The young people who killed Rachel Burkheimer on one day and those who killed John Jasmer on another raise sobering questions. Those who knew but didn’t prevent or report the killings – the watchers – raise questions even more chilling.
Killers and watchers alike knew their victims as friends. Both killings were at close range.
Sex and jealousy played parts in both Snohomish County killings, but neither was impulsive. In fact, both killings had moments in which killers and watchers could have had second thoughts.
Watchers did not tell adults who would stop it. Even after the killings, killers and watchers expressed confused, blurry loyalties to each other.
The young people had voids – “holes where their hearts used to be” in Willie Nelson’s words – where you’d expect disabling shock, grief or remorse. Even experienced professionals were struck by their emptiness.
Those professionals groped in vain for answers to the emptiness. One of the defense attorneys at the sentencing hearing listed several possible explanations, but gave up on making sense of the brutal murder. The judge concurred.
There is, I think, a strong urge to tie these youngsters’ actions and inactions to some concrete explanation and then, I suppose, throw the concrete overboard, hoping it will sink permanently out of sight.
But the successful investigation and prosecution of young people for two murders should not mask this fact. These 10 killers and their entourages are individually responsible for their actions and inactions, and they are symptoms of even bigger problems.
Most of the killers and watchers who victimized Rachel were themselves abandoned and abused by adults early in their lives and in obvious ways. Theirs were impoverished histories of failed foster placements, exploitation and street life.
Young people with similar histories often make positive choices. But these young folks formed a pathetic, dangerous, self-serving-and-preserving tribe – and killed a friend for breaking code. It reeks of “Lord of the Flies” tribal behavior.
We know that young people, and especially young males, can be extremely aggressive. Theirs is the age of young soldiers exactly because of that. For many adolescents around the world, war is a good fight with adult supervision.
Neither the tribe that killed Rachel nor the one the killed John rejected authority. Rather, both bestowed authority on the young males who seemed most aggressive.
Those who killed John and those who watched were different than those who killed Rachel in an important way. They looked and smelled good. They were socially skilled and moved comfortably in the mainstream community. They did well in school, had money and resources, dressed well and played sports.
But they also formed a deadly “Lord of the Flies” tribe and killed a friend. More to the point, they danced the dance of “A Tribe Apart.” Patricia Hearsch first spotted and named this phenomenon in her book by the same name.
Neighborhood, school and socio-economic status do not define relationships and loyalties within a “tribe apart.” Those things used to help parents track their children’s activities and interests. Not in this case, and perhaps no longer.
John’s killers and watchers came from at least six high schools between Seattle and Everett. Some don’t even know each other personally.
Hearsch notes a particularly disturbing quality. “Tribe apart” members simultaneously, and without personal conflict, operate in the larger pro-social community and in their parallel tribal community.
Magnets other than schools and neighborhood drew them together, and held them in a loosely loyal group. Hearsch points out that such tribes are drawn together by interests such as music, dance, movies, video games and illegal behaviors such as drugs and graffiti.
It is unsettling that a large number of teenagers, over a long period of time, heard about, talked about and planned the murder of a friend without effective adults doing something to prevent it.
“Tribe apart” members stay in touch with each other in ways largely invisible to adults. In this case, cell phones, text messaging, instant messaging and common interest chat rooms helped keep members under adult radar. It is hard to overestimate the power of this communication. It holds young people together and largely keeps adults at arm’s distance.
With all of their contacts spread over several schools, neighborhoods and even towns, if members find parents who let them drink or use drugs at their house, they become models of ineffective adults. Parties become tribal grounds.
If parents’ personal or work lives make them unavailable at certain important times, those become times and places that a “tribe apart” lacks adult leadership. They draw closer together.
If they can text message their plans under the noses of adults at home or in school, those communications can become ways for tribes to grow.
Young people have always needed the leadership of adults. Without it, they tend to sink to their lowest moral denominator. “Lord of the Flies” is a brilliant literary description of that kind of descent.
Today’s dilemma is that groups of young people can spend hours seeming to be in the presence of adults but without their active leadership.
The dilemma cries out for parents and other caring adults to assert their presence, to engage with young people in their lives, and to have a deep interest in what draws and holds them together.
It calls for adults to be deeply interested in youngsters as people.
Bill France, a father of three, is a child advocate in the criminal justice system and has worked as director of clinical programs at Luther Child Center in Everett. Send e-mail to bsjf@gte.net.
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