Talk:List of rampage killers in the Americas

2012 Seattle Shooting, 2012 Oregon shooting

I noticed there aren't entries about the shooting spree in Seattle in May when 5 people including the gunman were killed. Also the shooting spree in Oregon a few days before the Connecticut shooting. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.75.231.27 (talk) 05:18, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

They were not added, because they do not meet the lists terms of inclusion. (Lord Gøn (talk) 15:03, 23 December 2012 (UTC))

Unborn Child

Unborn Child?

Very odd emphasis, how about "Killed pregnant WOMAN"? What she is just the container for the fetus and does not count? Pearl2525 (talk) 05:51, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

Well, of course the mother of the child is counted, either among those killed, or among those wounded. Unborn children are counted in neither, so they are mentioned in the Add Notes. (Lord Gøn (talk) 23:32, 27 July 2012 (UTC))

Sorting

When sorting the table by number of victims killed or injured, it appears to be sorting lexicographically (e.g. 2, 23, 3, 4, 45, 5, etc.) rather than numerically, probably because the ranges (10-12, etc.) aren't numbers, but text. Is there a way this can be fixed? Kasanax (talk) 16:49, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

Yes, there is. Shall it be done? (Lord Gøn (talk) 23:28, 27 July 2012 (UTC))

adam lanza

I added adam lanza as a rampage killer, is there some reason he isnt' considered a rampage killer?--Patbahn (talk) 19:41, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

Sure, he is, but there is an entire section dedicated exclusively to school massacres and that's the place where he is listed. As it says in the introduction here:

This section does not include school massacres, ...

(Lord Gøn (talk) 20:23, 16 December 2012 (UTC))

This list is so incomplete as to be useless, listing as it does only one mass murder in Mexico in this century. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.233.129.242 (talk) 05:22, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

If you know of any other cases that fit the list's terms of inclusion go ahead and add them, or at least do us the favour and post some links to reliable sources, so someone else can do it. Though, if you have all those massacres in mind that were committed by the narcos, don't bother, since gang-related violence is not what this list is about. (Lord Gøn (talk) 17:19, 24 December 2012 (UTC))

"Killers" who failed to kill anyone

There seems to be the beginning of a revert war in which two editors have removed from this table the "killers" who have zero deaths to their name. One editor attempted to put this material back in (since re-reverted), based on a discussion at Talk:List of rampage killers. There actually seem to be two discussions of the subject there, and adding together the comments, there were four editors who believed the zero-death "killers" should not be listed, and one who believed they should be. The latter editor is also the editor who reverted those entries back into the list (they have since been reverted out.) Now, four to one is not exactly a clear consensus of the community, but logic is clearly on the side of the "majority" in this case. We really cannot call someone a "killer" if they haven't succeeded in killing anyone, regardless of what arbitrary "criteria" might have been selected by one or more editors of the article. Neutron (talk) 15:35, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Actually, we shouldn't be listing people as 'rampage killers' unless they have been convicted in a court of law as such. As it stands, the article grossly violates WP:BLP policy, by including living people who have been arrested, but not convicted. AndyTheGrump (talk) 15:48, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

I agree with both above. I personally have no objection to including incidents with no deaths, but if we do go that way, the scope of the article needs to change. Particularly, I would suggest renaming the series to List of rampage attackers. But if this list is about killers, including people who killed no-one is silly and legitimately could be considered a WP:BLP violation. Also, Andy is correct. We should not, and can not include people not convicted for the same reasons. People on trial warrant the presumption of innocence and there is no reason not to wait until conviction. Resolute 15:54, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

I've removed the most obvious WP:BLP violations. I've left Nicholas Troy Sheley on the list for now, as although the article lists him as 'arrested', he has been convicted for two murders. His inclusion is questionable though, in that the two murders he has been convicted of don't meet the article criteria. AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:04, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

What would you suggest for those who have been found unfit to stand trial? They are alive, and have never been (and in most cases, never will be) convicted, while continuing to be "mandatory guests" of the state. And then there are those who have been found not guilty by reason of insanity, although that finding does imply that they committed the act with which they are charged, but that they are not legally responsible for it due to their mental condition. Neutron (talk) 16:23, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

What I suggest is that this list complies with WP:BLP policy - only it isn't a suggestion, it is a requirement. If living people haven't been convicted of crimes, we do not state that they have committed them. Ever. This isn't open to negotiation. AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:30, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

I'm trying to have a reasonable discussion with you here. You don't need to verbally stamp your feet at me. I do think that someone found unfit to stand trial should not be listed, but I think the community could reasonably go either way on those found not guilty by reason of insanity. It's basically a plea of "I did it but I'm not responsible for my actions." I am not certain whether, legally, the presumption of innocence still applies to such a person; but I am fairly certain that in determining whether they should be released from the "hospital", the system does take their "crime" into account, so in practical terms the presumption of innocence is not fully intact, at the very least. Plus, if we're not allowed to assume that such a person committed the crime, we've got a major problem at John Hinckley, Jr. Neutron (talk) 16:54, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

