Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Interview transcript with shooter's former roommates
Editor's note: The transcript below is from an interview conducted by CNN reporter Gary Tuchman with two former roommates of gunman Cho Seung-Hui. The interview ran Tuesday night on CNN's "Anderson Cooper 360." CNN said the roommates agreed to the interview on the condition their last names were not used.
TUCHMAN: So you guys go to Virginia Tech. Were you roommates for a time?
JOHN: Freshman year we lived in the same hall in Pritchard. And then last year we requested to move from Pritchard to Cochran and live in the same suite.
TUCHMAN: So you were suite mates?
JOHN: Yes.
TUCHMAN: And you were suite mates at what time?
JOHN: Fall of '05 to spring of '06.
TUCHMAN: Fall of '05 to spring of '06 so that was last school
year?
JOHN: Yes.
TUCHMAN: Did you guys like being suite mates?
JOHN: Yes.
TUCHMAN: So you get along.
ANDY: Yes. We hang out all the time.
TUCHMAN: That's good. How many guys were in your suite, Andy.
ANDY: There were eight of us in there, four rooms.
TUCHMAN: Four rooms. So four, two guys to each room.
ANDY: Yes.
TUCHMAN: And one of your suite mates was ...
ANDY: Seung.
TUCHMAN: Seung. And who was his roommate?
ANDY: It was John.
TUCHMAN: OK. Now, John, you shared a small room with Seung?
JOHN: Yes.
TUCHMAN: OK, I'm going to call him Cho for purposes of this conversation. But you shared a small room with him. What kind of roommate was he?
JOHN: He was pretty quiet. Really clean. Not one you could complain
about really, to start off with.
TUCHMAN: When you first moved in, you saw this guy, friendly
enough, right? Quiet. Everyone wants a quiet roommate, right?
JOHN: Yes. I mean, he wasn't friendly by any means. He was just
quiet.
TUCHMAN: Was he mean?
JOHN: No. Sometimes I guess he was rude by the way you would try to
get a conversation with him. And you didn't get any feedback from him. Like
talking to a brick wall.
TUCHMAN: And did you think that was strange initially?
JOHN: Yes, I did. But I used to be pretty shy, too when I came to
Tech. And I thought maybe something happening inside, I don't know. Just
turned to be so quiet and not want to talk to people.
TUCHMAN: And Andy did you feel the same way when you first met
him? Just a real quiet guy, didn't you think that was kind of weird?
ANDY: I thought he was just really quiet and shy. I didn't think he
was weird initially. Just some people are shier than others.
TUCHMAN: OK. So when did you start noticing, Andy, that perhaps
he was being a shy, nice guy?
ANDY: Tried to hang out with him at first. Introduced him to our
friends and stuff and weeks of this and he never opened up. Just never talked
to us and went about his day by himself. Never saw anyone come visit him.
TUCHMAN: Did you ever sit down and have a conversation with him?
ANDY: Never more than a couple words. Other than the one time we went
out to a party and he opened up and said he had an imaginary girlfriend.
TUCHMAN: He told you he had an imaginary girlfriend? What
prompted him to say that?
ANDY: Yes. We'd been drinking so I guess he decided to open up.
TUCHMAN: So he had a few beers and he opened up. And what did
he say about an imaginary girlfriend?
ANDY: He called her "Jelly" and she called him "Spanky."
TUCHMAN: Spanky and Jelly.
ANDY: Yep. And that was that.
TUCHMAN: And what did he say about this imaginary girlfriend?
ANDY: She was a supermodel, I think.
JOHN: Yes.
TUCHMAN: And were you guys amused by this? Weirded out by it?
ANDY: More amused. You think, this guy is pretty crazy.
JOHN: Strange, strange guy.
TUCHMAN: But then something happened that you say he started
harassing women at school here, right.
JOHN: Yes.
TUCHMAN: Tell me about that, John.
JOHN: I went back to my room one night and there was a policeman in
there. And apparently what had happened was, he started talking to her online
first. Found out where she lived. Started talking to her on AIM, then he went
over there. He was using the name question mark. Said "hey, I'm question
mark." And that really freaked the girl out.
