Going West: True Crime - Kip Kinkel // 54

Episode Date: January 22, 2020

In May 1998, a 15-year-old freshman in high school killed his parents before shooting up his school in Springfield, Oregon. For years he showed signs of danger and potential mental health issues- So how did this terrible event occur? And what exactly happened? This is the story of Kip Kinkel and the Thurston High School Shooting. _____ REMRISE Remrise is a personalized formula based on YOUR sleep issues and patterns. After taking a short quiz, Remrise will recommend the perfect blend of amino acids plus Eastern and Western herbs ground and placed in convenient capsules to get you to sleep - and keep you asleep. Click this link to get your first week FREE!! https://tinyurl.com/remrisegoingwest ___ DEATH WISH Death Wish uses USDA Certified Organic and Fair Trade Coffee Beans - meaning you're getting the highest quality beans on the market. Because of this, the taste is smooth, never-bitter, and noticeably better than what you'd usually buy from the store. It's also low in acidity- which makes us all feel better. This 100% natural, incredibly delicious coffee is available in bags either ground or whole bean. But it's also available as Cold Brew in cans, and even in K-cups for your convenience! Use code 'GOINGWEST' at checkout to receive 10% off your order! https://www.deathwishcoffee.com Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What is going on to crime fans, I'm your host Heath, and I'm your other host, Daphne, and you're listening to Going West. Before we get into today's case, as always, we want to give thanks to everyone who gave us a five-star review on Apple Podcasts. So thank you so much today to Lilla from Tampa, Florida and Sarah from Minnesota. And then a big thanks to Lindy from Indiana and Wendy from Coldchester, Connecticut. Thank you so much to Emily from Gilbert, Arizona and Selena from Dallas, Texas. And then we have Sarah from El Paso, Texas, and Charles from Corden, Indiana. Big thanks to Amanda and Kyle from Syracuse, New York, and Nikki from San Diego.

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So thank you so much to Cherish, Linda, Danielle, Elizabeth, Kristen, and Nicky, you guys are amazing. And we're definitely gonna be putting out a new bonus episode Pretty soon for you guys to listen to right now. I think we're at what 10 bonus episodes We're about to release our 10th one probably I guess yeah sometime next week. So if you guys want nine Going west episodes check out our bonus series which is called a real crime the only way to access it is by going to patreon.com slash going west podcast and subscribing and it really helps out the show. It's $5 a month and you get bonus content. Alright guys, this is episode 54 of Going West so let's get into it.

Kip Kinkle, open fire in the Thurston High School cafeteria, killing two and wounding 25 others. Kinkley killed his parents the day before. He just came in from the side door and started shooting everybody. It was one table that was as close to the door as it was. It's been filled with shot. On May 21, 1998, Kip Kinkle and 15 years old walked up to Thurston High School

with four weapons and a thousand rounds of ammunition under a trench coat. I shot him again. weapons and a thousand rounds of ammunition under a trench coat. Let's just fly away! Kip Lind Kinkl, known as Kip Kinkl, was born on August 30, 1982 in Springfield, Oregon to parents of Faith and Bill, who were both Spanish teachers. He had an older sister, Kristen, who was born about six years before he was. And during Kip and Kristen's childhood, their parents actually took a sabbatical and went to Spain for Kipp's first year of school, which was kindergarten. And Faith had been teaching at Springfield High School while Bill taught at Thurston High School. And Thurston is a right next to Springfield or as an in-spring field.

Um, Springfield is going to be a little further away, like, Thurston's kinda out there. Like, if you're headed towards Bend, Oregon, you'd have to go out through Thurston to go up the Mackenzie. So, Springfield's kinda more in the city, and Thurston's kinda out in the boons a little bit. But they're like next to each other. Yeah, right.

So, they went to Spain in 1986 when Kip was just four years old, and like I said, this was his first year of school and it was in Spain and he had a teacher who only spoke Spanish and he was not fluent in Spanish at all. I don't even think he spoke a word of Spanish. So his sister was in fifth grade at the time and she was put into a third grade class because that was the only teacher who spoke English. So Kip had a really tough time with this. And even his parents taught Spanish like I said, and his sister knew a little bit, but Kip just could not get the hang of it. So he also had a hard time learning in general, and he was slower than a lot of the other kids his age.