I think I both agree and disagree with that. Consider also a rampage that ends in suicide. There will never be a conviction, but there is also no question about whom the perpetrator(s) is/are, so inclusion remains policy compliant. Likewise, for people found mentally unfit, that would probably have to be considered on a case-by-case basis. If reliable sources/the courts basically say "this person did it, but no trial can happen due to this circumstance", that doesn't generally mean the entry has to be removed. We should, however, be specific in our notes. Resolute 16:56, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Ok, since I have created this list, I probably know best what it is supposed to be about, and as I have repeatedly explained in other discussion about the same subject, it is entirely constructed around the German word "Amokläufer". It is not my fault that there is no corresponding English word for it with exactly the same meaning. When I chose to name it List of mass murderers and spree killers, two other terms that are used as synonyms for it in English speaking countries, there were complaints that some cases were not mass murders, and I refered them to the term "mass murder by intention", which is used in the scientific literature to describe someone who intended to kill a lot of people, but failed to do so, and makes clear that the experts know that the current terminology is insufficient to encompass the entire phenomenon of mass assaults. Then somebody renamed it to "rampage killers" and I thought, ok if people prefer that, so be it, but the problem still remains, it does not adequately describe the German "Amokläufer", it is merely synonymous.

I can only repeat the question I have asked in one of the other discussions: What word would you use to identify an armed person, running through the streets with the intent to murder as many people as possible, injuring more than 30, but failing to kill a single one of them? If you have a better term than "rampage killer", one the common populace actually uses, I'm all ears.

@AndyTheGrump - To call my objection simply "bollocks" is not particularly civil, and before you went to delete several cases in a more or less randomly fashion, you could at least have discussed the matter here first, because all the entries you have deleted are sourced, and the sources either explicitly state that the people named are the perpetrators, or make clear that there is no reasonable doubt that they are the culprits. To even think that Dekraai is not the person who shot those eight people in the hair salon is completely unreasonable and has no foundation in any of the available sources. And for Abel Klemmensen there was a source that stated that he was in prison for the murders, and even though the article is not available online anymore, you could've at least bothered enough to copy-paste the headline into Google translate, which may have put a dent into your certainty of "no source for conviction" with a "No parole for Abel". Everette has been sentenced to life imprisonment and died in jail in the early 80s. The sources for Malagon and Rodriguez never say they are the alleged perpetrators, they clearly state they did it, and ain't Wikipedia based on what sources say? I'm off now, but could you please refer me to the policy that forbids to mention someone in connection with a crime as long as he is not convicted, even though it is beyond certainty that he or she committed it, or where the sources blatantly state that this is the person who did it? Also it is almost impossible to find out if a man like Rodriguez has been convicted or not, after all it happened in the Dominican Republic in 1968, so no western newspaper probably gave a rat's ass about what happened to him after the initial reporting. Would it be preferable to completely omit the case, even though we know it happened, or should we say the perp is unknown, even though his name has been reported? (Lord Gøn (talk) 17:08, 30 August 2013 (UTC))

WP:BLPCRIME. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 17:19, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Lord Gøn, let me make this absolutely clear - inclusion of any living person on a 'list of rampage killers' who has not been convicted in a court of law of the said crimes is a clear and unambiguous violation of Wikipedia WP:BLP policy, and cannot ever be tolerated. If you, or anyone else, violates policy in such a gross manner again, I will revert it - and if this is repeated I will report the matter, and ask that those responsible be blocked from editing. And yes, your edit summary stating that "the list's terms of inclusion make very clear that mass murders by intention are also included" was utter bollocks because firstly the article's terms of inclusion say no such thing, and secondly, even if they did, it would still be a gross violation of WP:BLP policy to include such people. I don't give a toss about what "Amokläufer" means in English, or about anything else you have to say as the 'owner' of this article - WP:BLP policy is non-negotiable. We do not base such article content on what we consider 'reasonable doubt' - ever. So yes, I wasn't civil - and why should I be, when you have shown such utter disregard for basic Wikipedia policy. If you wan't to complain about my ;incivility', feel free to do so - but expect to be held accountable for your own actions. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:08, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

(ec) Lord Gon, I think your response demonstrates some of the difficulties in having this type of list at all. For one thing, I know of no two- or three-word phrase in English that encompasses both a person who killed a lot of other people, and someone who tried to kill a lot of people but succeeded only in injuring them. What I do know know is that you cannot call someone in the latter group a "killer"; whether that's because of WP:BLP, old-fashioned common sense, or just plain human decency is not really the issue. Just because an adequate term does not exist does not mean you can go ahead and lump people together because you think there needs to be a list. And there are number of other problems with these lists. Listing living persons who are awaiting trial (and probably, those unfit to stand trial due to a mental condition) as "killers" is one big problem. Another problem is the way you have divided up these lists into different types of killings. On which list would I find Timothy McVeigh? Or Mohamed Atta (et al)? Each of them killed a lot more people than any of the people on this particular list. Is there some other list for people who used explosives or airplanes, rather than guns or knives? Neutron (talk) 18:19, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