TUCHMAN: So he was stalking her.
JOHN: Yes. He found out everything about her first.
TUCHMAN: And like, he told this girl all the things he learned about
her.
JOHN: I don't know if he told her that. But he -- he thought they
were playing some kind of game or something.
TUCHMAN: And did you know the girl?
JOHN: No. I...
TUCHMAN: And was she freaked out about it? Did you hear later?
JOHN: Freaked out enough about it to call the police.
TUCHMAN: And did this happen with any other girls, Andy?
ANDY: There were two other instances that we know of. One was one of
our friends -- he started following and bothering her, and another was down the
hall.
TUCHMAN: And what happened in those cases?
ANDY: The one down the hall, I got the girl's screen name and kind of
told her -- I IM'ed her and told her, this guy, you know, he's messing around
with you. Here's his name, and you should kind of ignore him and just stay
away from him. And the other time, the cops responded again, and Seung became
upset about that. And he had told me that he might as well kill himself. And
so, I told the cops that, and they took him away to the counseling center for a
night or two.
TUCHMAN: And when he told you that he might kill himself, did you
think he might be serious?
ANDY: It's -- it was more out of -- I could kind of see him doing
that. It was about -- it was before break, is what I remember, so -- and he
never went home. So he would have been there over break by himself if he was
serious about it.
TUCHMAN: And John, the guy never talked to you, so for him to say he
might want to kill himself, I guess that would be pretty notable, right?
JOHN: Yeah, that would be a red flag, I would say -- if he had said it
to me. He talked more to Andy probably than he did to me, just because Andy is
more of a friendly guy and he likes to make friends, talk to people, things
like that.
TUCHMAN: You look like a pretty friendly guy to me, John.
JOHN: Thanks.
TUCHMAN: OK. But you were -- you lived in the same room as Seung.
JOHN: Yes, but after time, I just stopped trying to talk to him, and
then when all this started happening with other girls and things like that, I
started to keep a closer eye on him, and it was more of -- certainly being his
roommate is more of a watchdog thing, to see where he went...
TUCHMAN: Why did you feel you had to be a watchdog? Were you afraid
for your own safety?
JOHN: Not -- not necessarily for my own safety, but for friends. I
stopped telling friends to come by my room, especially girls. I -- I thought
about several times trying to follow him to see if maybe he's going to stalk
some other girl in some other dorm, so we could get word to them like we did to
the girl that was down the hall.
TUCHMAN: I mean, did you think he might harm some of these girls?
JOHN: I never thought that at some point he would harm them, no. But
at the same time...
TUCHMAN: But why were you thinking of following him?
JOHN: Just because I know a girl would be extremely weirded out by
that. I wouldn't want some guy following my sister or knowing everything about
my sister and her not knowing that. So...
TUCHMAN: So when he came back from the clinic, after threatening to
kill himself, did he talk about that at all? Or did you ask him about that,
Andy?
ANDY: No, it was kind of weird, obviously, for a time after that,
because I had reported him for it, and pretty much there was no other incidents
after that. He kept to himself a lot more after that.
TUCHMAN: Did he like music, for example?
ANDY: Yeah, he did. He listened to a lot of rock, a lot of Led
Zeppelin, Nirvana, "Shine Down" by Collective Soul.
TUCHMAN: You were saying that there was one song he kept playing over
and over? What was that?
ANDY: It was "Shine Down."
JOHN: Yeah.
TUCHMAN: By Collective Soul.
ANDY: Yeah.
TUCHMAN: Was there any reason? He would just keep playing it over and
over and over again?
JOHN: Yeah.
TUCHMAN: And was this on an iPod or on stereo speakers?
JOHN: It was on his laptop.
TUCHMAN: His laptop. And you guys heard it?
JOHN: It would wake me up in the morning sometimes.
TUCHMAN: And I actually think it's a good song, but to hear it over
and over again would probably drive you nuts, right?
JOHN: Yeah.
TUCHMAN: Like, what did you say to him?
JOHN: I never said anything because...
TUCHMAN: How come?