So this really frustrated him. From an early age, Kip's teachers noticed that he became anxious and angry very easily, and although he had a pretty high intelligence, especially with math, his motor skills were slow and he had a hard time spelling, even his own last name. While Kip was in third grade, his father Bill retired from teaching Spanish at Thurston High School, and moved over to Lane Community College in Eugene, Oregon to teach night classes. So Heath and I actually met in Eugene, Oregon and that's where Heath is from. He's from that area, so Heath tells a little bit about the area to make it easier for people

to understand this. Okay, so Thurston, like I said, is kind of out there, like if you're headed towards Eastern Oregon. It's kind of on the outskirts of the town, so basically Eugene Springfield and then right after Springfield you'd have Thurston. Eugene is actually like the bigger city in terms of this area. It's where the University of Oregon is, so the campus there is pretty big. And then right after that, there's the community college,

Lane Community College, which kind of connects Eugene to Springfield in a sense, like it's kind of in between the both of them, and I actually went to Lane Community College. Fun fact. Kip was diagnosed with dyslexia in 4th grade, but at the same time he was placed in a gifted program due to his above average skills in math and science. Years later, while Kip was in seventh grade, he and his friends went on to the school computers and ordered the anarchist cookbook, which is a book about how to make explosives and it gives other instructions regarding sabotage, tear gas, drugs, and improvised weapons. Not something a seventh grader should have. Actually, I totally remember that book and a couple of my friends in middle school actually

had that book. Merle. Yeah. So the kids were all caught purchasing this book and faith who his kips mom was really worried that he was being poorly influenced by his friends. So she thought that this was like, oh, you know, my son's a good boy, his friends are bad, and now he has this horrible book. I don't know if it's horrible, it sounds bad, but I've never read it, so. Yeah, I mean, from from what I know about the book, I never actually read the book, but yeah, like you said, it's basically like a guide to destruction. Because Kip came from a good family with really caring and super intelligent parents, obviously. They did put a lot of pressure on him to succeed since they were academics, but they did this with Kip's sister, Kristen too, and she didn't have as hard of a time in general as Kip did. At this time, Kristen was now in college and no longer living at home.

And she originally began attending the University of Oregon in Eugene and then transferred to Hawaii Pacific on a full cheerleading scholarship Since she had been an Oregon Ducks cheerleader while she attended the U of L The following year Kipp bought a sought-off shotgun from one of his friends, but he didn't tell anyone He kept it a secret and he hid it in his room. Kip had a real fascination with guns and explosives. He would even apparently set off small homemade explosives when he was in a bad mood because it made him feel better. At this time, Kip was just 14 years old. He had spoken to his parents about getting guns and they always discouraged it because

of its dangers and he was just a kid obviously. But eventually, his dad Bill decided that if he was going to be interested in using guns, he at least should know how to handle them safely. So he took Kip to a gun safety class and told him that he was only allowed to use guns when they were both together. Just a few months later, after Kip turned 15, he went to Bend, Oregon, which, like Heath mentioned earlier, it's just east of the area, and he went snowboarding

with one of his friends. They got the wise idea to stand on a highway overpass and throw big rocks at passing cars below, and they ended up hitting a car, and the police were called. The police found Kip's friend near the overpass while Kip had gone back to the motel that they were staying at, and they were both underage, so I don't know if there was an adult present, but I'm not sure. Regardless, when the police arrived to the motel, Kip was hysterical, and he regretted his actions immediately, and he was crying and asked if anyone was hurt since the rock had been a foot wide. But luckily, no one was hurt, so Kip and his friend were taken down to the station and charged and their parents were called.

Kipp's parents drove the over two-hour drive to get to Bend so they could pick him up from the station and other than being charged, Kipp was to complete 32 hours of community service as well as write a letter of apology to the person whose car he hit and also pay the $50 in damages. So luckily it didn't seem to be that bad of a situation if there was only $50 of damage,

but still not a smart thing to do. He's very lucky that he didn't end up killing somebody because that's a very dangerous thing to do. But regardless, a few weeks after the rock incident, Kip's parents decided that it was probably best he'd start seeing a psychologist since his anger, depression, and bad behavior was getting even worse. So Kip started seeing Dr. Jeffrey Hicks of Eugene, Oregon, and Faith told him about her concerns regarding her son's interest in explosives, guns, and knives. Also, she stated that he had a tough relationship with his dad. During Kip's