What about my suggestion above? List of rampage attackers? Resolute 18:46, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Doesn't remotely solve the WP:BLP problem - and made-up names for lists are rarely satisfactory. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:51, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

We are dealing with two BLP problems here, and this suggestion is quite obviously intended only to solve one of them. Once we settle on the proper scope, we can then settle on the proper entries. Resolute 19:14, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

First of all, it is fairly obvious that none of you has actually taken the time to study the subject of mass murder and rampage killing, or read any of the relevant scientific literature, so to me, who has dedicated five years of his life to put this list together, and read thousands of newspaper articles, scientific essays, and books about the topic, many of your objections about killers that killed no one seem pretty absurd. As Kelleher writes in "Flash Point: The American Mass Murderer": Many mass murderers injure far more victims than they kill; however, they must certainly be considered mass murderers by the obvious intention of their actions. For example, if an individual randomly attacks children in a school yard with an AK-47 assault rifle or indiscriminately assaults coworkers with a powerful handgun, yet only manages to kill two individuals while wounding dozens, is he less an intended mass murderer than the perpetrator whose aim was better or whose victims were less fortunate? Certainly he is not. So why should we omit cases, just because the perpetrators failed to achieve what they set out to do, being to kill people? Because the term used to describe them is inadequate? That doesn't make any sense.

WP:BLPCRIME does not strictly prohibit to name an unconvicted offender, it merely states that you should "give serious consideration to not including material in any article suggesting that the person has committed, or is accused of committing, a crime unless a conviction is secured." I am giving serious consideration in every case, and I do not include those where the sources raise any doubt that the accused is the actual offender, but those cases that you can find here are all of a kind where the sources left no doubt that the arrested were the ones who committed the crime. It is very rare that a rampage killer is not captured red handed, the nature of the crime makes that nearly impossible, so it is almost never questioned if the right person was caught, and the trials mostly revolve around the culprit's sanity. The policy also applies only to "people who are relatively unknown", and most rampage killers cease to be relatively unknown right at the point where they start to kill people. By their very actions they become high profile criminals and make sure they get into the spotlight of the public, so the application of WP:BLPCRIME for this list is rather questionable in my eyes.

I remember a similar discussion in 2011 about naming Jared Lee Loughner who was caught at the crime scene, gun in hand, and where even suggesting that he may not've been the one who shot Gabrielle Giffords and the others was simply ridiculous. Even if he wouldn't have been found guilty, the fact would remain that he was the person who pulled the trigger, and therefore would be a rampage killer, conviction or not. The same discussion had been going on in the case of James Eagan Holmes and it was eventually settled by calling him a suspect, because everybody knew that not naming him as the perpetrator of the Aurora shooting would be foolish in the eyes of every halfway reasonable person.

@AndyTheGrump - I've never said that I "own" the article, but you can't deny the fact that I am the one who created it and does pretty much all the work here, so who else would know what this list was supposed to be about? And as I have already explained in previous discussions all the experts know that the current terminology is insufficient and frequently come up with new creations in an attempt to fill a terrible gap in the English vocabulary, but so far with little success. The German language now has such a term, so you tell me why this list should not use it as its base? The terms of inclusion make clear enough what can be found here, or at least they did, before The Rambling Man deleted them, and the only problems seem to be that readers either have the wrong expectations when reading the term "rampage killer", or are simply not knowledgable enough regarding the topic. Furthermore, I really don't know why you feel the necessity to be so rude, and even if you are very adamant that your interpretation of WP:BLP is the correct one, even though I certainly digress, you could at least give me the benefit of the doubt and assume good faith.

@Neutron - The list is divided in a way that corresponds to the relevant scientific literature, and if you bother to delve into the subject you will see why Atta and McVeigh are not listed. They may be mass murderers, and terrorists, but they are not rampage killers. (Lord Gøn (talk) 01:29, 31 August 2013 (UTC))

Lord Gøn, I am under no obligation whatsoever to 'give you the benefit of the doubt' here - to the contrary, WP:BLP policy is absolutely explicit: "Contentious material about living persons (or in some cases, recently deceased) that is unsourced or poorly sourced – whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable – should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion." Inclusion of individuals not convicted of murder in a list of spree killers is about as 'contentious' as one could possibly get. Frankly, I am astonished that anyone remotely familiar with Wikipedia policy could argue otherwise - but if you want to do so, I suggest that you raise the matter at the Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard. And no, I am sure I'm not as familiar as you are with the subject matter of this article as you are - but that is a complete irrelevance where policy compliance is concerned. AndyTheGrump (talk) 02:27, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

No, you are not obliged to give me the benefit of the doubt, but then civility demands that you tone down a bit and assume good faith. It wouldn't hurt you, nor would it prevent you from getting your point across, but would greatly help to keep the discussion here objective and focused. The tone of your writing is utterly disrespectful and at least in my eyes a violation of one of the five pillars of Wikipedia. Seeing that you have been blocked numerous times for gross incivility already I recommend you to reconsider your way of behaviour, because obviously it is not just me who has problems with your spiteful remarks.

