Before Glenn Litton shot two schoolchildren, destroying a happy meal corner at Feather River Adventist School in Northern California, he sent a text.
The statement, sent to far companions, included Litton’s statement in which he declared himself tasked with carrying out” child killings” as part of an international team that Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea and the FBI have said is minimal. After his Dec. 4 firing at the religious class, during which Litton likewise shot and killed himself, he also planned an contact with the same statement, according to Honea.
” It was a criminal attack”, Honea said in an interview. ” It was a tragic murder”.
The Sheriff’s Office made the arrest of a man on Tuesday on suspicion of selling Litton, the weapon that seriously injured the two kids, ages 5 and 6, in the county.
Law enforcement has captured the fullest image of the shooting, along with a recent interview at the Sheriff’s Office office, as well as of its immediate aftermath and the years before it.
A class targeted, or more than one?
After Elias Wolford, 5, and Roman Mendez, 6, both suffered critical scars in the killing, terror seized the tightly knit spiritual Christian community. One of the many schools connected to Butte County’s Christian churches is Feather River Adventist School, which is just one.
Under the guise of enrolling his nil nephew, Litton, who went by the name Michael Sanders, had scheduled an appointment with the director of Feather River Adventist School.
Honea claimed the gunman had used a ruse before.
The deputy confirmed that Litton even attended an Christian school in Chico in June despite the fact that she was attempting to enroll a child. By organizing a similar meeting the day after the Feather River Adventist school was attacked, Litton even planned an attack on another Christian school in Red Bluff, which is located about 70 kilometers west of Oroville.
Litton asked issues that appeared to indicate that he was monitoring the university across three of the three schools he visited, according to Honea.
The sheriff questioned whether Litton had a selfish character, as evidenced by his self-appointment as a military leader in the fictional nation.
‘ A great heart,’ but a stressed history
According to Honea, Litton’s cognitive health appeared to be a significant factor in his determination to flame at Feather River Adventist.
Litton declared himself a colonel in the so-called International Alliance in the statement he sent to his friends, and the organization is tasked with carrying out” deterrent in necessary answer to America’s engagement with Genocide and Oppression of Palestinians along with attacks against Yemen.”
At a Dec. 5 news conference, Honea said,” It appears he pulled information from various options and it all came up in his mind to form a truth that may be fake or different from ours.
In a recent interview, Honea and deputies revealed that Litton had scheduled the letters and had sent the mailed words, the material of which Honea initially shared at the news conference without revealing the precise method used.
Honea continued, noting that he had to look up what treatment Litton had for his mental health issues after the shooting.
According to court documents, the 56-year-old has a legal history that dates back to when she was 16 and underwent outpatient mental health care as a teenager until she was adult. According to Butte County District Attorney Mike Ramsey, Litton was accused of theft and transportation infractions as a teenager. As an adult, he served time in prison as an adult for fraud and embezzlement, in one Butte County situation, Litton stole IDs for food, book and enjoyment.
His older sister, who claims he had tried to help him with his substance abuse issues before being detained by national regulators in 2015 for aggravated identity theft, claimed she tried unsuccessfully.
But he was always denied the company because of a “mental wellness diagnosis”, according to a letter written by Litton’s girl.
In a letter to a prosecutor for a national situation her brother faced, Litton’s girl wrote,” Glenn has a great soul but has always struggled with an addiction that has negatively impacted his selections.”
The girl did not respond to a post request.
Shooter bought a convicted murderer’s personality, he says
Federal officials tracked down Litton after he applied for passports twice in 2014 and 2015 under two different names.
In the first instance, Litton applied for a card in Sacramento under the name Michael Anthony Nolen, a gentleman who Litton claimed lived in Tennessee and was born in 1972, according to the indictment. ( Litton was born in Chico in 1968.)
In 2015, he filed an app in Carson City, Nevada, under the name Arthur Gene Lane, a person convicted of murder in Sacramento County. In 2001, Lane video-taped himself, wrapping a noose around his wife’s chest, and placing a seat under her.
According to court documents, Lane informed authorities that he had sold his personal information to Litton for$ 800. Litton filed the passport application using a Nevada pilot’s license, Social Security number, test and a Visa debit card in Lane’s title.
While awaiting his sentence, Litton enrolled in mental health services, judge documents say. Siddhartha” Sid” Patel, the particular broker in charge of the FBI Sacramento area department, said that he admitted to a charge of aggravated identity theft in California and Nevada.