JOHN: I always thought he was kind of a fragile guy, at the time.
That was still before -- I think before the police came and I just didn't want
to say, hey, turn that music off or switch the song because I didn't have that
kind of relationship with him.
TUCHMAN: Did you ever say anything about that to him, Andy?
ANDY: About the music? No. Never.
TUCHMAN: I mean, you guys seem to be very patient with him. And
somewhat caring. That you didn't want to bother him.
JOHN: I think in that situation, with anybody that's like that you
just try to be as patient as you can. You don't want to come down hard on them
or send them into some kind of shut-down lock-out mode.
TUCHMAN: But here you are dealing with a guy who was a stalker.
And was very strange and never talked with you. Did he ever get in trouble?
Did he ever do anything to get himself in trouble other than stalking?
JOHN: Not to my knowledge.
ANDY: No.
TUCHMAN: You were telling me something earlier, though, about
graffiti? Or writing?
JOHN: He would write on the suite walls. I don't think he ever got
into any kind of trouble for it.
TUCHMAN: What did he write on the suite walls?
JOHN: Lyrics to the music he would listen to.
TUCHMAN: Chalk or paint?
JOHN: Pencil or pen.
TUCHMAN: And are you allowed to write on the walls?
JOHN: No.
TUCHMAN: And what did you do about that?
JOHN: We just told our RA's. They went up the chain of command with
it, I guess.
TUCHMAN: You were afraid you would get fined, have to pay a fine
for it.
JOHN: Yes. If they didn't know who it was, everybody in the suite
would have to pay a fine.
TUCHMAN: You were telling me before. Did he have any hobbies?
Did he do anything other than sit in his room and listen to music?
ANDY: He went to the gym and he had a bicycle that he worked on. And
he was always riding that, usually.
JOHN: He would go out really late at night and ride his bike around
for a few hours and come back.
TUCHMAN: From what we're hearing, he liked to write and wrote
some strange things. Did you ever see any of the things he wrote?
JOHN: No.
ANDY: No.
TUCHMAN: In creative writing or did you know that about him?
That he wrote?
JOHN: We knew that he wrote a lot because sometimes you could see
notebooks sitting on his desk. And the pages would be full of his writings for
class or you would sometimes see a graded assignment sitting on his desk.
TUCHMAN: Did he ever talk about weapons?
JOHN: No.
ANDY: He had ...
JOHN: A knife. That's it, right?
TUCHMAN: He had a knife?
JOHN: Yes.
TUCHMAN: In the dorm room?
JOHN: Yes.
TUCHMAN: What kind of knife?
JOHN: A serrated with little bottom blades. It really wasn't that
big. You see most people carry them around in their pockets and things.
TUCHMAN: A pocketknife?
JOHN: Yes.
TUCHMAN: What did he use it for?
JOHN: I don't know why he would need one.
TUCHMAN: Did you ever wonder about that?
JOHN: It seems like I know a lot of guys at school who would need
one. But from back home, working or whatever, they might have one. Carry one
around with them.
TUCHMAN: Did he ever talk about weapons?
JOHN: No.
ANDY: I was shocked when I heard that he knew how to use a gun on
people.
TUCHMAN: Really?
ANDY: Yes.
TUCHMAN: Now, when you heard, that there was an Asian man who
was the gunman, what did you think, Andy?
ANDY: I was with my roommate from last year. And we kind of maybe
guessed that it was him because it matched the description and we were a little
fearful that it would be him, hoping it wasn't.
TUCHMAN: Why did you think right away that it would be him?
There are a lot of Asians here.
ANDY: Well, part of the description too, was the guy they arrested on
the Drill Field initially looked similar to him. Close cropped hair. And
then, with the girl in A.J., too. After it was released that it was an RA and
a girl killed we kind of found the girl had gotten into trouble with the guy.
When I heard it was the boyfriend, I was kind of thinking it wasn't Seung
because I had never seen him with a girl or with anyone else, for that matter.
TUCHMAN: John, when you heard it was an Asian man that did this,
did you think it was him?