Yes, you are correct, WP:BLP prevents us from adding contentious material that is unsourced ot poorly sourced, but that is exactly the point, because all the information that is included in this list in fact is sourced and therefore is not a violation to WP:BLP. If reliable sources blatantly state that Person X has killed Y, then it is not our obligation to question it. It's a fact, it's sourced, so it can be added. All of you here are expressing with a lot of confidence that there's some terrible violation of BLP going on here, but if it is so, could you please cite the relevant lines that would prove your opinion is correct? Merely exclaiming "It is so!" is not proving anything, and I have seen it numerous times over the years, that people are prone to throw around with policies and guidelines that supposedly reinforce their point of view, just to find that they are completely misinterpreting them.

So, let's go through BLP, if we find any point this list is actually violating. According to BLP, all content must adhere to NPOV, verifiability, and NOR. As I see it there are no POV issues here, because all the information is presented in a completely neutral way, it is just a listing of facts that have been reported by reliable sources, and therefore are verifiable, and not original research. Though inline citations are not used, the cases that have no separate Wikipedia article have at least one, and most of the time several reliable sources at the end of each row that prove the correctness of the given information. So far no cases have really been challenged, so there was no need for inline citations, and grouping the relevant sources together seemed clearer and more user-friendly.

There is no contentious material as I see it, because anyone who has killed one or several other persons is per definitionem a killer and can therefore be denominated as such. In Wikipedia the basis for determining if someone has killed others are, and can only be reliable sources, which are used here throughout for exactly that purpose. As stated above, it is not for us Wikipedians to question the information in a reliable source, if there are no contradictions with other sources, and it is written in WP:STICKTOSOURCE that we should "[t]ake care not to go beyond what is expressed in the sources, or to use them in ways inconsistent with the intention of the source, such as using material out of context. In short, stick to the sources." So if numerous sources report that Belarminio Rodriguez sprayed a square with bullets, killing six and wounding nine, we are not allowed to assume that he may not have done it, because that would be mere speculation, original research and certainly not in accordance with the given information.

Yes, there are those "killers that killed no one" and you may say that this is a violation of BLP, but I have explained the reasoning behind it, and I'd still say it is valid and in accordance with the scientific literature. I have also expressed my willingness to change the list's title any time, if somebody comes up with a better term for the type of person this list is about, so to imply malice on my part is unfounded. Also, BLP makes clear that "what counts as exempt under BLP can be controversial", so anybody claiming with absolute certainty that he, or she knows how BLP should be interpreted is probably wrong.

The tone of the list is as dispassionate as it can get, it is balanced, since no criticism or praise of any kind is present, nor are there any viewpoints expressed. There is no problem with gossip or feedback loops, nor are any self-published sources used. The external links section comprises of only two links, both providing general information on the topic and therefore do not conflict with BLPEL. There is no violation of any point raised in the privacy section, or BLPNAME, since rampage killers generally cease to be low profile persons due to their sensationalist crime that is often deliberately designed to garner a maximum amount of public attention. Also, BLP1E does not apply, because this is not an article about a person notable for only one event, but a list of high profile persons all notable for at least one event, where no focus is put onto a specific individual. As stated above BLPCRIME does not prohibit explicitly to name an offender that is yet to be convicted, but only demands to "give serious consideration to not including material in any article suggesting that the person has committed, or is accused of committing, a crime." I assure you that I am weighing the information given in the sources with care, and decide against including any cases where uncertainty remains of the accused persons guilt. I do not see any point though in refraining to name a person that obviously is the culprit. E.g. Nidal Malik Hasan was arrested at the crime scene after being shot by police, while firing at an officer, and has been identified as the gunman by numerous witnesses, so any presumptions that he may not have been the perpetrator of the Fort Hood shooting defied common sense even shortly after the event occurred. BLPCAT, which also applies to lists, states that "the case for each content category must be made clear by the article text and its reliable sources", which, I suppose, is ensured. It also says regarding Category:Criminals that it "should only be added for an incident that is relevant to the person's notability; the incident was published by reliable third-party sources;" both of which are true for all cases presented here. So far I do not see any clear violations of BLP-policy. Now here is the only thing that may apply, because the aforemention continues with "the subject was convicted; and the conviction was not overturned on appeal." Now that is highly problematic, because there are numerous rampage killers that are never convicted, because they are found to have been insane. According to this it would not have been allowed here on Wikipedia to categorize Howard Unruh a mass murderer until his death in 2009, since he was found unfit to stand trial and therefore never was convicted. But not to call him the murderer of those 13 people in Camden, even 60 years after the crime, would've been in crass opposition to the available literature which never left any doubt that he was a mass murderer, and even one of the first in modern US history. There are many similar cases like that, and if we are not allowed to call a spade a spade, because of some ill-conceived policy Wikipedians may appear like fools in the eyes of the general populace and the scientific community. But then BLPCAT thankfully leaves us a backdoor by writing "should only be added" and thus does not forbid it entirely. Furthermore, rampage killer is not a legal term, and therefore does not imply that anyone denominated as such is actually a criminal.(Lord Gøn (talk) 14:40, 31 August 2013 (UTC))

