about it.
- And, when it came time to do something about
these incidents, Cameron?
- We talked about it.
We talked about doing something, but I mean
we went to the principal's office once.
- You're hesitating with your answers.
When I ask you a question I want an answer,
I don't want long pauses.
You've had enough time to consider these things.
- So what, I can't think about what I'm gonna say?
- You've been through this so many times
you already know the answers.
You gave interviews.
No, you didn't give interviews to the papers.
But, you did the interview with Doctor Ewings
and you had intense questioning by the police
right after the murder.
So, I believe that you've had sufficient time
to think these things through.
What happened when you spoke to the principal?
- He more or less said it was a part of
the growing up process that you gotta learn
how to deal with teenagers.
- Do you get an allowance Cameron?
- Yeah, I get $50 a week.
I get it from the ATM.
My parents have an account at First Savings for me.
- And, what do you have to do for this $50.
- Nothing much.
- Well, that will toughen you up, won't it?
- Yeah, whatever.
- Can you tell me how much is in the account altogether?
I don't need an exact figure, just an estimate.
- Why? - You don't ask me why.
You're not my equal, we already established that.
So, how much is in the account?
- $2,000 maybe 1,500 I don't know.
- Was there more or less before the incident?
- Maybe less.
- I read in an interview with Doctor Ewings
that your mom was gonna build a pool in the house.
Do you know how much that costs?
- No, I don't know how much that costs.
- I don't believe you, Cameron.
Your parents are money conscious people
and money conscious people talk prices.
- My parents work very hard for their money.
Okay, they weren't given anything, they didn't take
anything from the government.
And, they make more than most people.
They make more than you do.
Does that bother you?
- No, it doesn't.
I'm white, you're black does that bother you?
- Nah, that doesn't bother me at all.
- How much did the pool cost?
- I don't know.
I don't like hearing about that stuff so I really,
I don't know.
- Why didn't you like hearing about that stuff?
Okay, here we go again,
the long pauses.
When I ask you a question I want an answer.
You owe the community answers to these questions
and the best answers you can come up with.
So, tell me why didn't you like hearing about
what things cost?
- I guess I wanted to hear about something else.
That's all they ever talked about so I didn't
care much to hear about it.
- So you didn't like it.
- No, I didn't like it.
- Len bought two rifles, how much did they cost?
- I don't know, I wasn't with him. He didn't tell me.
- Uh-uh, you were with him when he bought one rifle,
the Israeli rifle, the Galil along with ammunition.
How much did you pay for it?
- More than $500.
- You got a good deal, who negotiated?
- Len did.
- And, what were you doing, washing teacups
in the kitchen?
- What's that supposed to mean?
- It means that you paint a very precious
picture of yourself, very precious and very careful.
Whose idea was it to get Carla to go to the gun range?
It's not usually a girl's activity unless
some guy's pushing her into it.
- I don't really remember, but probably Len.
It was his father's club.
- So, we have this little group of three people
you, Len, and Carla.
You hang out together, you shoot together,
you forgive one another's little transgressions.
But, according to you Len was the head of this group
even though you were stronger, by all accounts
had the most money, the best athlete.
How did Len come to be the leader?
- I didn't see him so much as a leader,
I just was comfortable with him.
I didn't have a lot of friends so
when I started hanging out with him it was easy
to keep doing that.
- You were involved in a church vandalizing incident.
Tell me about it.
- It wasn't against the church, or God,
or anything like that.
It was stupid. - And indecent.
- Yeah, but it wasn't sacrilegious.
We just put paint on the walls.
- So, besides painting the message "God doesn't
"live here anymore," and the sign you wrote about Jesus
you also painted the number 88 on the walls.
What does that mean?
- I don't know, I think Len just made up the number
to see what people thought about it.
- Except, you and I know that the number 88
stands for Heil Hitler, don't we,
don't we know that, Cameron?
- I know that now, I didn't know that then.
There's a lot of things that I know now
that I didn't know before.
- How much of this did you see coming?
- I really didn't think this would happen
I honestly didn't.
- I'm gonna be concentrating on the shootings
so why don't you just give me everything you can
leading up to it?
- Like a week before it happened?
- If you think that works.
- Well, me and Len were apart for a few days
because of Carla.
He had found information on her being molested
by her father.
Her parents were split up at the time
and her ma was working as a waitress
and she was living with.
Her father was an alcoholic in the trailer park
and I guess molested her.
Len found that information and scanned it
and put on the Circuit, which was like a
online magazine for our school.
And, I told him I thought that was really messed up
and so that's why we weren't talking,
that's why we stopped talking for a little bit.
He called me and said that he knew I was right and that he was sorry.
He was just really depressed.
He was down about everything.
He was, I mean, really down.
