Mass shootings are almost never random, according to Follman. The vast majority of mass shooters dont spontaneously decide to pull out a gun in public and start shooting. Learning to identify whos most at risk for committing mass violence, identifying warning signs and finding ways to intervene, can save lives.
Thats what behavioral threat assessment teams do. The process and composition of a team can differ in various contexts, including educational, corporate, and law enforcement settings, but the general idea is the same: the teams receive information from community members about behavior that is concerning. The teams investigate that behavior to determine whether someone is at risk of committing mass violence. Then, depending on their conclusion, the team finds a way to reach out to the person and try to get them support before they commit an act of violence. That contact can happen at the persons home, but it might also happen at work, school, or another community setting.
Its difficult to prove the efficacy of these interventions, because theres no way to quantify the number of mass shootings that didnt happen because someone got help. But experts and mental health advocates say the work has prevented people from carrying out violence, and Follman has reported on cases where law enforcement believes people were successfully diverted from committing acts of mass violence.
Its very possible. There are many examples of successful threat cases where the case subjects have been diverted away from, in many cases, often very serious and developed plans for committing violence, Follman says.
Researchers have identified several circumstances shared by people who commit mass violence. They are almost (but not always) men, many of whom have suffered from some form of early childhood trauma or abuse. Most are suicidal. The number of perpetrators who attempted suicide beforehand was astounding, Jillian Peterson, a professor at Hamline University and co-founder of The Violence Project, a database of every mass shooting in the US since 1966, has said.
Peterson, who with her colleagues interviewed the small number of mass shooters who survived after committing violence, came to an important realization: that nobody goes in planning to come out. That insight is significant, she says, because it means that some of the same tools mental health professionals have to prevent suicides can help prevent mass shootings as well.
But while those are common factors among mass shooters, they arent the most helpful at determining risk ” the vast majority of men, and people who are suicidal, dont become mass shooters. Other behavioral indicators help investigators better identify who is most likely to commit mass violence.
Among the most important is a history of domestic violence. In 2021, researchers found that a majority of mass shootings were domestic violence-related. A substantial fraction of mass shootings are not these killings of strangers in public places, but they occur in ongoing domestic disputes, says Nagin.
Garen Wintemute, the founding director of the Violence Prevention Research Program at University of California Davis, and an expert in mass shootings and political violence, says that intervening on people involved in intimate partner violence at whatever level of severity likely has a role in preventing mass shootings and many other bad things down the road.
Researchers have identified other behaviors common in mass shooters: a sudden increase in, interest in, or purchases of guns and ammunition, and increased interest in previous mass shooters. A would-be mass shooter also often makes bizarre or threatening comments in the lead-up to a shooting, indicating to those close to him, or to a community online, that he intends to do something violent ” a phenomenon researchers call leakage.
The Georgia school shooter shared multiple characteristics with other mass shooters, including recent mental health issues and an apparent interest in the Parkland, Florida, school shooter. Like others, he leaked his threats online.
Investigators are still piecing together what attempts were made to get the alleged shooter help before the shooting. But generally, when a behavioral threat assessment team has identified someone at risk, the next step is to come up with a plan to help. It often involves the persons family or friends, and can entail direct contact with the person of concern. The ideal of this work is with both empathy and concern, Follman says. And then coming up with a plan to intervene and try to help, which is also based on specific information gathered about that person from the person themselves and the people around them. What does this person need? What can we do to help move them away from where they are now to a better place?
The goal is to make the person less isolated and angry, and to attempt to ease the grievances that might be making them feel violent. Every treatment plan looks different.
Its not like theres a simple menu and you pick one thing and then the switch flips and everythings fine. Thats not how threat management works, Follman says.
Currently, in-school threat assessment teams are required in nine states, not including Georgia ” but experts say that more states should require them, and make sure they have the resources they need to develop risk assessment strategies and track their results. People who live in states without risk assessment teams can push their states to require them in schools and other government settings.