If you violate WP:BLP policy again by including living people on this list who have not been convicted of murder, I shall report the matter, and ask that you be blocked from editing. Given the self-evident disregard you show for WP:BLP policy in your latest post, I suspect this will be a formality. AndyTheGrump (talk) 14:50, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

First of all, I have not reverted any of the current edits, I have made the point for my previous edits fairly clear, and the discussion what to do now is ongoing. So what do you think you are achieving with writing in all bold and threatening me. Keep calm, this isn't WWIII. And where please is my "self-evident disregard" for WP:BLP? All I have stated above is based on what the policy actually says, if you see some serious problems with my reasoning, please go ahead and state your opinion. But if you prefer to run to the admins in an attempt to shut me out of the discussion, don't hold back and do so. Maybe they are more reasonable talking partners and have also something to say about your way of leading a conversation. (Lord Gøn (talk) 15:18, 31 August 2013 (UTC))

• Including the names of people who never killed anyone on a "list of rampage killers" is a blatant BLP violation. This entire page might not survive a challenge at AFD for this and related reasons — just saying, hint hint. Carrite (talk) 16:07, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

• You're wrong there. I guarantee it would survive an AfD. I'd !vote keep, since the concept of the list is obviously suitable and questions of the appropriateness of a limited number of entries does not invalidate the whole. Dealing with the issue belongs here, in this discussion, and/or a wider RFC meant to encompass the entire series. Resolute 16:56, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

• You should move this whole discussion to the main "List of rampage killers" article and put redirects from all the specific regions. This is the wrong place for it. I can see the logic for removing non-killers, but a good renaming is another option. Please let's not have edit wars on all the subsets of the article - let's have one RFC and hash it out. Wnt (talk) 04:03, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

• • so who else would know what this list was supposed to be about? :Readers, Lord Gøn. People have already explained the extremly serious BLP concerns above, so I won't repeat them -just keep in mind they cannot be bypassed. But even if all the individuals in the list were from the XV century, the problem is also one of accuracy. For the principle of least astonishment, a reader does not expect a "killer" to have not killed anyone, even if some sources think this is just a technicality. You do not own articles. The topic must be clear to readers, and in this case it is not. Just as nobody is included in a List of billionaires because they tried to be a billionaire and failed, for the same logical reason nobody can be included here unless they have actually and directly killed someone. If you want to list those people, fair enough, this may have sense, but do it in a separate list, e.g. List of attempted rampage murders or List of non-lethal rampage attacks, or whatever, but not calling them killers. --cyclopia^speak! 07:15, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

Well, as I have said, I know that "rampage killer" is an insufficient term, but what should I do in your opinion? Leave out several notorius cases just because the perpetrators failed to kill someone? That would probably make even less sense to readers than the current situation. And it's not as if I have not tried to make sure that people are not led astray, after all I did add the terms of inclusion visible for everyone right at the top of the page. Also, I never even hinted that I own the article, all I did was trying to explain that since I have started it, I am probably the only person who knows what intentions were behind its creation. And what point would there be to have a separate list for attempted rampage killings? The crime remains the same, even though the outcome is a bit different. (Lord Gøn (talk) 14:40, 31 August 2013 (UTC))

"What should I do in your opinion? Leave out several notorious cases just because the perpetrators failed to kill someone?". Whilst the title of the article is "List of Rampage Killers" - well, yes. Obviously. Completely obviously. Black Kite (talk) 14:43, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

Obvious to you maybe. To me, not so much. But anyway, I've done a quick Google search, and found that the term "rampage attacker" even though found rarely, is at least used by Mark Arnes in "Going postal", and Peter Langman uses "rampage attack" in "Why kids kill", Larkin in "The Columbine Legacy", and Newman/Fox in "Repeat Tragedy", so changing the title to "List of rampage attackers" seems like a possible solution that is somewhat covered by a few experts. At least the problem about the zero-kill incidents could be resolved that way. (Lord Gøn (talk) 15:31, 31 August 2013 (UTC))

