Thursday, December 6, 2007

ROBERT HAWKINS: OMAHA WESTROADS MALL GUNMAN ONLY 19 YEARS OLD

ROBERT HAWKINS

Mall gunman made call about suicide note
By OSKAR GARCIAASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
DECEMBER 6, 2007

OMAHA, Neb. -- Less than an hour before he killed eight people and himself in a mall shooting spree, a troubled teenage gunman called the woman who had taken him in to tell her about a suicide note - but she said Thursday she never thought he would hurt anyone but himself.

Debora Maruca-Kovac told CBS's "The Early Show" she found the note after Robert A. Hawkins, 19, called to thank her and her family for their help, to express his love, and to tell her he had left the note behind.

"He had said how much he loved his family and all his friends and how he was sorry he was a burden to everybody and his whole life he was a piece of (expletive) and now he'll be famous," she said, describing the note. "I was fearful that he was going to try to commit suicide but I had no idea that he would involve so many other families."

(snip)

Hawkins moved from his family's home about a year ago. Maruca-Kovac and her husband, whose sons were friends with Hawkins, welcomed him into their home and tried to help him.

"When he first came in the house, he was introverted, a troubled young man who was like a lost pound puppy that nobody wanted," Maruca-Kovac told The Associated Press.

READ MORE ABOUT THIS TRAGIC MALL SHOOTING...

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