And, I felt bad because I got on him so much
about him getting on Carla and I thought maybe
I just made it too big of a deal, like blowing it
out of proportion.
And that maybe I should have just let it slide by.
I mean, that's what I was thinking about then
like I should have just let it be cool.
Friday, he called me again and he was back up, he was happy.
He said him and Carla were back together and that
they were gonna do this big thing and he wanted me
to be involved with it.
And, he said they were gonna write, "Stop the violence,"
in his blood.
- So you said no?
- Yeah, I said no but I don't know he blew up on me
and he was yelling about me being a Judas
and ranting on about stuff.
I didn't really even, I mean,
understand and I was just screwed up about
the whole thing because I had had Carla's back
this whole time and then
now they're back friends and now I'm the one
out of the group.
So, Saturday I just decided to kind of keep
my distance from Len as much as possible.
I wanted to kind of slide by, slide by until
I graduated, you know what I mean,
because I really wanted to graduate.
- You were a senior, had you been accepted
to any colleges.
- Yeah, I was accepted into the University
of Chicago and Indiana.
- So, you were just gonna lay low until graduation time?
- Something like that.
Then, I went home and Carla had left me a message
on my phone.
- Your phone? - Yeah, my phone.
- You have a separate phone from your family?
- Mm-hmm, so I called her back.
We just talked about things.
I brought up the fact that I didn't understand
why her and Len got back together.
And, she said that there was just too much
violence in the world and her being mad at him
was just a kind of mental violence.
I said, it makes sense for her to be mad at him.
She said, "No," she's like, "If you keep it inside
"that it always could come out at some point.
"It becomes a part of you."
I mean, she even brought up
that she said maybe we should make love
because there would be no violence if we made love.
- Oh. - After I spoke
to Carla I called Len and I told him I was in.
He told me to meet him at the school library
and to bring red paint.
I told him I didn't have any red paint.
He said black would do.
So, that's all I was really supposed to do.
I figured because he was talking about using red paint
that he kind of backed off the whole idea
of using his own blood, which I felt like
it couldn't be that serious.
So then, Monday came around and I got to school
around 20 minutes before eight.
- How did you get in?
Wasn't the school locked at that time
except for the teacher's entrance?
- No, you can always go through the basement.
It's always unlocked.
I mean, if no one's there you can go through
the storm doors right by the generator
then you can go up the stairwell.
So, that's what I did.
I went through that way and I went up the stairwell.
I mean, I was so nervous that I even came up
with an excuse that I was just there painting something.
I had gotten dark blue paint and a paint brush
from the garage.
- From your family's garage?
- Yeah, when I got to the library Len was
looking out the window and he had a duffle bag on the floor.
I walked up I said, "hey."
He told me that he was gonna start painting
all the walls
and that he wanted to know if I wanted
to cut him to start the bleeding.
I mean, I said no, you know.
He reached in the duffle bag and pulled out a Kalashnikov.
And, I asked him what it was for.
He said it was to hold off people while he painted the wall.
He pointed it at me a cocked it.
I was so scared that I couldn't move.
I wanted to run, but I thought he was actually
going to shoot me.
Then, all of a sudden he just started laughing
out of the side of his mouth like he does sometimes.
And he points the gun down and he said Carla
should be here soon, that I should get started
on the painting in the hallway.
He told me get one of the guns and go start painting.
- How many guns were in the duffle bag?
- There was only one gun that I saw.
It was an AR-18.
There was clothes in the bags and a lot of ammunition
and that was it.
- And, what did you do when he told you to take the gun?
- I mean, I said okay.
I just wanted to get out of there because
I needed to think.
I didn't know what was going on.
So, I took the gun and I took the paint
and I took the paintbrush and I went outside
and I started painting on the opposite wall
of the library.
I painted, "Stop the Violence."
I mean, I was so scared my hand was shaking
the whole time.
I turned around and I saw Leonard cut his wrist
and he was over at the media board writing,
"Stop the Violence."
And, "Amos 8:3."
- Did you know what that meant at the time?
- I had no idea what it meant.
I even tried to read it backwards and I didn't know
it was something that was in the Bible at the time.
- Okay, and then what happened?
- I decided I need to get out of there.
I was freaking out.
So, I started heading toward the Physics lab
because there's an exit over there.
As I was getting over there Carla was just getting there.
So, I tried to grab her and tell her we had
to get out of there.
By that time she wondered why I had a gun in my hand.
And, by that time Len was already yelling.
And so, I tried to pull her and she pulled away
because she didn't know what was going on.
And then, he shot and he blasted this whole glass
all over the floor and she started yelling.
And so, we both started running the stairwell.
He's shooting and I'm trying to yell and tell her
that he's got a gun and he's cut himself.
But, I couldn't really get anything.
I don't know if I was making any sense or what.
I got down there and I saw a fire alarm.