Can you cite a source that defines 'rampage attack'? Without one, any criteria for inclusion will look like WP:OR, in my opinion. AndyTheGrump (talk) 15:41, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

Well, the problem is that most of the scientific literature actually uses the term mass murderer to describe such criminals, and it is readily admitted that it is insufficient and any definition of the term somewhat arbitrary. Their threshold is then variously set either at three or four people killed. As I said above, rampage attacker is not used widely, and I have the impression that many authors expect their readers to instinctively know what they are talking about, since everybody probably has heard about some guy shooting up a school or mall, because he was angry. You also wouldn't define a bottle, but assume that everyone knows what it is.

In cases where a more detailed definition is attempted, many experts come up with their own terminology to describe this kind of criminal, but none of them is used by the general public. Park Dietz, e.g. coined the term "pseudocommando", which is generally defined as someone "who kills in public during the daytime, plans his offense well in advance, and comes prepared with a powerful arsenal of weapons." They "do not show signs of planned escape after the killings" and are "often motivated by extreme feelings of anger while trying to issue payback."

Hempel et al. use "sudden mass assault by a single individual", which they simply defined as an amok-like behaviour, where the perpetrator intentionally killed at least three victims with a firearm, while Mullen coined "autogenic massacre", which is a massacre generated in isolation, carried out by individuals, and serving the idiosyncratic purposes of the perpetrators. When reading their essays, it is clear that they are all talking about the same thing, but it is obvious they are stuggling with finding an acceptable term just as much as I do. More widely used in the media are mass murderer, spree killer, or rampage killer, but generally it can be said that all of the above are often used synonymously to describe something everyone should innately know what is meant, a person more or less randomly trying to kill other people in an apparently suicidal attack with guns, knives, or similar weapons, often because they feel hatred and rage towards society. (Lord Gøn (talk) 16:21, 31 August 2013 (UTC))

Aren't the sources you cite referring to individuals who actually kill, though? AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:31, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

In the 80s for various reasons the discussion in the scientific community in English speaking countries shifted from referring to these incidents as amok, which has no constraints regarding the number of people killed or wounded, to mass murder, which demands that an arbitrarily set number of people has been killed. Probably due to that fixation on mass homicide in the last few decades, it is true that all of the above terms have been conceived with a victims threshold in mind. That is not unreasonable per se, since a lower limit of victims makes sure that you are working only with cases that are scientifically relevant. But Kelleher legitimately argues that restricting the discussion of rampage killings to mass murders, while leaving out any incidents where the perpetrator's intention to commit a mass murder is evident, but did not succeed, does not make any sense. Furthermore Grant Duwe in " A circle of distortion" explains that even though the term "mass murder" is mostly used in a highly specific context in the media, and even the scientific literature, the context being rampage killings, the actual meaning of mass murder is a lot more general, and in reality most mass murderers are not of the rampaging type. So, what we have here is the current endpoint of a development in rampage killing studies, that favoured the concentration on mass homicides, and that is reflected in the terminology above. I will refrain from giving you a history lesson in how the labelling of rampage killers has changed over the course of the last 100 years or so, but I tell you it was a highly volatile affair, that still is not settled. (Lord Gøn (talk) 18:57, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

All of that can be explained in an appropriate article(s); maybe it already is, I don't know. However, we also need to consider the common meanings of words. The "average reader", when seeing the word "killers" in the title, is going to conclude that the persons listed have actually killed someone. Even if the "scientific literature" lumps in those who actually killed with those whose victims all survived, for purposes of study and analysis, the common meaning of "killer" remains a person who has killed another person. Therefore, if "killer" is in the title, we cannot include in the list persons who did not kill anyone. Neutron (talk) 14:15, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

I see the point, but I really didn't want to drop relevant cases just because of my incapability of finding an adequate alternative, and nobody else came foreward with one either. Though, the proposed change to List of rampage attackers seems a reasonable solution, so I will propose the title change as soon as the AfD is closed and the situation generally clarified. (Lord Gøn (talk) 17:11, 3 September 2013 (UTC))

Is a sortable list useful?

