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William FREUND
Classification:
Homicide
Characteristics:Asperger's syndrome
- Donned a
dark cape
and paintball mask and went on a shooting rampage
Number of victims: 2
Date of murders: October 29,
2005
Date of birth: 1986
Victims profile: Christina Smith, 22, and her father, Vernon,
45
(neighbors)
Method of murder:
Shooting
Location: Aliso Viejo, California, USA
Status: Committed suicide
by shooting himself the same day
William
Freund (c. 1986
– October 29, 2005) was a nineteen year old male who donned a
cape and ski mask and went on a shooting rampage in the city of
Aliso Viejo, California.
He shot and
killed two people before going home and killing himself by
shooting himself in the torso.
Before going on the rampage, he
is said to have posted his plans on the online Asperger's
Syndrome message board wrongplanet.net. He also posted on the
message board of the comedy website Something Awful under the
alias "forbiddenforum" asking for information on where to buy
buckshot ammunition.
Forum members
responded with information, then derision as he claimed that he
was going to be shooting at people attempting to vandalize his
Halloween pumpkins. The thread was closed a few days before his
shooting spree.
He also posted on AnandTech but never commented
on suicide or his plans to kill. He was a computer expert who,
according to his employer, kept to himself and severely lacked
social skills.
Killer Sought Solace Online
By Kimi Yoshino, Mai Tran, Times Staff Writers and Christian
Berthelsen
Los Angeles
Times
November 01, 2005
In the weeks before 19-year-old William Freund donned a cape and
mask and went on a shooting rampage in his Aliso Viejo
neighborhood, he reached out for help on the Internet.
He wrote more than two dozen online messages in
October, asking for a "real life" friend and saying he was
contemplating suicide. He also threatened to start "a Terror
Campaign to hurt those that have hurt me."
The messages paint a portrait of a troubled
young man struggling with Asperger's syndrome, a neurological
disorder described as a variant of autism that hampers people's
ability to interact socially. He revealed his anguish and
frustration on a website, wrongplanet.net, used by people with
Asperger's.
In a prophetic message written Oct. 16, about
the "Terror Campaign," he also said, "My future ended some time
ago." Other postings included "Everybody hates me" and "I feel
like I need to kill myself." He also disclosed that he had bought
a 12-gauge shotgun and had gone online to buy ammunition.
Members of the online community for Asperger's
tried to reassure Freund and offer suggestions, and volunteer
moderators tried to find his parents.
Their efforts failed.
On Saturday morning, Freund put on a dark cape
and paintball mask and entered a neighboring house, killing
Christina Smith, 22, and her father, Vernon, 45. He then shot at a
house across the street and tried to fire at a neighbor, but the
shotgun jammed. Then he walked home and killed himself with the
shotgun.
Orange County sheriff's spokesman Jim Amormino
said investigators did not know what sparked the shooting or why
Freund targeted the Smiths. "We're looking into his mental health
at the time of the shooting," he said.
An autopsy completed Sunday showed that Freund
died of a single gunshot to the upper torso. Toxicology tests are
being conducted, but Amormino said, "We don't expect drugs and
alcohol set off his bizarre behavior."
What may be the best clues to what set him off
could be the messages Freund left behind in postings on
wrongplanet.net. The website was created by people with Asperger's
syndrome and intended as a place they could post comments, share
experiences and talk to one another in online chat rooms. It also
offers articles about the disease but is not intended to be a
authoritative medical source.
Those with the disorder are often described as
loners who have trouble communicating and may not fit in socially.
To the outside world, people
with Asperger's are sometimes merely presumed to be rude, although
the condition is caused by a neurobiological disorder. Depression
and suicidal thoughts often afflict people with Asperger's, but
violent behavior is rare.
The syndrome affects more males than females,
and although the number of people with Asperger's is unknown, some
experts estimate that 1 in 250 people has at least a mild case.
Experts agree that it is subtler than autism but can often be
emotionally crippling.
Freund tended to keep to himself,
although he worked for a while repairing computers and fixing
viruses, said his former employer, Forrest Fuster, 24, of Mission
Viejo.
"He was incredibly smart, but he lacked social
skills severely," Fuster said. "He was a very deep thinker."
In his online profile, Freund described himself
as an only child of adoptive parents, a student at ITT Technical
Institute in Anaheim who enjoyed "computers, role playing, fantasy,
pugs, Food, guns." He graduated from Aliso Niguel High School in
2004, the same school as Christina Smith, who graduated in 2001.
His online messages were filled with spelling
and grammatical errors, alternately depicting a self-aware person
desperately seeking help and a frustrated, angry man who wanted to
lash out at others.
On Oct. 15 he said he had tried suicide before.
