A swastika was mowed into a field. Was it part of a chain of events that led to murder?

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Public Safety

A swastika was mowed into a field. Was it part of a chain of events that led to murder?

By Justin Jouvenal December 26 at 9:31 PM

Neighbors said the display of hate in a Lorton, Va., community was as large as it was shocking: a swastika roughly 40 feet across mowed into the grass of a community field.

Tire marks from a riding mower ran from the lot and up a road to the home of a teen who was known as troubled in the neighborhood, leaving little mystery as to the perpetrator, a neighbor said. Residents of Gunston Manor were soon debating how to handle the situation: go to police or talk to the teen’s family directly? ... The latter plan won out — and now some regret that decision.

The incident came roughly two months before the 17-year-old allegedly shot and killed the parents of his 16-year-old girlfriend in their Reston home Friday. Scott Fricker, 48, and Buckley Kuhn-Fricker, 43, had forbidden their daughter to see the teen after family and friends said the couple discovered a Twitter account they believed was linked to the teen. It retweeted tweets praising Hitler, made derogatory comments about Jews, called for “white revolution,” and showed an image of a man hanging from a noose beneath a slur for gays, among other objectionable content.

The teen, who has been charged with two counts of murder, remains hospitalized in critical condition after turning the gun on himself.

{A teen is charged with killing his girlfriend’s parents. They had worried he was a neo-Nazi.}
....

Peter Hermann and Ellie Silverman contributed to this report.

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[elleng]

1. The youngster is certainly troubled,

and likely for a long time. Many similarly situated, no doubt.

What to do?