first session with Dr. Hicks, Kip cried while talking about his dad because he thought his dad considered him a bad kid with bad habits, while his mom thought of him more as a good kid with bad habits. He didn't think his father had any faith in him to succeed in anything. After this session, Dr. Hicks determined that Kip didn't appear to have psychosis or any thought disorder, but he did diagnose him with major depressive disorder. Kip continued to go to sessions, but it turned out Dr. Hicks was a gun enthusiast himself, so in their sessions they spoke positively about guns. And I know everyone has their own opinions about guns, so we're

not saying they're good or bad, but in this situation, where a young boy who ended up using guns for very bad reasons sought therapy for it, and his counselor spoke positively about them, that doesn't really help here. During the sessions, Kip did take responsibility for his part in the rock incident as well as stealing CDs from target. Throughout the sessions, Dr. Hicks noted that Kip seemed less angry but was still very depressed and interested in explosives. Kip's fourth session was three months after his first one, so the sessions were definitely

pretty spread out. In April of 1997, so just three weeks after his fourth therapy session, Kip was suspended from school after he kicked a fellow student in the head. The other student had originally shoved Kip, and he fought back with more force. Kip was the only one who was punished for this since the other student was injured. And soon after he returned to eighth grade at Thurston Middle School, he was suspended yet again after chucking a pencil at a classmate.

And I just want to give you guys a mental image of Kip Kinkle before we move on. He's not a very big kid, he's not burly, muscular, or overweight. He's actually kind of small for his age, I would say. I think for his age, I mean, 15 kids are usually pretty small, but he's small and skinny. Yeah, he's kind of a scrawny kid, so I think maybe if he was being picked on, maybe he felt like his only way of getting back at these kids was to use excessive force. So go over the top, which is what happened in the case where he kicked this other classmate in the head. A little over a month after this incident in early June 1997, Kip had his sixth therapy session and started taking pro-Zach.

He told Dr. Hicks that the medication was helping with his anger a lot and that he was also sleeping better. He was even feeling less depressed and he didn't notice anything negative from the medication. A few weeks later, Kip and his dad Bill went out to buy a 9mm glock, which is a handgun for those who don't know, but Bill didn't buy it for him. He told Kip that he needed to do the research on which gun he was interested in getting, and that he had to use his own money for it. He also couldn't use it without Bill around, at least not until he was 21. Dr. Hicks was not happy about this though because he didn't think that Kip

should own a handgun at all, and he really wished that the parents would have discussed this with him first, because he would not have advised this. And I did say that Dr. Hicks was a gun enthusiast, so I know they did talk positively about them, but he still didn't think that Kip should have a gun at all. Yeah, and maybe the talk they had about guns could have been hunting rifles. I mean, an Oregon hunting is pretty popular. That's true. So it might not have had anything to do with handguns in the first place.

So in the end of July, Kip had his last counseling session with Dr. Hicks, and apparently didn't seem to be depressed. He had made a lot of improvements, actually. For whatever reason, Dr. Hicks and the Kinkles decided it would be okay to stop sessions since Kip was getting along with his parents and was overall in a better mood. So this was just Kip's 9th session. I'm not sure why they decided to stop the therapy just because he seemed to be doing

better. If anything, they should realize that therapy was working for him and that he should keep seeing Dr. Hicks or that nothing changes. When Heath and I lived in Eugene, I only lived there for like a year and a half, but when I did live there, I actually worked at a therapy office, and therapy is not a quick fix. You don't just go for a few months and then stop. Especially if you're showing the signs that Kip was. I mean, it just seems a little irresponsible to pull him out, and I'm not sure what their insurance situation was. You know, maybe their insurance would only cover a certain amount of sessions before the kinkles would have to pay,

but even Dr. Hicks thought he should terminate sessions, which is really odd. Yeah, I mean, I don't know what the progress was like with Kip, but it does to me seem a little premature considering the events that were going to happen later. It's not like he was going for years. I mean, he only went nine times. That's not a lot. You know, you don't just get better mentally. Your brain doesn't just improve like that. Yeah, and I'm thinking maybe they thought, Hey, he's on Prozac now. He seems like he's doing better. These nine sessions really helped. And now he's on medication. He just needs to keep taking the medication. He'll be fine.

