Florida

‘I Was Almost a School Shooter': Man Calls for Mental Health, Gun Reform in Open Letter

Following the massacre of 17 students and teachers at a Florida high school last week, a Colorado father of four wrote an open letter Tuesday claiming that the only thing that stopped him from carrying out his own bloodbath 30 years ago was his inability to get a gun.

“I was almost a school shooter,” Aaron Stark wrote in a letter shared with NBC affiliate KUSA. “I am not a school shooter because I didn't have access to guns. Guns don't kill people, people kill people. But people with guns kill lots of people.”

Stark wrote that he felt like an outcast in 1996, when he attended Denver's North High School, where he was allegedly bullied and had a very chaotic childhood. “I was going to try and kill a lot of people and then kill myself,” he said during an emotional interview. “It was not directed at the people, it was directed at myself.”

Stark said later on MSNBC Tuesday afternoon that “we need to have a hard look at the effect that guns have” and said in the aftermath of the shooting people needed to be looking at both mental health and gun reform. He also called for people to show more compassion to others.

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