JOHN: Yes. And I don't really know a lot of Asians at Tech and that
may have been the reason, too, but the only strange Asian that I would have
known would have been Seung. And everybody I knew that I told stories about
Seung, they all called me and said "do you think that was Seung?" When they
found out it was an Asian.
TUCHMAN: Now that you look back at his behavior, was there
anything with the benefit of hindsight that you see as weird. I wonder if I
should have said something about or done something about?
JOHN: Of course.
TUCHMAN: Like what, for example.
JOHN: Things take time when RAs are working through their chain of
command and things, too. Maybe talking to the cops more. Telling them to keep
a better eye on him. Things like that.
TUCHMAN: What do you think Andy, is there any specific instance
of something that he did that you are thinking about now that seemed like a
warning sign?
ANDY: All the incidents with the girls are the big warning signs. No
of them ever came to charges or anything because I'm sure those girls weren't
trying to cause trouble but if any of them had it may have stopped things but,
yes, those are definite warning signs of someone that had some social problems.
TUCHMAN: How many different girls do you know that he stalked?
ANDY: I think, three.
TUCHMAN: And you were telling me about one of the girls whose
door he went to and he talked to her. Tell me about that. What did he say?
ANDY: You know more about that.
JOHN: He said he walked in and what he told me, one night, which was
really strange because he never talked to me. He never got up to close the
door himself and turn off the lights when he was going to bed. So it was
really strange when closed the door and turned to me and said "hey, you want to
know why I went up to that girl's dorm room the other night?"
And I said "sure, why?"
He said that he wanted to go up there and look her in the eye to see
how cool she was. Cause that's the only way he could tell how cool she was by
looking her in the eyes. And when he looked in her eyes, he saw promiscuity.
TUCHMAN: And when he said that to you, what did you say to him?
JOHN: I said, I just shrugged my shoulders. I didn't know what to
say. It really shocked me to hear that come out of his mouth.
TUCHMAN: Did you ever see him with a girl?
JOHN: No.
TUCHMAN: You said he had an imaginary girlfriend but you never
saw him with a real girlfriend.
JOHN: He was never with anyone? A professor, another guy, a girl.
TUCHMAN: So you lived with this guy one year and you never saw
him with another person except for your roommates?
JOHN: Right.
ANDY: Right.
TUCHMAN: Did you ever break bread with him, eat with him?
JOHN: At the beginning of the semester, yes. When we would all get
together and go out to eat dinner. We would invite him along.
TUCHMAN: And he would come?
JOHN: Yes. He came for a few times, after awhile, he stopped. He
declined.
TUCHMAN: But when he came the first few times, did he talk?
JOHN: No.
TUCHMAN: He just sat there and ate?
JOHN: Yes. And our other friends would try to talk to him, too.
About where he was from, what his major was, and he would give them all the
same one word sentence answer.
TUCHMAN: You were saying, when you went to bed, he left the
lights on?
JOHN: When he went to bed, he left the lights on. Most of the times I
would be up doing homework late and he would just go change, and leave the door
wide open and the lights on. And we had lofted beds, too, so the light was
right next to his head.
TUCHMAN: And he would leave the light on all night?
JOHN: As long as I was in there. I would turn it off, I felt bad, I
know that I have to have the light off to go to sleep. But, at first when he
did that, I would say "Seung, if you ever want to go to sleep just say it and I
will turn my lamp on. I you want the door shut, that's fine, too. If you want
the fan on or off, I don't care."
And he would say "OK." And he would just do the same thing over
again.
TUCHMAN: What is, Andy, the strangest thing you remember him
doing, now that you look back on it?
Was there anything that you told your other friends about or your
parents about?
ANDY: Trying to think of the craziest incident with him. I guess it
was his Facebook profile. He had a -- called it Question Mark. And he told me
that that was his brother. And he had gotten my cell phone number from when we
used to invite him to dinner and stuff. So he called me on a couple of
instances, talking and saying he was Question Mark. And I remember one night,
I finally just got completely tired of it, and I'm like, Seung, you know, you
need to stop this. And he's like, this isn't Seung, this is Question Mark,
being really insisting on that.