A lot of people would call when I worked at the therapy office, they would call and they just said, Oh, I just want to come in for one or two sessions as if they would come in and get advice and then leave. But I always would talk to my co-workers about that and we would always just be like, like therapy isn't a quick fix like that. Like you need it for a long time for it to actually do things. I mean it seemed like it was working for him but I don't know I don't think they should have pulled him out obviously. That summer Kip bought yet another secret gun from a friend and this time it was a 22 caliber pistol. He added this to his collection which was now three guns, only one of which his parents

were aware of, and that one wasn't even his. It was technically his dad bills. That fall, Kip began attending thirst in high school as a freshman and this was the school that Bill used to teach Spanish at before switching to Lane Community College in Eugene. Kip was a freshman and he had a few good friends. He appeared to be doing well. He was doing better in school and even was invited to join the freshman football team.

This is something that his dad wanted him to do because like we mentioned Kip was kind of a skinny kid and he loved the Oregon Ducks football team and Bill thought that this would be a good opportunity to get out any anger that he had and to also make more friends. And Bill was still friends with a thirst in high school football coach so he called in a favor. At this same time, Kip stopped taking pro-Zac after having been on it for three months. Again, this was decided because Kip appeared to be doing well, but if something's finally working, stopping the medication

in therapy is only, in my opinion, going to stop the positive effects. You know, I mean, like I said, your mind doesn't just magically heal like that. So now Kip is entering high school, and he's out of therapy and off from his medication. And to make things a little bit more scary here, Bill agreed to let Kip buy yet another gun, and this time it was a Ruger 22 semi-automatic rifle, which are known to be used for target shooting and small game hunting. And around this time, Kip wrote a very alarming speech for his speech class regarding how to make a bomb.

And weirdly enough, people in this class weren't all that freaked out by it because it seemed like a lot of the kids were presenting obscure topics. One of his female classmates actually did a speech on how to join the Church of Satan, but regardless, Kip started to get a reputation around school. Many students thought that he was morbid and kind of strange. But also, Kip said some pretty unusual things to earn this reputation. He had said to someone that he wanted to join the army when he turned 18 so that he could see what it was like to kill someone. He listened to a lot of rage against the machine, Marilyn Manson, and

9-inch nails, which I guess a lot of people think is weird and creepy and dark, but it's just rock me. I mean, that was honestly just the thing in the late 90s. Yeah, I don't think that's weird at all. But in the end of 1997, there were two school shootings that happened in the US. One was in Pearl, Mississippi, which was where a 16 year old shot up his high school and killed two students. And I hope I'm saying this right, the other was in West Pataka, Kentucky, where a 14 year old shot up, praying students and killed three of them. Neither of the shooters killed themselves, and after Kip watched

the news coverage on this, he mentioned to his friends that if he did that, he would kill himself after, and he thought that these other kids were stupid for not doing so. At this point, Kip is 15 years old. And keep in mind at this time, school shootings were not a very common thing. Like Deftany mentioned, there had been two that year. But before that time, it really, really wasn't a thing in the United States. It wasn't something that I was afraid of growing up in the 90s. I wasn't either.

And I mean, I think in this time time like there was this too and then there was Columbine and I think there was a lot in this period of time for some weird reason, but this was kind of like the start of the school shootings. Obviously there were definitely some school shootings before this, but it seemed like this was kind of the start of an uptick. So although Kip had a few friends, they were becoming more and more alarmed by his behavior. In December 1997, one of his friends named Jeff Anderson was having a birthday celebration at his house after turning 15. And while the kids were playing video games,

Kip snuck away and went out to Jeff's driveway where he drew a big K. Jeff's mom told him that Kip was no longer allowed at the house, and we're not sure what Kip used to write the letter K or just how big it was, but Jeff's parents were absolutely pissed. We also read somewhere that he wrote the word kill in the driveway using whipped cream, but we're not sure which is true. Just a few months later, in March 1998, Kip and his friend watched more school shooting coverage where Kip told his friend he thought it was cool.

