In the debilitating days of Peyton Hendron’s high school-changed COVID-19 senior year at Susquehanna Valley High School, he entered a virtual education program in economics class and asked, “What do you plan to do when you retire?”
“Murder-suicide,” Hendron wrote.
Despite his protests that it was all a joke, the bespectacled 17-year-old, who had long been considered a smart loner by his classmates, was questioned by state police about the possible threat and then taken into custody and a psychiatric hospital. the state law on mental health.
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But a day and a half later he was released. And two weeks later, he was allowed to attend prom, including a senior parade, where he was photographed on top of a cabriolet driven by his father and decorated with yellow and blue balloons and congratulatory signs. “Peyton Hendron.”
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According to authorities and others familiar with the incident, this story of Hendron’s rubbing with the law last spring, according to authorities and others familiar with the incident, highlighted the same point that school officials made in a message to parents at the time: did not find a specific, credible threat against the school or any person of this sign of trouble.
The same young white man bought a Bushmaster XM-15 rifle, traveled three hours to Buffalo and continued, according to authorities, a racist live broadcast of Saturday’s shooting at a crowded supermarket that killed 10 blacks.
Gendron, now 18, was charged with state murder over the weekend and a court-appointed attorney general pleaded not guilty on his behalf. He remained in prison under suicide surveillance while federal prosecutors considered hate crimes charges.
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Even when the FBI raided the comfortable home where Hendron lived with his parents and two younger brothers, neighbors and classmates in this 5,000-strong community near the New York-Pennsylvania line, they say they saw no idea of the young man who now is described on television.
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And they say they have seen nothing of the kind of racist rhetoric seen in the 180-page online diatribe allegedly written by Gendron, in which he describes in the smallest detail how he researched zip codes with the most -high concentration of blacks, watched the Tops supermarket in Buffalo and carried out the attack to terrorize all non-whites, non-Christians to leave the country.
Classmates described Gendron as a quiet, studious boy who received high marks but seemed out of place in recent years, turning to online streaming games, gun cravings, and ways to get the attention of his peers.
When the school was partially reopened early last year after a COVID-19 shutdown, Gendron appeared covered from head to toe in a protective suit. Matthew Casado, a classmate, said he did not think the other students liked the stunt, which he called a “harmless joke.”
“Most people haven’t talked to him,” he said. “They didn’t want to be known as friends with a child who was socially awkward and nerdy.”
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Gendron excelled in science after winning top marks in a state chemistry competition. But he was known for behaving alone and not talking much. And when he spoke, it was about isolation, rejection, and despair.
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“He says he doesn’t like school because he has no friends. He would say he was lonely, “said Casado, who graduated with Gendron last year.
At one point last winter, Hendron’s mother called Casado’s mother with a request: Please get Matthew to call Peyton, because he has no friends and has to talk.
The two boys eventually went to flea markets together, watching videos on YouTube and shooting guns in nearby state land for the next few months. Kazado said he had never heard his friend talk about anything violent.
“I didn’t think it would hurt a fly,” he said.
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Some neighbors had a similar view, seeing the family as happy and prosperous, with Paul Hendron and his wife Pamela taking stable jobs as civil engineers at the New York State Department of Transportation, earning a total of nearly $ 200,000, according to online records.
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Dozens of Facebook posts over the years have shown parents and their three boys – often dressed in appropriate outfits – enjoying vacations in the amusement park, going for boat trips, shooting with laser markers and opening Christmas presents.
Carl Lobdel, a family friend who first met Gendron on a camping holiday a decade ago, said he was shocked that Peyton had been identified as a suspect in the mass shooting.
“He was very friendly, very respectful,” Lobdel said, adding that his family had become so close to the Gendrons that they even attended Peyton’s prom last year. “When I heard about the shooting … I just cried.”
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The family did not respond to a request for comment over the weekend, nor did Hendron’s lawyer. On Monday, no one opened the door to the family home, surrounded by a neat, spacious lawn. Near the front door was a small right hand pressed into concrete with a heart symbol and the inscription “PAYTON 2008”.
A parent of a student at Susquehanna Valley High said she was furious that the student who was investigated for making the threat last year – who he later learned was Gendron – was still eligible to participate in all diploma work. The woman asked not to be identified because she was afraid of harassment.
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According to a recording of a conference call from federal and local law enforcement officials obtained by the Associated Press on Monday, Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramagia said Hendron’s comments at the school in June 2021 were “summary statements” “And are not directed at anyone in a specific or specific place, so no criminal charges have been filed. He said the state police “does everything within the law”.
Gendron enrolled at Broome County Community College and later dropped out. The school would not say why. And according to the online writings attributed to him, he began planning his attack on the Buffalo supermarket at least in November, saying he was planted in his racist views online.
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“I have never been diagnosed with a mental disability or disorder and I believe I am completely sane,” according to one passage.
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A new 589-page journal diary page surfaced Monday, which authorities attribute to Gendron, and some of his account-tracked passages AP sources gave to him to investigate high school threats.
“Another bad experience was when I had to go to the hospital’s emergency department because I said the words ‘murder / suicide’ to an online newspaper in an economics class,” one record said. “I came out of it because I stuck to the story that I was leaving class and I just stupidly wrote it down. That’s why I believe I can still buy guns. “
“It wasn’t a joke, I recorded it because I was planning to do it.”
© 2022 The Canadian Press
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