But the Apalachee school shooting makes clear that even when officials are aware of a potential threat, they sometimes lack the legal mechanisms to take action. Thats why they also need laws to help keep guns from getting into the hands of would-be mass shooters.
Finding gun regulations that help prevent mass shootings
One appealing thing about behavioral threat assessment work is that its an intervention that can be done without butting head-first into the brick wall that is Americas intractable debate over gun control.
But make no mistake: a country with over 400 million guns in it, and with gun regulation so lax that almost anyone can carry a gun in public whenever they want, makes the work of preventing mass shootings much more difficult.
Georgia doesnt have safe storage laws, which in other states require guns to be locked up and kept away from children. The shooters father, when questioned by police in 2023, said that his son didnt have unfettered access to his guns. A law requiring guns to be secured in the state might have made it harder for the shooter to have access to the weapon he used.
There are other specific gun policies that can help prevent mass shootings and might be more politically feasible. Lawmakers and voters who care about reducing mass shootings have already helped push for their passage in states like New York, Florida, and California. For advocates who care about reducing mass shooting, they are a good place to start.
One of the most important legal tools available to prevent mass shootings is extreme risk laws, commonly referred to as red flag laws. The laws, currently in place in 21 states, including several after the Parkland, Florida, school shooting in 2018, allow both family members and law enforcement to petition courts to temporarily confiscate someones firearms if they believe the owner is at a risk of committing harm either to themselves or others. Red flag laws, Follman says, are a relatively new gun policy that is very important and very useful to the field of threat assessment. Though critics have challenged the constitutionality of the laws, they have so far withstood legal challenges.
Another common factor among mass shooters is their use of assault-style rifles, known for their capacity to rapidly fire bullets and to kill or injure large numbers of people in a short amount of time. Though research has shown that assault weapons bans can meaningfully reduce mass shooting deaths when theyre in effect, Republicans blocked an assault weapons ban when it came before Congress in December 2023, and polls show that while Americans generally favor more strict gun regulation, they are more divided on the question of whether to ban assault weapons outright.
In part because of Republican opposition to regulating assault rifles, gun safety advocates have turned their focus to banning bump stocks as a more targeted and effective means of reducing mass shootings, and in 2018 the Trump administration took the rare step, for a GOP administration, of banning bump stocks following a Las Vegas mass shooting. But the Supreme Court struck down the regulation in June 2024.
What happens next is an open question, and Republicans have been relatively quiet about the Supreme Courts decision. But congressional action could be an important next step. As Justice Samuel Alito noted in his concurring opinion, Congress could pass a law banning bump stocks, which would help limit the lethality of weapons used by mass shooters.
Given that a Republican president was the first to ban bump stocks, and the regulation was relatively uncontroversial at the time, its not impossible to believe that Congress could make it happen. Similarly, Vice President Kamala Harris has urged states to adopt red flag laws, and former President Donald Trump also previously expressed support for these laws, despite the concern from gun rights advocates. Support from leaders of both major parties belies the notion that gun regulations that could counter mass shootings are completely off the table.
And though experts say passing those laws would have an impact, they are not the only thing that can be done. Family members and law enforcement in states that already have red flag laws can try to get the courts to intervene if theyre worried about someone with guns. Individual community members, especially in the workplace and at school, can pay attention when someone seems to be leaking intentions of a mass shooting and report that behavior to the authorities. The media can do their best not to elevate the profiles of mass shooters, which has been shown to inspire a copycat effect.
Most of all, Follman says, its important not to treat the problem as hopeless. Sometimes, he says, that can even encourage would-be shooters. We have this national narrative about how this is never going to end and nothing ever really changes, and theres nothing we can really do about it. But understanding that mass shootings arent random, that they can be predicted and prevented, can help people understand what warning signs to look out for.
Despair and outrage, he says, is not a good way to think about the problem.
Update, September 6, 9 am ET: This story was originally published on September 4, 2024, and has been updated with information about the Apalachee High School shooter.