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Store Video Shows Gunman's Final Moments

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By ANNA JO BRATTON, The Associated Press

Published: December 8, 2007

OMAHA, Neb. - Chilling surveillance images released Friday show a shaggy haired, bespectacled Robert Hawkins taking aim at holiday shoppers, and his hand-scrawled suicide note offers compassion for his friends and only contempt for his victims.

"I know everyone will remember me as some sort of monster, but please understand that I just don't want to be a burden on the ones that I care for my entire life," he wrote. "I just want to take a few pieces of expletive with me."

The 19-year-old gunman left the note Wednesday at the suburban house where he lived before going to Omaha's Westroads Mall with an AK-47 and opening fire on the midday holiday shopping crowd, killing eight people before turning the gun on himself.

Three still images taken from surveillance video of the attack show Hawkins initially walking into the mall unarmed, wearing glasses, a black zippered sweat shirt over a black T-shirt with a white logo.

Six minutes later, he returns and strides through an entrance decked with holiday decorations, an apparent bulge under his clothing. In the last image, he is shown with his sleeves rolled up, aiming the AK-47 to fire in front of a store mannequin.

The photos appear to contradict earlier reports that the gunman had a military-style haircut and entered the mall wearing a camouflage vest. Also, the note made no mention of widely reported broadcast reports that he wrote he wanted to "go out in style."

Hawkins was a troubled teenager who spent four years in a series of treatment centers, group homes and foster care after threatening to kill his stepmother in 2002. He had recently broken up with a girlfriend and lost his job at a McDonald's.

"I've just snapped. I can't take this meaningless existence anymore I've been a constant disappointment and that trend would have only continued."

Hawkins added: "I love you mommy. I love you dad," and expressed love for several other people. He told them to remember the good times they had.

"Just think tho I'm gonna be expletive famous," he wrote.

Also Friday, those who knew Hawkins most recently in suburban Bellevue said they tried to warn police about his behavior but got no response.

A man who lived nearby said he went to police a month ago to report his and other parents' concerns that Hawkins and his friends had easy access to guns, sold drugs and smoked pot with an adult.

Bellevue police said the house where Hawkins lived is in an unincorporated part of the city and not in their jurisdiction. Police Chief John Stacey would not talk about Harrington's complaint, but said normally officers pass complaints from that neighborhood to the Sarpy County Sheriff's Department.

Sheriff's officials said they never received the complaint.

Kevin Harrington, 45, said he told police in Bellevue about a month ago that one of Hawkins' friends offered to sell Valium to his 13-year-old son. Harrington said he also told police that Hawkins had previously shot at a car during a drug deal gone bad.

"We told them about the drugs, we told them about the guns, and nothing was done," Harrington said.

Harrington said his 16-year-old daughter used to hang out with the group of teens at the home of Debora Maruca-Kovac, the 50-year-old woman Hawkins lived with.

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