So I knew he had been in Cochran. I went through all the lounges at
Cochran and not that many, but I finally found him on the...
TUCHMAN: Cochran residence hall.
ANDY: Yeah. I found him on the third floor in one of the study
lounges, and the lights were off. And the moment I walked in, he hung the
phone up and acted like everything was normal and denied that he had been on
the phone with me.
TUCHMAN: Did that creep you out?
ANDY: Definitely, it did. I thought it was a stupid little game
again, but it didn't creep me out, but I definitely thought it was weird,
because he wasn't making any threats or anything, but...
TUCHMAN: What was the -- now that you're looking back at it, what was
the creepiest or weirdest thing you remember about him?
JOHN: Other than him telling me about why I went to talk to that girl,
I would say along the lines of Question Mark. He called me one night -- he
called our dorm room phone, and he said, hey, this is Question Mark. Is Seung
there? I said, no, he's not here. This is his brother Question Mark, is Seung
there? I said, Seung didn't have a brother. He told me that he had no
brother. So I kept insisting he didn't have a brother, and he kept
saying, "yes, he does, yes, he does." And finally just hung up the phone.
TUCHMAN: Do you think he was, like, high?
JOHN: No.
TUCHMAN: Or drunk?
JOHN: Probably not.
TUCHMAN: Just kind of weird.
JOHN: Yeah.
TUCHMAN: What did -- OK. Just wait until the door closes.
What did your parents make of all this? What was going on while you
were living with him?
JOHN: At the time, I really didn't tell him all of the stuff that he'd
been doing. I didn't want to worry them anymore. I was still fine. He never
showed any indication that he would harm anybody. So I -- I didn't really tell
them about it.
TUCHMAN: Did you tell your parents that you had this suite mate?
ANDY: They were concerned. I talked to them about -- before I called,
at that time you told me that he was going to kill himself. And then in the
background, they said I should have, and they were concerned and thought maybe
that he should be moved somewhere else, but that's not usually done.
TUCHMAN: So your parents really were concerned about this kid.
ANDY: Uh-huh.
TUCHMAN: Now that you look back at it, do you wish you did anything
differently, Andy?
ANDY: I wish...
ANDY: It's hard to tell with someone like him. I was thinking about
it the other day, and if we had pushed then, would he have done that then? I
don't know. Because I had heard there had been some incidents, maybe recently,
where he had some trouble that led to this, but would he have done it then? I
don't know. I don't know if there would have been anything that could have
been done to stop him. I didn't expect this out of him.
TUCHMAN: What about you, John? When you look back at it, is there
anything you wish you would have done differently?
JOHN: I keep running it through my head a lot. Since I found out he
was an Asian in his 20s, I thought it could be Seung. I'd been thinking about
it ever since. And I just can't come to a good idea about what we could have
done, other than what we did do. We -- you know, we called the police, we told
our RAs. We thought we were doing the right thing and it's being taken care
of. And I'm not saying that the police or Virginia Tech didn't do their job.
No way am I saying that. But I just feel, you know, everything that could have
been done was done at the time, and maybe if we had tried harder to get him
checked out or something like that, maybe I might have felt -- I don't know.
TUCHMAN: Were you ever afraid for your own safety at any time with this kid?
JOHN: He was a little weird. You know, after you know he'd been stalking girls and looking at their Facebooks and learning everything about them, and sometimes at night when I go to sleep, I'd be a little nervous. But I could always tell -- he would go into a pretty deep sleep because he would lay in bed and he would always moan and he's always -- would be a really restless sleeper and moving around. So I always went to bed after he did, and he woke up about two hours before I did and was always gone.
TUCHMAN: Would you have been afraid to go to sleep at night before he did?
JOHN: No.
TUCHMAN: But you didn't do that.
JOHN: Not then.
TUCHMAN: But you never did do that.
JOHN: No. That's for the most part because I waited really late to do homework.
TUCHMAN: OK. What about you?
ANDY: There is a couple of incidents where he would like -- you leave your door open when you live in the dorm, and he'd be standing in the doorway, and I'd turn around and he'd be there. And there was one time he'd taken a picture of him. And the only reason I noticed him was because of the camera flash. And I know there was a couple of other incidents with other people, but I was more weirded out and scared. But looking back on it all now, you know, he could have been back there doing anything, and we would have never seen it coming.
