Sandy Hook: FBI releases 1,500 pages of documents on 2012 school shooting

The documents reveal more about the gunman Adam Lanza life just prior to killing 20 children at the school

Kyra Murray holds a photo with victims of the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School during a press conference at the US Capitol 18 September 2013 in Washington, DC. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)

The FBI has just released 1,500 pages of documents that shed more light on the tragic 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut.

Twenty children and six adults were gunned down that day by the shooter Adam Lanza, who then killed himself.

In the wake of the shooting, the FBI assisted local and state police with the exhaustive investigation and the documents released are comprised of field notes of witness statements from Lanza’s neighbors, his life in the weeks and months leading up to the shooting, and more information from his school and medical records.

The trove also contains information gathered from grand jury subpoenas of internet companies Lanza frequently viewed.

There are also accounts of his relationship with his mother Nancy, whom Lanza shot four times and killed just before going to the elementary school.

According to agents’ field notes Lanza led an isolated existence in the months prior to the shooting, only listening to Japanese techno music and playing video games.

He and his mother only communicated via email because he did not leave his room for three months.

Ms Lanza, according to witness accounts, was worried and planned to move to Seattle the following spring in the hopes it would improve her son’s life.

She had once worked at the school, which Lanza also attended, and one document detailed that "Lanza apparently felt his mother loved the students more than she loved him.”

He also did not leave his house when superstorm Sandy had hit the east coast in October 2012, though the power had been cut for several days.

One set of notes indicated Lanza “had no real friends”.

A witness also told agents that the gunman had been bullied in school, but “not excessively,” due to his “social awkwardness” and physical appearance.

Lanza was considered underweight for his height and age at the time of his death.

An online friend, whom he met on a website dedicated to the 1999 Columbine High School mass shooting, called him the “weirdest person online” in one witness interview conducted.

She also noted that Lanza used screen names that were styled to honour mass shooters like German Tim Kretschmer and Canadian Kimveer Gill.

The FBI’s summary of the interview is chilling: "He was singularly focused and obsessed with mass murders … Lanza devoted almost all his internet activity to researching and discussing mass murders and spree killings.”

Lanza also had a prior run-in with the bureau.

When he was in ninth grade, he had hacked through two levels of security into a government computer. The redacted documents did not indicate which agency.

Reportedly agents who visited the Lanza home spoke to Lanza's mother and “told her that if her son was that smart, he could have a job with them someday.”