What is the purpose of having this as a sortable list? And if the list is sortable, why are there blank rows separating every group of five? The blank rows don't seem to sort properly. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 22:52, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

The purpose of a sortable list is, obviously, to be able to sort the entries by different criteria. If somebody wants to have the entries sorted by country or year, he can have that with a single click, instead of having to search the list and compile it himself. That is an unquestionable advantage, and one that hurts nobody at that. The blank lines are there to improve readability. It probably is an unorthodox approach, but by separating groups of five the tables become quite a bit more eye friendly in my opinion. (Lord Gøn (talk) 23:03, 2 September 2013 (UTC))

I agree that sortability is good in this case - especially for the name, year and # killed columns. But I agree with DC on the blank rows. To be honest, I find them to be an eyesore. Resolute 00:59, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Of course I can speak only for the browser I am using, which is Firefox, and there it looks ok in my eyes, though it may come out different in other browsers. Back in the day when I used the Internet Explorer I added even two blank lines, because one wouldn't really be visible. That said, I for my part find long lists that are basically one big block of rows ghastly to behold and in severe need of some structuring. (Lord Gøn (talk) 12:26, 3 September 2013 (UTC))

Agree entirely with Resolute: sortable is very useful (gives you immediately what is the most lethal, less lethal, most injured, most recent etc.) -but blank lines aren't.--cyclopia^speak! 13:05, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Once the pointless AFD is closed I'll happily help with sorting. It's very helpful, but only if done correctly. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:22, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

I know there are problems with sorting by number of injured and killed, are there any others I am not aware of? Problems that have nothing to do with the blank lines, that is. (Lord Gøn (talk) 18:47, 3 September 2013 (UTC))

We can improve it, e.g. making the date column properly sortable including the year, rather than individual date/year cols. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:28, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

Do you suggest to merge them into one column? Just asking, because I actually like and frequently use the possibility to sort the entries by month. (Lord Gøn (talk) 19:37, 3 September 2013 (UTC))

Yep, normally we'd have a "date", not just a "day/month" and "year". But whatever. Let's discuss it once this pointy AFD has closed. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:43, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

And as if by magic, the snow close appeared! Right, back to being constructive. I would remove the blank lines, they're not required. Nor is the Number column (it also makes it difficult to update, if an entry suddenly needs to be inserted midway into the table, all the entries following it will need to be renumbered) and as I said above, the date column should be made into one. I can't honestly see the utility in discovering which people went on their rampage in, say, April. Names of perpetrators can be written out correctly and still be sorted by surname using the {{sortname}}. I'll knock up a quick example of what I think is needed in a sandbox. The Rambling Man (talk) 06:47, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

Here you go. My version is WP:ACCESS-friendly, sorts correctly, makes use of a couple of sorting templates and tricks and looks good (in my opinion!). The Rambling Man (talk) 07:23, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

I've had discussions about pretty much all of the above points previously, and my arguments and points of view haven't changed since then, but let me reiterate them briefly. The blank lines are there to give the lists some structure and improve readability, because without them the list looks like a giant wall of cells. I wish there were a table available that'd do that structuring automatically and had I the skill I'd program one myself. The numbers on the left are there to make it possible to get the lists back into their original state with one click, and also make it easier to find a case in the wikicode. Regarding the merging of the date/year columns I simply refer you to a discussion here (just scroll down until the tables show up). About the perpetrators, I thought it was the most natural thing to do to put the last names first, since this is how pretty much every index is handling this. Overall your suggestion looks quite a bit like the layout I have used when starting the list, and I've always had the impression that it was inferior to the current one. But I suppose it's all a matter of taste. (Lord Gøn (talk) 12:18, 5 September 2013 (UTC))

Some differences. My version is compliant with WP:ACCESS. My version sorts correctly in every field (your version could be resorted back to the original order when sorting by the corrected number of victims column, by the way), blank lines are appalling for both accessibility and when sorting, they really mess things up. Regarding dates, there's no good reason to separate dates and years, and in my example, the dates sort correctly. In fact, if you're adamant that you won't change these lists, then I suggest you make them unsortable as right now they're a complete mess. The Rambling Man (talk) 12:38, 5 September 2013 (UTC)

I readily admit that the sorting and updating of the blank lines and the numbers is a pain in the ass, though I thought they'd improve readability enough to look past that, and since hundreds of people are visiting the list every day, but only very few actually complain about anything, how should I assume that something was wrong with the layout? The most common problem seemed to be that people were not finding what they were looking for, and I tried to address that by adding the table with the number of cases listed, apparently with success, since these complaints have since ceased altogether.

Besides the list's appearance there is one other advantage for having a separate column for dates, which is that it can easily be found out, if there is some sort of seasonality of rampage killings, which seems to be the case at least partially. E.g. 43% of all the school massacres listed (prior to the removal of the zero fatalities cases that is) have occurred from March to May, with only few cases prior and during the summer holidays (for obvious reasons), as well as in October, January, and February. You may find this information irrelevant, though I find it quite interesting, and worth a ponder why it is so. (Lord Gøn (talk) 16:22, 5 September 2013 (UTC))

