A 'red flag' just isn't enough

By Staff
Rebecca James, Franklin County Times
Most of the country has been glued to the television with the unfolding of the tragedy at Virginia Tech, myself included.
The more news that comes out about shooter Cho Seung-Hui, the more it becomes obvious that several red flags had been raised prior to the massacre.
Two female students had complained that Seung-Hui was stalking them. A teacher had threatened to quit unless he was removed from her class. All the signs were there, and yet, the public says no one did anything about it.
School administrators even went as far to send him to a mental health institution for an evaluation in 2005, and was sent for outpatient treatment.
Officials contend that despite the warning signs, there was no indication that he should have been jailed or contended.
Furthermore, there's not a lot that police could have done.
You can't arrest a guy because he doesn't fit in or because he's a little weird, and as it turns out a lot weirder than anyone knew.
In hindsight, it's easy to say "he should have been thrown in a mental hospital when they had the chance."
Well, if they could have done that, they would have.
People have the wrong interpretation of what is really going on here.
They say police and school administrators dropped the ball. On the contrary. They did everything they could do without violating this guy's civil rights.
Again, in hindsight it's easy to say that he should have been put in jail months ago. They ran him through every legal process they could and some expert somewhere said he was "not a threat."
Essentially, that means "let him go."
This same person that was deemed no threat committed the most horrific mass murder in U.S. history.
My heart and prayers go out to the victims of the Virginia Tech massacre but please realize that we cannot pin this on the administrators and police at Virginia Tech.
They did all they could. If anything failed anyone, it's the system of conduct they had to follow.