"Ive Tried Everythink from asphxia, To lethal gases, Inert Gases
To full suspended hanging
The next day, he said that if he made it to
Halloween, he planned to equip himself with body armor, an airgun
and a laser to "just scare any little kids that try to destroy my
pumpkin
On Oct. 19, he asked for references to a mental
hospital, saying that he needed counseling and social skills
training. He also said he had no friends. He wrote that he wished
he had some, emphasizing it with 75 exclamation points.
Alexander Plank, 19, the founder of
wrongplanet.net, said volunteer moderators who monitored messages
had been concerned about Freund's postings and took action.
"People at our site tried to contact his
parents, but apparently there are a lot of Freunds in Orange
County," Plank said. There are 38 Freunds registered to vote.
Moderators also blocked Freund from posting
links to pro-suicide websites, said Plank, a freshman computer
science major at George Mason University in Northern Virginia.
After seeing articles about the weekend
shooting, Plank said, he called the Orange County Sheriff's
Department. By Monday evening, some of Freund's messages had been
removed from the website.
The sheriff's office declined to provide
information Monday about how Freund obtained the shotgun. Freund's
messages on the website reveal a fascination with guns and detail
his purchase from "a bunch off old farts at a gun center." He also
wrote about searching for "the most powerful specialized ammo,"
which most shops apparently wouldn't carry.
Details of Freud's medical treatment were
unavailable Monday. In the messages, however, he said his health
was deteriorating because of a new medication. "I'm not getting
any better and nobody can figure out what it is." He said he
wanted his parents to switch doctors but that they were happy with
his treatment.
His parents were not home Monday, and employees
at their Laguna Hills printing business said they had not heard
from them. Members of the Smith family were also not home.
Blake Melcher, 21, of Laguna Niguel said many
students had picked on Freund since middle school. "It happens at
all schools, where some kids are always picked on," he said.
In one online message, Freund said he had "no
friends, all enemies" and bought the shotgun for home defense.
Relatives sue over shotgun slayings
By Mai Tran - Los Angeles Times
November 18, 2006
Relatives of a father and daughter who were
killed when a neighbor burst into their Aliso Viejo home and
opened fire have filed a lawsuit against the killer's family, the
gun dealer who sold the weapon and a support-group website where
the gunman had vowed to wage a "terror campaign."
Denise Smith and her son, Brandon Smith, filed
the lawsuit in Orange County Superior Court this week, seeking
damages for wrongful death and emotional distress.
The Smiths allege that the gunman's parents,
Karen and Dennis Freund, "permitted" their son to keep a weapon in
their home, failed to supervise him, and failed to warn and
protect them from their son's violent nature, according to the
lawsuit.
Reached by telephone, Dennis Freund declined to
comment on the lawsuit. In interviews with investigators shortly
after the shootings last year, he and his wife said they did not
know that their 19-year-old son owned a shotgun.
An attorney for the Smiths said each of the
defendants contributed to the deaths.
"In various ways, these people are responsible
for what happened," said Barry Novack, a Beverly Hills attorney. "This
was a preventable incident. Had he not had a shotgun, had he not
been on this medication, this wouldn't have happened. There are
many layers here, and sometimes tragedy occurs when all the pins
line up the right way."
The shootings occurred on Oct. 29, 2005, when
William Freund, wearing a cape and a dark paintball helmet with a
clear face shield, drove his car less than 100 yards around the
corner of his California Summit neighborhood.
He entered the Smiths' home and opened fire,
killing Vernon Smith, 45, and his daughter, Christina, 22. Her
brother, Brandon, escaped through a back door and her mother,
Denise, was at work.
After leaving the Smith home, Freund walked
slowly back to his own house on Sunbury Drive and shot and killed
himself with the 12-gauge Remington shotgun, police said. There
were no relationships or other links between Freund and the
victims.
Before the murders, Freund e-mailed and posted
comments on the WrongPlanet.net website saying he needed a "real
life" friend and said he was contemplating suicide.
He also threatened to start "a terror campaign
to hurt those that have hurt me."
The website serves as a support group for
people with Asperger's syndrome, a neurological disorder,
described as a variant of autism, which hampers people's ability
to interact socially. Freund suffered from the disorder.
The suit accused the website of failing to
alert police, the victims, Freund's family or any authorities to
prevent harm.
WrongPlanet founder Alexander Plank declined to
comment Friday, but during an interview last year, he said
volunteer moderators in Virginia tried to call Freund's parents
but were unsuccessful.
The Smiths also accused the Saddleback Valley
Gun Center and its owner, George Hueneman, of negligently selling
the shotgun to a teenager suffering from a disorder.
Hueneman said he ran a state background check
on Freund -- which came up clean. He said the state did not log a
person's medical history. He said he was not aware of Freund's
condition and that the law did not require him to determine it
before selling a him gun.
"I checked with the state, and they told me to
sell it to him. How am I supposed to know that he was a mentally
disturbed teenager who was on prescription medication?" Hueneman
asked. "The state of California and the FBI didn't even know that."