The list's appearance is constrained by what our wiki markup language will allow, and you should be aware that it's not just for sighted readers, we have to consider our WP:ACCESS users too. Millions of people visit the various lists etc that I've written, virtually no complaints over the past eight years. It doesn't mean that the lists I've written can't be improved, as I've suggested in a number of ways. Secondly, the "seasonality" of murders could be summarised in an additional table if you really felt it was of use to anyone. You've already pointed out that most of the trends are "for obvious reasons" so I'm not sure what the point is. In any case, my previous conclusion remains, unless you're prepared to make most/all of the changes I've suggested, you should make all these tables unsortable because right now they're embarrassing Wikipedia and the community therein who work on lists. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:28, 5 September 2013 (UTC)

The TRM version is much better, although I would delink the countries per WP:OVERLINK (and I think, although I'm not sure, that best practice is to spell out US and Canadian state names rather than use abbreviations). I would also consider combing the location and country columns and using some sorting tricks there to sort for country first then place. If there are reliable sources saying that this sort of thing happens more in certain months, then that can be added as text - if there isn't, then sorting by month as well as year is effectively arbitrary and adds another column for no reason (increasing the "wall of cells" look). Lists ought to sort by surname, not first name, and people ought to be named as "John Smith", not "Smith, John", because that looks odd and inconsistent with best WP practices for lists. The blank lines are messy when you sort in some ways (e.g., for me, clicking on "weapon" sorts all the blank lines at the top, and clicking on "country" sorts them all at the bottom) and just look odd otherwise. Having numbers at the side is unnecessary if the table is arranged and sortable by number of killings; having numbers add the side just creates a barrier to editing. And that's not even mentioning ACCESS issues. Bencherlite^Talk 16:42, 5 September 2013 (UTC)

True, I hadn't got into the content really, i.e. the issues of linking common geographical terms or assuming our readers know what US state abbreviations mean. I was focusing on the major issues. Either way, in their current states, the tables need serious help. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:51, 5 September 2013 (UTC)

Oh, I have to admit that I've never given a second thought about how people who can't see actually get access to web-content. I simply assumed that all the text I can see on a page will be read out by some programme, with all the invisible code being left out. (Lord Gøn (talk) 17:08, 5 September 2013 (UTC))

With technical articles which contain lists, it's much more important for us to pay heed to WP:ACCESS. That's just one of the many changes I made in my sandbox to your current format. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:09, 5 September 2013 (UTC)

With all the suggested changes, the layout will look a lot more like the one I have used in the beginning. Jeez, and all the time I thought, I'd do the list some good with the changes I have made. (Lord Gøn (talk) 17:18, 5 September 2013 (UTC))

The simpler the better. You had some really odd coding in place for date sorting, for the blank lines etc. It's just not required. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:20, 5 September 2013 (UTC)

Eugene Everette

I have removed Eugene Everette from the list. They had been removed on 30 August, but were re-added to the list today by Lord Gøn. Although I am now able to find a "Eugene Everette" listed on the New York State Department of Correction website, we do not know if this is the same person referred to in news reports. This is why we discourage the use of primary sources such as these. We need to know that the Eugene Everette listed by that site is the same Eugene Evertte identified in news reports and we need to establish that he was incarcerated for the crimes reported upon. I see no evidence of either. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 23:08, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

It would be quite astonishing if this wasn't the same person. Same name, same ethnicity, same age, same location, same crime. But anyway, even if you do not want to see his name posted here, the fact reamins, that reliable sources have reported the killings, and therefore this is a valid entry and should be included. (Lord Gøn (talk) 23:17, 17 September 2013 (UTC))

No, this is exactly what we were discussing on the BLP noticeboard. If there are no sources that say Eugene Everette has been convicted of the crimes reported, you can't add him to your list. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 23:42, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

I am not talking about Everette, I am talking about the fact that seven people were killed in a shooting and arson attack that has all signs of being a rampage killing. There are no BLP issues with that so you can't just come along and remove the entire case. If you take offense at naming Everette all you may do is removing his name, but not the rest of the entry. (Lord Gøn (talk) 23:54, 17 September 2013 (UTC))

Actually, any editor may remove it per WP:BLP. You can't put someone on "list of rampage killers" without implying that they are a rampage killer. Why isn't this sinking it yet? Delicious carbuncle (talk) 00:12, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Ok, maybe I didn't explain well enough what I mean, so let me be a bit more precise. The rampage killer, or the arrested suspect may be covered by BLP, but the act itself is not. So, if a rampage killing is reported, it can and should be added to the list, no matter if somebody was convicted, or not. The addition of the killer's, or suspect's name is a completely different affair and has nothing to do with that. Taking the case of Everette as an example, you cannot possibly claim that it is necessary to remove the entry on grounds of BLP, if it is presented like this:

33.

---

03.28 March 28/29

1970

New York City, NY

U.S.

7

15

F A

After all, even if Everette may have been innocent, the killings still did occur and somebody must've committed them, so at least the information about the attack must be retained in the list. (Lord Gøn (talk) 12:39, 18 September 2013 (UTC))

If you want to rename this article to "List of rampage killings", go ahead. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 13:50, 18 September 2013 (UTC)