TUCHMAN: But he was taking a picture of you?
ANDY: Yes.
TUCHMAN: And what did you say to him?
ANDY: Well, there was another instance that was -- at the beginning of the year, when we were inviting him to dinner, he took us -- we went downstairs in the lounge, and he had the camera again and took a picture of the girls next to us. And it was kind of embarrassing, because he put the camera down real quick and the girls think that, you know, a guy (inaudible) table is taking pictures of them, and I didn't say -- I never said anything to him. I wish I had, because that was the thing he did. He took pictures of everyone, I guess.
TUCHMAN: Why do you think he was taking a picture of you in your dorm room?
ANDY: I have no idea.
TUCHMAN: (inaudible) about it?
ANDY: I didn't even think about it, you know. It's -- he was a strange kid, so expect strange things.
TUCHMAN: Do you think -- let me ask each of you this -- do you think Cho is the strangest kid you've ever met?
ANDY: He -- his actions were strange, and he was one of the strangest kids I've ever met.
TUCHMAN: Can you think of one stranger?
ANDY: No, I can't.
TUCHMAN: And what about you, John?
JOHN: He is definitely one of the strangest, and I would put a few other people up there with him. Just from high school back home. But as far as up to now, yeah, definitely, he is of course -- looking back on it, then, you know, you think there's always somebody worse. And then you look at him now, it's definitely.
TUCHMAN: How did you feel -- how do you feel now, sitting here, knowing what happened on your campus, John?
JOHN: Feel terrible. I keep thinking about it and thinking -- thinking about those victims and their families and what they're going through. And if maybe there was something you could have done to stop that or prevent that. Not a good feeling at all.
TUCHMAN: What about you, Andy? Can you believe it?
ANDY: Oh, seeing the families today really brought it home, because you know they're missing someone now and they didn't even get to say goodbye.
TUCHMAN: I mean, the fact is, you see what he was capable of and you lived in the same room with him for a year. Sitting here with me now, thinking about that, does that scare you?
JOHN: Yes. You don't know what set him off this time. Back then, if we had done something to set him off then ...
TUCHMAN: It sounds like you guys were really kind to him. Did you ever lose patience with him? Did you ever tell him quit, stop it, or what are you doing, what are you, nuts?
JOHN: When he started to stalk one of our friends, we told him that was it. And that was when he threatened to commit suicide.
ANDY: And we were pretty accommodating. You accommodate roommates.
You meet all sorts of people in college and you just got to be accommodating no matter how weird it is, I guess.
TUCHMAN: Do you remember, John, what you said to him specifically about the stalking of your friend? Do you remember the words you said to him or your tone of voice?
JOHN: I still didn't really want to be really rough to him because he was still in the same room. I didn't know. If I left that day, after I said something, I didn't know if I would come back and find all my stuff trashed, or something like that. So you say, stop --
TUCHMAN: Did you say stop?
JOHN: Yes. I said that's not cool. That's our friend. And he was just emotionless.
TUCHMAN: Did he tell you I want to kill myself or did that come later?
JOHN: He didn't tell me that.
TUCHMAN: He told you that.
ANDY: It came later on.
TUCHMAN: Like that same day?
ANDY: Yes, later, actually it may have been the next day. It was over the Internet. He IM'd that to me.
TUCHMAN: Really?
ANDY: Yes.
TUCHMAN: Do you remember, you don't still have that IM, do you?
ANDY: No.
TUCHMAN: Do you remember what he said in that IM?
ANDY: I might as well kill myself now.
TUCHMAN: So you guys talked to each other and decided to call the police at that point.
JOHN: And the girl, too, I think she had her parents call the police when she found out. He kept going back to her door and writing on her dry erase board after we told him to stop.
TUCHMAN: Did he go to classes all the time or did he cut?
JOHN: As far as we knew, he was going to classes.
ANDY: He would leave most of the day and you would see him come back every once in a while, but for the most part, he wasn't in the room.