So, I broke the fire alarm and then all of a sudden
it was just all noise.
The whole world was just loud noise.
And, I found this broom closet and I threw her in there.
I just told her to stay there, don't move,
just stay there and wait, just stay there and wait,
don't say anything.
By that time Len had gotten to the second floor,
come down the stairwell.
I shot at the wall beside him and he ducked
back into the stairwell.
- How far away was he from you at that time?
- It's a long hallway. I don't know, it was a long hallway.
He was over there blood on his shirt,
blood on his arm just yelling.
I didn't want to get closer because I didn't know
if I had to, I didn't know if I had to
if I could actually shoot him, you know?
So, I ran and I hid in the classroom.
When I got in there I realized it was a bad idea
because he could just walk in at anytime.
I mean, I was hiding behind a desk, but it was
it wasn't a solid desk or anything like that.
He could see me if he came in.
So, I just sat behind and I pointed the gun
at the door.
I started hearing shouting and yelling.
And, I looked out the window and kids were running
and hiding behind buses.
I saw two kids on the floor one was moving
and one wasn't.
I mean, I didn't know what to do.
I heard gun shots.
I knew it was Len, but I didn't know
where it was coming from.
I mean, I didn't know anything.
I didn't know if Carla was okay.
I was too scared to move so I just kind of
stayed there and waited.
Then, I heard sirens.
It was a SWAT team.
They were coming in and at the point
I decided to put the gun down 'cause I didn't
want the gun to be in my hands anymore.
When they got into the school I started yelling for them.
When they got to the classroom they told me to
stand up and put my hands up.
They pointed the rifle at me and told me to stand up
and I put my hands up and that was the end of it.
- Except that it wasn't over.
One student had been killed on the spot.
A number of students had been wounded.
And, a lot of kids who are gonna have this
buried deep in their minds for a long,
long time. - I know.
- Leonard's body was found under one of
the "Stop the Violence" signs.
You know that, don't you?
- Yeah, I know that.
- But Carla didn't see him bring the rifle into
the school, did she?
And, she didn't see who was shooting from the window.
So, that's just up to you to report, right?
- It's the truth.
- Well, I believe that
it is the truth, Cameron.
But, it's a hard truth.
It's a tragic truth.
And, it's one we're all going to have to live with
for a long, long time.
- I know.
- One last thing, after that morning did you
ever try to contact the parents of the boy who was killed?
- I couldn't face them.
- I can understand that.
Do you consider yourself a threat to society?
- No, I don't.
- Did you consider yourself a threat to society
when you woke up that morning of April 22nd?
- No, I didn't.
- And, what have you been doing since then?
- Going to school, working at the mall.
I plan on going away to school in the Fall.
- That's in a good life.
- I don't see it that way.
- The reason for these interviews is to try to find ways
of avoidiing future occurrences of this type.
We don't wanna find any more young people lying dead
between school buses.
How would you go about preventing it from happening?
- I don't even know how it happened.
So, I don't know how to prevent it.
What I do know is I do wish I could take it back.
That's the truth, whether you believe it or not.
- What I believe is that you do wish you could
take back the events that happened on that April morning.
But, I'm not sure that you want to take back
the events that led up to that morning.
And, I'm not even sure you would recognize them
if they came up again.
Thank you for your time.
- Hi Cameron.
- Wow, how you doing?
- I'm well. You look pretty good.
- How'd you find me?
- You know, classmates.com.
- I'm sorry, come in.
Actually, the truth is I work for LA Times magazine now.
So, I can find whoever I want.
- Do you want some water?
- That'd be great, thanks.
- You don't mind tap, right?
Here, sit down.
So, you're a writer, so that's why you're here.
- No, that's not why I'm here.
I just wanted to thank you.
- For what?
- You saved my life.
- Well, you're welcome.
So, what happened, where'd you go?
- Well, my parents
they moved us out of town basically the minute
that I was released by the police.
I was so pissed off.
Trust me, I really wanted to see you.
I just, felt so guilty.
- I think everybody was pissed off.
So what, you came back for the 10th anniversary?
Where are the killers now article, is that the angle?
- Yeah, pretty much, you nailed it.
- You want to interview me?
- I just wanna see how you're doing.
- I work at the Indian casino. I'm the IT guy.
It's not anything great, but it's okay.
- Married?
- No, never. You?
- Let's not go there.
My love life has been as series of disasters.
- Divorced? Are you divorced?
- Yeah.
Anyway, I was given access to all the tapes
of the interviews that we did.
And, I watch all of them.
But, there's one video that I haven't seen yet.
I was wondering if you would watch it with me.
- What is it?
- It's Len's home videos.
- And, you saw all the videos, you saw everything?
- Yeah, all of 'em. Yours and mine.
It really took me back to that time.
