Reuters, 5 December 1997
WEST PADUCAH, Ky. (Reuters) – A fantasy scene in the 1995 film “The Basketball Diaries” may have inspired the Kentucky shooting rampage in which a 14-year-old boy killed three classmates and wounded five, a prosecutor said Thursday.
Michael Carneal, who faces murder charges after opening fire on a school prayer group Monday, has told authorities he remembers a scene in the movie that resembles the shootings, Commonwealth Attorney Timothy Kaltenbach said.
“I asked if he had ever seen this before, ever seen anything done like this, and he said, ‘Yes, I have seen this done in “Basketball Diaries.”‘ And I can tell you this, there is such a scene in ‘Basketball Diaries,”‘ Kaltenbach told reporters.
The movie, which starred Leonardo DiCaprio, was based on writer Jim Carroll’s 1978 memoir about a high school boy’s life filled with basketball, poetry and drugs. One scene features a fantasy in which the protagonist shoots classmates and a teacher.
“I think that these movies are a factor, one factor that people come up with some of these ideas,” Kaltenbach said.
Bill Bond, principal of Heath High School, where the shootings took place, has said Carneal’s essays revealed a boy who felt he was constantly being ridiculed.
Three girls died in the attack, launched just as classes were set to resume Monday morning. The organs of one girl were donated for transplants, and two men have received her heart and lungs.
Of the five wounded students, two girls remained in a hospital. Bond said one was paralyzed from the waist down, but a hospital spokesman would not confirm that.
–Reuters Limited
Webmaster’s note: Also in the Louisville Courier-Journal (5 Dec. 1997) page A7, it was reported that “…through an agent, (Jim) Carroll said yesterday he was ‘extremely saddened by the recent events in Kentucky.’ He denied any connection between his book, ‘written thirty years ago and the killings. What happened in Kentucky was a product of the pernicious violence of our time and the act of an unbalanced individual.'”
It was also a lead story on NBC NIGHTLY NEWS, showing film clips from the movie of DiCaprio shooting up his classroom. The reporters did point out that that was a dream sequence.
The sheriff and other officials in McCracken County also stated that they did not think the movie itself was a motive for the shootings.
Thanks to Paul for submitting this story to the website.