He relays the sad saga of the abuse that Eric Hainstock suffered at the hands of his unfit parents.
Nichols writes:
The "board of education" in the Hainstock house was a paddle, one with those very words written upon it in what was surely supposed to be an amusing pun, that prosecutors once said his dad used to whomp on him.
Shawn Hainstock, a 2001 abuse complaint alleged, also spanked his son with a belt, kicked him, threatened him with juvenile court and foster care - something that, actually, would have been a blessing. Instead he lived in a home that was a curse.
Everyone wonders what schools can do to stop these kids. The answer: nothing.
That's not true.
Schools can employ measures to keep weapons out.
It's just not true that schools can do nothing to stop the violence.
I think most school officials harbor that "It can't happen here" attitude. That's a problem that needs to be addressed, inadequate assessment of the threat.
The fact is it can happen -- anywhere.
Certainly, they try. The abuse complaint filed against Shawn Hainstock, which eventually resulted in a deferred prosecution agreement and then was dismissed, suggests it was the school that notified authorities of the abuse after the boy wrote about it in class.
As a result, Eric Hainstock was placed with a grandmother until April of 2002, when he was allowed to return to his home. Not that it was ever much of one.
Eric Hainstock's parents divorced in 1993 after a short marriage, and Judge Patrick Taggart found in a 1995 opinion that both had "serious limitations." Both were instructed, among other things, not to take the boy, who was 4 years old, to any taverns.
Although unemployed and on disability, the father seems to have had some redeeming qualities.
The boy's mother apparently wanted so little to do with him, or with child support payments, that her parental rights were terminated entirely in 2000. That was shortly before police were told that the boy had a problem that affected his behavior and that his family could no longer afford medication or counseling.
One of the reasons, court records suggest, that his mother was not better at supporting him? She apparently remarried and got pregnant not long after the divorce was finalized and, according to a 1996 letter sent to the Sauk County Child Support Agency, couldn't work for a while because of pregnancy-related discomfort.
Eric Hainstock had a horrible home life.
He had parents who didn't care for him properly, a father who beat him and a mother who didn't even want to bother to do that.
It seems that Nichols is trying to make a connection between Hainstock's crimes and his lack of medication and counseling.
Is he suggesting that the police should be blamed for letting Hainstock slip through the cracks, or that the government is at fault because Hainstock didn't have his medical needs met?
I'm not sure what Nichols is suggesting. I think he may be saying that one shouldn't blame Hainstock for being a monster. Instead, one should blame the creators of the monster.
Eric Hainstock is 15 years old and if he is found guilty he should spend his life in a cell. But 15 is not 25, and you have to acknowledge that it takes some kind of odd crucible to warp a kid that young.
That doesn't happen because some board of education somewhere - a real one - didn't mandate enough counselors or anti-bully programs. Schools aren't parents, much as some parents would like them to be.
That's not just unrealistic. When a kid has a warped view of a parent to start with, that can, we now know, also be dangerous.
So, who's to blame for Hainstock bringing a gun to school and killing the principal?
His dad?
His mom?
The police?
The Sauk County Child Support Agency?
Nichols declares that the school can't be blamed. He believes that Hainstock didn't murder Klang because a board of education failed to put an anti-bully program in place or provide counselors.
It's strange that Nichols would say that, considering earlier in his column he implied that Hainstock's lack of counseling played a part in his violent, deadly outburst.
Whatever, Nichols insists that the school is not at fault.
He also believes that fifteen-year-old Eric is not to be blamed. He was as much a victim of circumstances as Klang. Nichols wants some sympathy for Eric Hainstock. He was abused. He had a very rough life. So he committed murder.
I think that Hainstock deserves some sympathy for being born into such a difficult and loveless environment; but if every kid that had a rough home life shot and killed the principal, then there would be a shortage of principals.
Many, many kids suffer in bad homes. Very, very few decide that the appropriate response is to go to school and kill someone.
Was Eric Hainstock a victim?
Yes.
Did that, in turn, give him license to victimize?
No.
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