Litton received a two-year prison sentence and was released in 2018 after receiving controlled transfer. The program, according to Litton’s girl, was to engage in a truck driving class after his release.
In the email, Litton’s sister wrote,” I can tell you Glenn knows his wrongdoing and often discusses how he plans to change his behavior in the future.”
After his captivity transfer, prison wasn’t far behind for Litton. He stole$ 1, 000 from a CVS in Arizona, officials said. He was detained in South San Francisco in connection with an unrelated case, and he was later transferred to San Bernardino County to await a crime cost.
According to court documents, Litton was freed from prison in San Bernardino following a Humphrey reading to find out whether an criminal has sufficient funds to publish loan.
” Everything else stopped,” he declared.
It was at 1: 08 p. m. Dec. 4 that a student called 911 to relay that a shooter had opened fire on Feather River Adventist, a small school on a 7-acre lot surrounded by lush orchards and lumbering cows.
Within two minutes, the California Highway Patrol arrived on the scene, with deputies close by.
In interviews, Butte County Sheriff’s Office Lt. Pat McNelis described how nearly everyone in the department – 83 deputies – jumped on investigating the case. Deputies handled the local investigation, tracing Litton’s movements, while the FBI intervened to reach global contacts as the specter of international terrorism hung over the incident, Honea said.
” Everything else stopped”, McNelis said. A fatal vehicle collision, in which a juvenile was arrested, diverted some deputies Dec. 9, though little else pulled resources away from the Feather River Adventist investigation.
Within 26 hours of the shooting, top Butte County Sheriff’s Office and FBI leaders compiled a full timeline of Litton’s movements leading up to the school shooting, as well as his extensive criminal history.
Deputies described the round-the-clock police work nearly the entire department did following the Dec. 4 shooting in an effort to piece together Litton’s life and provide answers for the public.
According to McNelis, deputies first contacted Litton’s sister after she had requested that he travel by Sacramento Greyhound to Chico for two nights.
Deputies fanned out across Chico and surrounding areas, pouring through countless hours of surveillance footage and cellphone records to piece together, step by step, Litton’s tracks.
Litton stayed at two different inns in Chico over eight days, reflecting his nomadic lifestyle, deputies said.
On Dec. 3 — one day before the shooting — Litton went to a Chico computer repair store and paid$ 20 in an attempt to have his device destroyed, McNelis said. The FBI assisted in putting that computer back together after it was recovered, he claimed.
That night, Litton stayed overnight at a Denny’s near Motel 6 carrying a distinctive duffel bag, until about 4: 08 a. m., according to surveillance video.
According to McNelis, deputies discovered him while he was catching a Butte Regional Transit bus at the West Second and Salem Street stops, and they also were aware from an earlier investigation that the company had surveillance cameras they could use to comb through.
While on the bus, they picked up his phone records, and saw he headed to Raley’s in Oroville. He walked off, carrying the duffel bag, and strolled along Montgomery and Myers streets, McNelis said.
He called an Uber, which went to the Feather River Adventist School, and he purchased an energy drink at Raley’s under the name Mark Hansen.
Deputies compiled a detailed analysis of Litton’s movements and criminal history in the wake of the shooting and, according to Honea, through good old-fashioned police work and investigative tools from the digital era.
Honea’s three decades of service to local law enforcement did not lead to anything comparable.
When it comes to deputies working without sleep, Honea said,” I had to make them go home.”
Deputies said in the interview that the depth of the information provided to residents was derived from a desire to assist a grieving community in finding solutions and holding accountable those responsible for the region’s fear.
After the 5-year-old couldn’t move his legs immediately following the shooting, Elias ‘ grandmother reported online on Wednesday that he had regained some movement in his legs. This was encouraging news. Roman’s family, in an update to a crowdfunding website, said the 6-year-old was released from UC Davis Medical Center on Dec. 20 and is “doing amazing”.
Even so, the school will never be the same.
According to Laurie Trujillo, a spokesperson for the Feather River Adventist School and the Northern California Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, teachers must deal with the effects of trauma that manifest in various ways, which necessitate constant attention and adaptability.
After Litton concluded the meeting with Feather River Adventist’s principal, he headed down a breezeway. He opened fire on Roman and Elias against the backdrop of a flower mural that was displayed on a playground wall. Then, he turned the gun on himself.
” If that is not an attack of domestic terrorism, I am not sure what is”, Honea said.
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