In May, Kip and his friends used 400 rolls of toilet paper, which is a lot to teepee someone's house. And Kip was one of the kids who was caught doing so. His parents grounded him after this, which embarrassed Kip because once again he was letting his parents down and he looked irresponsible, which really bothered him. Yet he couldn't stop offending. I mean, it's weird because he got so upset when he did bad things and he hated what his

parents thought of him when he did the bad things, but he couldn't stop doing them. But anyway, he was obviously very much back to acting out, and yet no one thought to put him back in therapy or back on his medication. After this, Kip's friend stole a gun from his dad, so he could sell it to Kip, and this transaction happened at school on the Thurston High School campus. Kip gave his friend $110 to buy the 32-calibre barretta semi-automatic pistol, which is a concealed carry and known to sometimes be used as a backup weapon. Kip's friend's dad actually noticed that the gun was missing and called the school thinking that one of his son's friends may have stolen it, so he gave the school a list of almost 12 boys who he believed could have had it, but Kip

wasn't one of the names. A detective already happened to be at Thurston High School and went around questioning the boys on the list, and some of them thought that Kip Kinkle might have had it. So the detective pulled Kip out of study hall to question him about the gun, and during their conversation Kip admitted that he had the gun and that it was in his locker and a paper sack. Kip and his friend Corey, who had given him the gun, were both arrested on the spot and even expelled. Something interesting I've noticed is that every time that Kip does something bad, he admits to it right away. Yeah, it's almost as if like he he's prepared to give himself up if he knows he's done something wrong.

Like he, like a lot of people would be like, no, like that's not my locker or something. And he knows that he's doing something wrong, which is another thing about admitting it, is he knows I messed up and I have to deal with the consequences, which is just really interesting to me. What I think is really interesting is the fact that a Kip to me, like from all the photos that I've seen and the stories that I've heard just growing up in the area is the fact that Kip to me, like from all the photos that I've seen and the stories that I've heard, just growing up in the area, it seems like Kip, from all the stuff that we've detailed.

In my mind, I thought he was kind of like a goody two shoes kid. This is kind of what I thought of him all through growing up and what I knew about him. I was like, wow, he seems like kind of like a square kid that went off, but it's crazy to dive into these details and find out that it was a slow progression into all of these things and they just kept building up and getting worse and worse. Because he offended so much, you mean? Yeah, right. It just seems so strange to me that one thing kind of led to another, like, first it was drop in the rock off of the overpass, and then it was buyin and then it was this and then it was you know what I mean it was like a progression of bad things right bad ideas from Kip. Kip was brought down to the station where he was charged with possession of a firearm in a public building which is a felony.

During Kip's interview, he was incredibly distraught and told the detective that he was worried about what his parents were going to think about what he did. Kip's parents were then called to pick him up and his dad Bill ended up getting him. At around 2pm on May 20, 1998, Bill picked up Kip from the police station and they headed to Burger King. During their drive to pick up lunch, Bill was really upset. He said, you're only 15 and you've already got two felonies. After they sat down in Burger King with the two whoppers they ordered, Bill apparently said, you disgust me, before getting up and eating his burger in the car, leaving

Kip inside. Kip later stated that he couldn't eat his burger because the voices in his head were too loud. So he threw his whopper away and went to go out to the car, but he was afraid his dad would ask him where his burger was and discover that he threw it away. He didn't want his dad to be mad at him for wasting money, so he went and sat in the bathroom for a few minutes before going back to the car. While they were driving home, Bill was still, of course, really upset with Kip. But Kip says he doesn't remember anything his dad said, because there were three voices in his head telling him to kill his dad. When Kipp and Bill got home, Kipp went up to his bedroom and cried.

He felt embarrassed that he disappointed his dad and that he was now expelled from school. According to Kip, voices in his head continued to tell him to kill his dad and that he had no other choice. At this time, the kinkles were living in a beautiful wooden a-frame house surrounded by trees in Springfield, Oregon, more specifically in a wooded area in the hills along the Mackenzie River, known as deerhorn, where there are a wooded area in the hills along the McKenzie River known as deer horn, where there are a lot of upscale homes. And I think he grew up in this house if I'm not mistaken. Yeah, so deer horn is actually kind of up the McKenzie River a little bit.

It's just about a 15 drive from Thurston High School though, so it's not like far. Around 3 p.m., Bill sat at the kitchen counter while he drank coffee because he headed off to work a little bit later since he taught night classes. So that's why he ended up picking up Kip from the police station since Faith was working during the day. As he sipped his coffee, Kip walked downstairs with a 22 caliber rifle and fired a single shot in the back of Bill's head.

