Adam’s Suicide: Why the Glock and not the Bushmaster?

Hello all! Been a long time viewer but just now decided to finally create an account and become more involved with the forum.

I was wondering if anyone had any ideas as to why Adam opted to use the Glock 10mm instead of the AR15 for his suicide. Despite not maintaining his weapons very well, which ultimately caused the myriad of weapon malfunctions he encountered on the day of the shooting, Adam was relatively well-versed with firearms. Surely he would’ve known that a .223/5.56 bullet out of a 16 inch barrel would produce nearly three times the energy of a 10mm bullet out of a 4.6 inch barrel. Although the 16 inch barrel may be more awkward to deal with when aiming at ones own head, it’s definitely possible especially if he placed the gun in his mouth. Not to mention, there are photos of Adam kneeled down aiming his Saiga shotgun at his head rather effortlessly, which has a 18 inch barrel.

Adam ensuring that he successfully committed suicide that day was just as important as committing mass murder. Although taking a 10mm bullet to the brain is definitely nothing to sneeze at, choosing to use the Glock lowered his chances of a successful suicide significantly.

Curious to hear others’ thoughts!

I think it largely comes down to the length of the weapon, being a long rifle, the bushmaster would’ve been awkward to aim at one’s own head/chin. On top of that, the bushmaster was experiencing frequent malfunctions, namely failure to enter battery, making it effectively useless until cleared (which is why Adam cleared four unfired rounds in the hallway beyond room 8 and then fired 15 rounds randomly out of the window in room 10 before discarding the rifle) The Glock was the obvious choice as it was quick to deploy and easy to aim at his own head, don’t forget that it was a Glock 20 SF in 10mm which is a fairly powerful cartridge (just look at the images of Adam’s brain matter spattered on the whiteboard of room 10 and you have your demonstration of the power of the round)

Also, just look at the recent images of Adam pointing weapons at his head. There are images of him with a handgun and again with the Saiga but interestingly not the bushmaster suggesting he didn’t even consider it a ‘true’ option... I agree a 5.56 rifle round would be a far more certain way out for Adam, but I think it came down to practicality and ease of access... Something Adam was acutely aware of as he didn’t opt to bring the Saiga into the school suggesting he was making split-second decisions on the fly and wasn’t willing to risk burdening himself with a second long gun...

Just my thoughts!

N/A

Ynoocs wrote:

Although taking a 10mm bullet to the brain is definitely nothing to sneeze at, choosing to use the Glock lowered his chances of a successful suicide significantly.

"significantly"? Doubtful. Studies show that the vast majority (over 90%) of deliberately self-inflicted gunshot wounds are fatal. Pekka shows that a person can kill themselves with a caliber as weak as .22, granted he was bleeding out for hours before he died, but the point still stands. Most failed gunshot suicides are usually due to terrible shot placement, i.e. they don't aim directly for the brain and end up either destroying their entire face or having the bullet exit out the back of their mouth. If you've ever seen videos or pictures of failed gunshot suicides it's very gory stuff.

QuestionMark wrote:

"significantly"? Doubtful. Studies show that the vast majority (over 90%) of deliberately self-inflicted gunshot wounds are fatal.

Significantly wasn't the right word perhaps. I'm aware that that the vast majority of suicides by firearm are fatal and 10mm auto is a pretty serious cartridge. I guess I find it strange that Adam, who was very particular about his selection of an elementary school for a shooting in order to minimize chances of him being overpowered and therefore not "succeeding", and who was also particular about choosing devastating soft point ammunition for his Bushmaster to maximize victim deaths/casualties, would then choose to commit suicide with a cartridge that is less powerful than what he had at his fingertips. It's also worth noting that Adam had a tendency to overkill his victims, shooting some up to 13 times. Why did he not adopt that same mentality of overkill with his own suicide by opting to select the more powerful bullet?

I almost view it like a bank robber who, upon hearing police officers imminently closing in on him, chooses to run with a bag of cash containing $100,000 instead of the bag with $1,000,000. Perhaps that's ridiculous, but it's just how I'm seeing it.

Ynoocs wrote:

QuestionMark wrote:

"significantly"? Doubtful. Studies show that the vast majority (over 90%) of deliberately self-inflicted gunshot wounds are fatal.

