Parents of Elliot Rodger's stabbing victims share their frustrations
They say the killings in California could have been prevented if police had recognised the warning signals by the disturbed Elliot Rodger
Inside a two-bedroom beachside apartment, Elliot Rodger began his Santa Barbara rampage last month by mutilating his two roommates and their friend. The scene, police said, was horrific.
But there were few signs of a struggle, according to the victims' parents. There was no blood on the walls or ceiling, and the confrontation between Rodger and the three other young men seemed to have been confined to a small space, the parents said based on a visit to the crime scene. They said evidence taken from the apartment makes them think that Rodger may have used a machete, knives and a hammer to kill their sons.
"How did one boy do this? Our sons, there were three of them. … We wonder, were our boys drugged?" Junan Chen, the father of George Chen, 19, said in an interview.
After Rodger killed them on May 23, he set out in his black BMW and later on foot, fatally shooting three strangers before committing suicide. Those latter killings happened in public view - in a store and in front of a sorority house - but the first three occurred behind closed doors in the shared apartment, and the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Department has disclosed few details about what happened there.
The parents of the three university students who were stabbed said it had taken them weeks to muster the courage to speak publicly about the killings.