His father died instantly. Kip then dragged his dad's body into the downstairs bathroom and covered him with a sheet. About an hour later, one of Kip's friends called the house and asked how he was doing and how his parents reacted. The friend then asked if his dad was home during their call and Kip said that he'd gone to the store. About 30 minutes later, a student who was in Bill's Spanish class at Lane Community College called the Kinkle home to see where Bill was since he hadn't shown up to class. Kip told the student that he wouldn't be in that day because of family problems. At around 6.30 pm, Kip's mother-fake returned home from work.

Kip went out to the garage to meet her there. Kip says the voices in his head said, kill her, look at what you've done, you have no other choice. While they were still in the garage, Kip got up behind his mom while she started to walk into the house and he said, I love you mom, before shooting her twice in the back of the head. He then shot her three more times in the face, and once in the heart to make sure that she was dead. He then covered her body with a sheet as well.

Kip later stated that the voices in his head also told him, get guns and bullets. You have no other choice. Go to the school and kill everybody. Look at what you've already done. Kip stayed home for the rest of the evening while his parents lay dead in the house and he even slept there overnight, which I think is just so eerie. That's very, very eerie. The following morning, which was Thursday, May 21, 1998, at 7.30am, Kip put on a long-tan trench coat and filled his school backpack with three guns and ammunition. It's interesting that he dressed in a trench coat because I think when a lot of us think of school shooters we think of trench coats and I feel like I personally think of this because of Columbine, but this happened around a year before Columbine did. Yeah, it's kind of strange and I think that

maybe Kip used a trench coat because it would be able to cover up the guns a little bit better and maybe that was just available to him and then then that kind of trend came along because I know when I was in high school I used to hang out with some goth kids and they would try and where their trench coats to school but they weren't allowed to specifically because of this case wow really yeah yeah without a doubt like they would wear their trench coats to school, their black trench coats, of course. And the principal would be like, no, you guys got to take those off. I mean, that's fair. Yeah, it's definitely fair. And I didn't have a problem with it either, so. But that's really interesting, well. Kip also taped a hunting knife to his leg, as well as bullets to his chest. And this was so he could kill himself after if he ran out of ammunition. He then got into his mother's fort explorer and drove the 15 minute ride to school by himself. And like we said, he was 15 years old, so as far as we know, Kip didn't drive yet, but this day, he did.

After parking about a block away from Thurston High School campus, he walked towards school and went inside towards the cafeteria. Since the first school bell hadn't run yet, Kip knew the majority of the student body would be hanging out in the cafeteria, waiting for their first class to begin. Before entering the cafeteria, he ran into one of his friends in the hall and told him to leave school because something bad was about to happen. Kip first shot 16-year-old Ben Walker, who was a sophomore. He had been standing in the hallway with his friends while he was shot. Ben hadn't always lived in Springfield and had actually only recently moved there from Southern Oregon with his family.

He was dating a girl named Cheyenne at the time of his death. He was known to be a very easygoing and all-around happy kid who who loved playing video games and his dream was to own a brewery someday. He died later in the hospital and his organs were donated to 12 people. So this kid literally saved 12 people with his organs after he was deceased. That's pretty amazing. Yeah, it's pretty incredible. Kip then went inside the cafeteria and fired 48 rounds with his rifle, which wounded 24 students. One of the other students that died in this attack was 17-year-old Michael Nicolawson. Michael was a junior in high school and was also a private in the Oregon National

Guard. At the time of his death, he was sitting at a table in the cafeteria doing homework with his fiance, Michelle Calhoun. Michael loved working with computers and was going to start training in the Oregon National Guard as soon as he finished out the school year, which was right around the corner since this happened in late May. He was going to be a systems analyst and computer programmer. While Kip was trying to reload his gun after he ran out of ammunition, a kid named Jacob Riker, who Kip had shot in the lungs, tackled him, followed by six other students.

They were punching Kip and trying to get the gun out of his hands while Kip was yelling at them to just kill him. The students were able to hold him until the police showed up and arrested him. By the time it was all over, 37 people had been struck and two were fatally shot. While Kip was in police custody, he got the knife that was taped to his leg and attacked one of the police officers hoping that they would shoot him. But instead, the officer maced him in the face. And I think Kip's whole reason behind all of this was death by cop.