Significantly wasn't the right word perhaps. I'm aware that that the vast majority of suicides by firearm are fatal and 10mm auto is a pretty serious cartridge. I guess I find it strange that Adam, who was very particular about his selection of an elementary school for a shooting in order to minimize chances of him being overpowered and therefore not "succeeding", and who was also particular about choosing devastating soft point ammunition for his Bushmaster to maximize victim deaths/casualties, would then choose to commit suicide with a cartridge that is less powerful than what he had at his fingertips. It's also worth noting that Adam had a tendency to overkill his victims, shooting some up to 13 times. Why did he not adopt that same mentality of overkill with his own suicide by opting to select the more powerful bullet?

I almost view it like a bank robber who, upon hearing police officers imminently closing in on him, chooses to run with a bag of cash containing $100,000 instead of the bag with $1,000,000. Perhaps that's ridiculous, but it's just how I'm seeing it.

All fair points, though I'd say for the bank robbery analogy, the difference would be closer, like that between a million and eight hundred thousand, than one hundred thousand.

If I had to guess as to why he chose the pistol, I imagine it was a split-second decision to make it as quick as possible. With the rifle he has to get on his knees, aim carefully, and then pull the trigger, and as people up above noted, hope that the gun doesn't jam. Meanwhile the handgun is as easy as pointing and shooting.

Maybe he just panicked as he realised that the Police are about to enter the School. So he choose to take the pistol( wich he wore at his body) over the Rifle. If i recall it correctly he discarded his Rifle a few meters away from the Position where he shot himself,so maybe( just a thought) this happened: He fired a few shots towards incoming Police trough the Window,realised that they are about to rush inside the school and drops the Rifle( im not sure but wasn't it reported that his AR-15 style Rifle jammed?) so maybe he grabbed the Pistol, moved towards the location where he ended up,tried to load(i know little about guns,so i dont know why he ejected a few rounds from his Pistol,maybe jamming?) and immediatly shot himself. Correct .e if im wrong.

His Bushmaster already had jammed so there was no point of him running back to it and grabbing it when he has his Glock 10mm with him, and plus he was deciding to kill himself by the Glock 10mm since he didn't want to suffer and choke on his own blood like Dylan Klebold did with his 9mm Tec-9.

He shot the back of his neck as too sever the brain stem

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9mmtomyhead wrote:

His Bushmaster already had jammed so there was no point of him running back to it and grabbing it when he has his Glock 10mm with him, and plus he was deciding to kill himself by the Glock 10mm since he didn't want to suffer and choke on his own blood like Dylan Klebold did with his 9mm Tec-9.

I thought the Bushmaster had already jammed several times and he had been able to clear the jams. He also fired one test shot from the Glock before his suicide, this time the Glock jammed so he still had to clear a jam unless he used the P226 he had with him.

fast200 wrote:

9mmtomyhead wrote:

His Bushmaster already had jammed so there was no point of him running back to it and grabbing it when he has his Glock 10mm with him, and plus he was deciding to kill himself by the Glock 10mm since he didn't want to suffer and choke on his own blood like Dylan Klebold did with his 9mm Tec-9.

I thought the Bushmaster had already jammed several times and he had been able to clear the jams. He also fired one test shot from the Glock before his suicide, this time the Glock jammed so he still had to clear a jam unless he used the P226 he had with him.

If he wanted to kill himself with his rifle then why bring the pistols? And it would have been awkward for him to place the rifle under wherever he wants to put it to end himself. I assume that he just panicked and knew Glock 10mm would be the best.

9mmtomyhead wrote:

fast200 wrote:

9mmtomyhead wrote:

His Bushmaster already had jammed so there was no point of him running back to it and grabbing it when he has his Glock 10mm with him, and plus he was deciding to kill himself by the Glock 10mm since he didn't want to suffer and choke on his own blood like Dylan Klebold did with his 9mm Tec-9.

I thought the Bushmaster had already jammed several times and he had been able to clear the jams. He also fired one test shot from the Glock before his suicide, this time the Glock jammed so he still had to clear a jam unless he used the P226 he had with him.

If he wanted to kill himself with his rifle then why bring the pistols? And it would have been awkward for him to place the rifle under wherever he wants to put it to end himself. I assume that he just panicked and knew Glock 10mm would be the best.

Yeah, I don't think he wanted to use the rifle for his suicide. I just wanted to clarify that he didn't use the Glock just because the Bushmaster had jammed.

