The strange seasonality of violence: Why April is ‘the beginning of the killing season’
Mass-murder researchers and terrorism experts do not like turning their calendars to April. For them, it marks the beginning of what one calls “the killing season.”
Timothy McVeigh blew up a federal building in Oklahoma City in April 1995. Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed 13 people at Columbine High School in April 1999. Seung Hui Cho killed 32 students and teachers at Virginia Tech in April 2007.
Waco. The Boston Marathon bombing. A mass stabbing in Pennsylvania.
Over the past two decades, April’s significance has become a source of concern for those who monitor hate groups and one of fascination for academics who study the seasonality of violence.
Aggravated assaults spike in summer — people are outside more, and the heat agitates. Burglars take the winter off because people hibernate in their homes. But why would April, with its cheerful tulips and spring sunshine, trigger so much extreme violence?
Timothy McVeigh, who bombed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995, is escorted two days later from the Noble County Courthouse in Perry, Okla. (DAVID LONGSTREATH/ASSOCIATED PRESS)“It’s a question we talk about all the time,” said Heidi Beirich, a domestic terrorism expert at the Southern Poverty Law Center, one of two groups that have issued April-related violence alerts. “It’s a really strange phenomenon. We sometimes refer to April as the beginning of the killing season.”
One of the factors that makes April particularly significant to threat assessment professionals, researchers and others is the desire of killers to pay homage to Columbine, other violent anniversaries and even Adolf Hitler’s birthday (April 20) by acting on the same date.
“April is a month that looms large in the calendar of many extremists in the United States, from racists and anti-Semites to anti-government groups,” the Anti-Defamation League has warned. “Because of these anniversaries, law enforcement officers, community leaders and school officials should be vigilant.”
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Even the weather may contribute to April’s dangers, experts say. The beginning of warm temperatures can stir action among the depressed and socially isolated.
Some researchers question the concept of seasonality. They point out that April is certainly not the only month for carnage. Aaron Alexis killed 12 people at the Washington Navy Yard in September 2013. Adam Lanza killed 20 first-graders and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December 2012. Jared Lee Loughner killed six and wounded 11, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), in January 2011.
“You might say, ‘Look, Kennedy was killed in November’ and now you look at all the bad things that happened in November and wonder why it’s so violent,” said David Phillips, a sociologist at the University of California at San Diego who has studied the timing of violence and suicide. “You have to be careful.”