TUCHMAN: Pretty unbelievable, isn't it?
JOHN: Yes.
Andy: Yes.
TUCHMAN: I want to thank you guys for talking with us. I want to see if any of my fellow journalists here have any other questions. They're curious about, Kate?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You guys mentioned that he IM'd you online. Did you guys talk to him more online than you did in person?
TUCHMAN: You can look at me when you answer that question, but did you talk to him a lot online?
ANDY: He would IM a lot online. He would definitely say a lot more over Instant Messenger than he would in person because he could hide behind the computer.
JOHN: I think that's one of the reasons he never talked to me that much because I was in the room when he IM'd. He never sent me an IM. I remember him talking to Andy a lot. Or Andy coming in and saying that he was talking to him or something like that.
TUCHMAN: Now that you are looking back at it, with the benefit of hindsight, do you think he was capable of being a murderer now that you are looking back at it?
JOHN: No.
TUCHMAN: Or does it still shock you?
JOHN: It still shocks me that he did this.
TUCHMAN: What about you?
ANDY: Its shocking. I didn't think he would be capable of it. I guessed it, unfortunately, but I was like, no way could he have done that.
TUCHMAN: What would you tell your kids down the road or friends to look out when they are living with somebody?
JOHN: First sign of somebody acting strange, make sure somebody knows about it or goes through the proper channels. Be careful.
TUCHMAN: I think it's amazing you shared the same room with the guy for a year. I mean, you are patient guys.
JOHN: Well, second semester, there really wasn't much at all.
TUCHMAN: He didn't talk to you. How can you live with someone who doesn't talk?
JOHN: I got used to it. I mean, I always thought it could be worse than. I could have a loud roommate in there that smoked or was drunk all the time. You know, so.
TUCHMAN: So you looked at this as the better of two evils. You didn't have a loud smoker, or drunk. Just a quiet guy.
JOHN: Yes. A guy that didn't like to talk.
TUCHMAN: Had you ever met anyone who didn't like to talk that was capable of talking?
JOHN: Not like this.
TUCHMAN: You?
ANDY: Never.
TUCHMAN: Did your other suite mates feel the same about him?
JOHN: They never talked to him. I'm sure they don't even know what his name was.
ANDY: I talked to one earlier and he didn't put the name together with this.
TUCHMAN: No kidding.
JOHN: He was just like a shadow. You wouldn't hear him move in and out. The only way that they would know it is if they saw him come out of the door.
TUCHMAN: So you didn't think he was, like there was a mental disability with him?
JOHN: We did talk about that at one point. But, I'm sure someone else
would have noticed it before we had, if there was a mental disability.
TUCHMAN: Did you think he was capable of functioning in the adult world?
JOHN: We talked about that, too. We didn't think he would ever get a job or be able to maintain a job. Without having the communication skills that seem necessary.
TUCHMAN: And did you feel the same way, Andy?
ANDY: I feel like you had to be something right to get into school.
Like, Tech's not the easiest school to get into.
TUCHMAN: That's the thing! He got into the school. So I say, OK, I give him that there must be something we don't see.
ANDY: So I gave him credit for that. He had to be doing something right when it came to academics, but I never could figure out what he would do when he would graduate. I never saw any social skills out of him.
TUCHMAN: Do you feel that your lives have changed now that this has happened?
JOHN: In what way?
TUCHMAN: Knowing that you lived with a guy like this that was the most prolific murderer with a gun in this country's history?
JOHN: I think it's hard to say now how it's going to change because you are still in a state of shock. But, I mean, it's just a terrible, terrible feeling.
TUCHMAN: Do you, and I don't want to make you feel guilty, please.
OK? But do you feel bad that you didn't do more?
JOHN: I do. And I just keep trying to think what more I could have done. Should have done.
TUCHMAN: What about you, Andy?
ANDY: I think everybody did all they could and he, there were a couple instances where cops were called, and nothing was pressed on it. So. I think that those immediately surrounding him, us and the RAs did their part.
TUCHMAN: I want to thank you guys for talking with us.