I looked at the police photo his Bushmaster, the barrel on that rifle is corroded, due to lack of maintenance improper storage and that's most likely why he had issues.
As for why he used the Glock, he had issues with his main rifle so he just used his sidearm

I think it was more a matter of speed and efficiency. We all know that adam was eager to end his life and possibly didn't want to risk coming out alive , that might also explain why he shot about 15 rounds into the windows of room 10 to possibly scare the cops into taking cover giving him a little bit more time .The amount of time it would take to get a 16 inch barrel into the right place and angle takes longer than it should therefore the glock being the only fast paced gun that could do significant damage to end his life in such little time

This has to be one of the stupidest fucking questions ever bruh, he chose the Glock because he could just quickly unholster it and blow his brains out rather than get into a really specific position in order to kill himself because rifles are long as fuck. 10mm is more than enuff anyways. Hell, even 9mm is more than enough.

vril wrote:

This has to be one of the stupidest fucking questions ever bruh, he chose the Glock because he could just quickly unholster it and blow his brains out rather than get into a really specific position in order to kill himself because rifles are long as fuck. 10mm is more than enuff anyways. Hell, even 9mm is more than enough.

What’s with the hostility you clown? People survive pistol suicide attempts many more times over than those attempted by rifle. Pistols only generate permanent cavities from wounding, whereas rifles generate both permanent and temporary cavities. I just find it odd that he chose the less powerful weapon to attempt suicide with when it’s well established that successfully committing suicide was his primary goal that day. And whether or not he used a long gun or not clearly had little if nothing to do with his decision on ideal suicide weapon as the photos of him posing with the Saiga shotgun, a weapon even LONGER than the AR15, completely exemplifies that.

Ynoocs wrote:

vril wrote:

This has to be one of the stupidest fucking questions ever bruh, he chose the Glock because he could just quickly unholster it and blow his brains out rather than get into a really specific position in order to kill himself because rifles are long as fuck. 10mm is more than enuff anyways. Hell, even 9mm is more than enough.

What’s with the hostility you clown? People survive pistol suicide attempts many more times over than those attempted by rifle. Pistols only generate permanent cavities from wounding, whereas rifles generate both permanent and temporary cavities. I just find it odd that he chose the less powerful weapon to attempt suicide with when it’s well established that successfully committing suicide was his primary goal that day. And whether or not he used a long gun or not clearly had little if nothing to do with his decision on ideal suicide weapon as the photos of him posing with the Saiga shotgun, a weapon even LONGER than the AR15, completely exemplifies that.

Sorry for the hostility, I just like being mean online because it's funny.

The 10mm loads Adam had were more powerful than average .357 magnum loads. People usually fail suicide with handguns due to poor positioning (i.e. shooting yourself under the chin and completely missing your brain as the gun isn't angled correctly), something Adam knew how to avoid. Permanent and temporary cavities don't matter at point blank, it's pretty obvious he was only contemplating using the Saiga but later abandoned the idea as he had obtained 2 handguns (Saiga pic was taken before Nancy purchased the Glock and Sig, the handgun he posed with was some .45 Nancy owned but sold at some point). Once Adam obtained a handgun capable of firing rounds with 750 ft pounds of muzzle energy (your average .357 magnum load is 550 ft lbs, 9mm is around 350 ft lbs, .223 is around 1200 ft lbs) he realized that it was all he needed for suicide. Adam was paranoid about surviving a gunshot wound, but not paranoid enough to use a rifle caliber for suicide. The 10mm is the bare minimum autoloading handgun caliber for hunting large game, which Adam definitely knew. You've got to remember that usually when people commit suicide with a handgun it's spur of the moment or hastily planned and they usually just use whatever rounds are already loaded in the gun or whatever's cheapest at the gun store. In contrast, there are many mass shooters who have committed suicide with handguns ranging from .22 up to 9mm and every one of them died. Adam knew that a big bore handgun round straight to the brain stem was a guaranteed fatality (which it is) and that his shotgun or rifle was overkill. I'm convinced the only reason he brought his shotgun was for breaching given he only had 2 mags of 20 rounds plus one suicide round (which he had for every gun because he was over-prepared) but abandoned it last minute as he realized it'd be too cumbersome to carry around and it'd take too much time to switch to it whenever he wanted to blast open a door.

By that stage, the Bushmaster probably jammed. It had jammed several times before because (((freedom group))) but I think Adam was trying to clear another jam when the cops arrived, so he dropped the thing and used the Glock instead.

Adam Lanza's suicide is the least interesting thing about him.

  

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