Essentially, he wanted to be shot and killed after the incident. Well, and it's interesting looking back to when he had told his friends that if he ever shot up a school, he would kill himself, but I think he just couldn't do it. Which I mean, I understand that must be a horrifying moment. I just think that he just couldn't do it until he wanted somebody else to do it, but nobody was gonna kill him. Well, I think also he kind of didn't have the opportunity

because while he's sitting there shooting students, these other students come up and tackle him to the ground, I don't think he had the opportunity to really kill himself at that point. And so maybe he was thinking, okay, well, if I pull this knife from my leg, attack this officer, he's definitely gonna shoot me, but it didn't go down like that. That's true, and that's why he taped the knife to himself in the first place in case

he didn't get a chance to shoot himself, it's just really sad. Kip then told police about his parents. At 9.30 a.m., police headed over to the Kinkles home in Springfield. When they arrived, there was an opera song from the Romeo and Juliet soundtrack. The one that was released in 1996 with Leonardo DiCaprio. Kipp had become obsessed with that film after reading the book in his English class. The music was blasting so loud in the house that the officers had to shout to each other and the CD had been set to repeat. In the living room, there were hundreds of rounds of ammunition laying all over the living room floor. Police quickly found the bodies of Faith and Bill Kinkle, along with several explosives which they detonated.

And I just want to say, first of all, probably the scariest thing you could do as a police officer is walk into a house and there's an opera song playing and then find dead bodies. It sounds horrifying. That just sounds straight out of a thriller movie. Ugh, so terrifying. I don't think that the explosives were very big, obviously.

I think there were just small ones. I don't know what his point was of doing these, but if we know anything about Kip, he loves explosives. So the following year, during Kip Kinkl's sentencing, several mental health experts tried to prove that Kip was mentally ill during the time of the attack, and that he even potentially had schizophrenia. Yet Dr. Hicks stated in the notes he wrote while treating Kip that he was in fine mental health. It was discovered around this time that the Kinkles have a serious mental health history on both faith and bills side of the family, but they never mentioned this to Kip's psychologist. And this could have likely made a difference in Dr. Hicks overall evaluation of Kip

if he had known this. Kip's sister Kristen really didn't want Kip to plead guilty by reason of insanity because she thought it was unfair to everyone who would have to sit through the lengthy trial. She believed that it was more just for him to plead guilty and spare everyone else. So on September 24th, 1999, just three days before the jury's selection, Kip Kinkle pleaded guilty to murder and attempted murder. A little over a month later, Kip was sentenced to 111 years in prison without the possibility of parole, but he was not given the death penalty due to his age. About eight years later, in June 2007, Kip sought a new trial after believing that his attorneys

should have gone to trial and proven that he was guilty by reason of insanity, even though it was his choice to dodge the trial after he talked to his sister. During the appeal, two psychiatrists attempted to prove that Kip had indeed shown signs of paranoia, as well as schizophrenia during the shootings in 1998. And I know that it's like a really hard to prove insanity. So this must have been really tough for them, but this appeal went on for about three months before the judge finally decided not to grant Kip a new trial. But Kip continued to appeal and he continued to be denied.

To this day, Kip Kinkl remains incarcerated at the Oregon State Correctional Institution in Salem. While he was in prison, he received his GED and eventually even his bachelor's degree. He later received his electrical license and became the prison's electrician. He also teaches yoga and the mental health ward. He's a part of the basketball team and enjoys exercising as well as reading and educating himself as much as possible. He's very spiritual and those who have visited him or spent time with him in prison say that he has found peace and remains incredibly remorseful for all the things he did

when he was 15 years old. It's awful because this kid clearly had very extreme mental health issues that weren't properly and consistently treated, and he ended up doing something horrible to a lot of people. We cover a lot of cases where the perpetrators show no regret and take no blame for their actions, yet Kip always has. It doesn't at all take away from the horrible things he did, but it's just sad that any of this had to happen at all. Especially now hearing about all the things he's doing and how at peace he's become and how much he appears to have healed mentally, it's just a shame that couldn't have happened before he killed innocent people. To this day, he avoids interviews and the media, but when he has been interviewed, he states that

his parents were good people who didn't deserve to die, and that no one deserved to die, and he wishes that he could take it all back. Most of the students and victims of Kip Kinkle believe he should remain behind bars, but some have thought about visiting him to find closure from the situation, especially since Kip has expressed so much regret and remorse. But regardless, these people will live with the horrors of what happened that spring day in 1998 for the episode of Going West.

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