This has really been haunting me.
Does it haunt you like it haunts me?
- I think about it day to day.
Sure I got my job, I got my place, I got my friends.
I'm okay. - Right.
Do you see your parents?
- Not at all, you know that.
You know me and my parents.
- So, will you watch this video with me?
- Yeah, I'll watch it with you.
- What's that a camera, a camcorder?
- Yeah. - Why'd you bring it?
- I don't know, I just wanted to.
♪ Win if you wanna
♪ And when that marijuana ganja got me ♪
♪ You a goner
♪ I'm a product of my environment ♪
♪ Part of that Primadonna
♪ With a pocket full of nada
♪ So, I'm hot to my chop
♪ Till I'm dropping
♪ With these dudes that I run with ♪
♪ That'd do the same if I asked them ♪
♪ Run up on the dude
♪ For his loose change and blast 'em ♪
♪ Ask me if I give a fuck
♪ I think of while I'm living
♪ I might as well live it up
♪ Funny thing about it is
♪ That I ain't never written raps ♪
♪ I read 'em off a screen
♪ In my frontal lobe
♪ Number below the draw
♪ And a bowl or a blunt to roll ♪
♪ Let the pool of collective thought ♪
♪ Develop--
♪ Down in the cold, dirty planter ♪
♪ Can I climb down
- No problem.
- What's up man?
- So dude, nothing just-- - Recording.
- Yeah, just messing around.
♪ Look at me, look at me, look at me ♪
♪ I'm standing on the wall
♪ Look at me, look at me, look at me ♪
♪ I pass before your eyes
♪ I'm feeling I can do it all
♪ Rise up and stand before the fall ♪
♪ One heart to pump it
♪ Through your veins
♪ One mind to guide it
♪ Through the range
♪ Range ♪ I'm changing
♪ Right before your eyes
♪ I put it up
♪ Towards the sky
♪ Before your eyes
♪ Let me in, let me in, let me in ♪
♪ To seep into your skin
♪ Let me in, let me in
♪ To seep into your skin
♪ Let me in, let me in, let me in ♪
♪ And start it to again
♪ So you were sleeping in the breeze ♪
♪ We've got the universe again
♪ One voice to
- All he could say was I should fit in here
and make an effort and be with the masses.
- Tell me why you wanna stay here
just so you can get that again.
- He asked me if I dreamt about sex again.
He was so fucking casual about it, too.
You should have heard this guy.
- What'd you say?
- I told him that I wanted to fuck Carla.
- You didn't say you wanted to do that.
- No, you're right, I didn't.
I told him that I wanted to make it with penguins.
- You make it with penguins.
- I was like, yeah, I'll fuck 'em, whatever.
Fuck 'em in their black and white bodies.
- Carla, just dance a little bit.
Hey, you're on camera.
That's it? - Yep, you bet.
- School of fish.
Hi fish, swimming around, swimming around.
Little gold ones, 1.59,
Swimming around, 8.99. Woo, too much.
Rats, white ones,
brown ones, white ones.
Too fast.
- Carla?
The rats titter and squeak.
- He was the only friend I had.
You were a friend of mine too, but
it was different.
I want you to know that it was different.
I wish
I wish I could say that I didn't see it coming.
- Can I ask you a couple questions?
Can you tell me your name and your involvement
in the Madison High School Shooting of 1999?
- My name is Cameron Porter.
I was best friends with the shooter.
♪ Sun's been beating at my back so long ♪
♪ And I don't know know that I can take it anymore ♪
♪ Wind is in my face and makes me blind ♪
♪ God is knocking at my door
♪ See me now
♪ All I need is someone to show me how ♪
♪ See me now
♪ All I need is someone to show me how ♪
♪ See me now
♪ All I need is someone to show me how ♪
♪ See me now
♪ All I need is someone to show me how ♪
♪ Time is ticking but that mean much ♪
♪ 'Cause I don't move much anymore ♪
♪ The clock is melting as the days go by ♪
♪ Maybe hope's the only cure
♪ See me now
♪ All I need is someone to show me how ♪
♪ See me now
♪ All I need is someone to show me how ♪
♪ There's no time for blinking
♪ There's far too much to see
♪ I can't control my thinking
♪ And I don't know who to be
♪ I feel as if my footsteps
♪ Are following the beat
♪ And horse and truth is the illusive ♪
♪ Carriage eating just before us ♪
♪ Compelled some how to chase it down rabbit ♪
♪ Hold it, have it, own it
♪ I buy into my methods and see ♪
♪ If I can mold it
♪ Into something I could ball up ♪
♪ And keep safe
♪ See if I was ever strong enough ♪
♪ To keep faith
♪ See me now
♪ All I need is someone to show me how ♪
♪ See me now
♪ All I need is someone to show me how♪