David Delich was making threats against people on MySpace and even wrote a blog entry on the site, dated February 22 of this year, which said he planned to ambush and kill police officers! Unbelievably the authorities ignored reports of his escalating behavior even while he was arming himself for his shooting spree.
From AZStar:
The MySpace messages ranged from bizarre to downright scary.
On Dec. 1, 2007, David “Nick” Delich, contacted former classmate and prom date Erin Schrader for the first time since he graduated from Sabino High School in 2001.
Delich, using the screen name “Bogoljub,” told Schrader that he was finally in a place where he could “capitalize on all his hard work” and put people in their place.
In the next, Delich said he was going to re-create the Holocaust and Schrader should “paint a target” on her forehead.
A few days later, “I have a surprise for you and your family, but I have to give it to you in person. It will be awesome.”
The last message, dated Feb. 27, 2008, was addressed to “Hey Phony” and asked, “Ready to spontaneously combust?”
Alarmed, Schrader got in touch with some of her old friends who knew Delich.
It turns out that at least six of them had received similar messages.
Like Schrader, they had tried to block Delich’s messages, only to have him send more messages under a different screen name.
It got to the point, Schrader said, that she looked over her shoulder wherever she walked, locked her bedroom door at night and told everyone she knew to give police Delich’s name if anything ever happened to her. She also said she called police after the last e-mail to report Delich.
So when she heard that three local law-enforcement officers had been shot — one fatally — and that Delich, 25, was a suspect, Schrader got mad.
“I was mad the police hadn’t taken me more seriously,” Schrader said. “I can’t say this could’ve been prevented, but it (my report) should’ve been so much more of an eye-opener.”
In fact, if police had checked out Delich’s MySpace accounts, they would have seen a blog written on Feb. 22, Schrader said. The blog says, “Soon, I plan to kill many police officers.”
The unpunctuated and uncapitalized message discusses what he calls trumped-up charges, a plan to shoot “them,” and getting shot instead.
“that was the plan, wasn’t it? backfire time. well see who gets shot and killed. and that is a threat to you pigs. every one. Ill see you, when your all alone. and itll be me and you. and then well see how it goes down. oh. were gonna see. boy are we.”
The police didn’t take the reports seriously though, even as Delich became increasingly hostile and started racking up arrests. Many of his friends also didn’t take his threats seriously:
Delich was always a little odd, a handful of his former classmates said Monday.
He told Schrader and Freibert that he was a prophet, put on Earth for a reason.
Schrader remembers that Delich would often change religions and try to persuade his friends to convert as well. He also had ideas and theories that were strange but that they simply brushed off.
Stepbrothers Shane Corrie and Jesse Wood, both 25, met Delich in their freshman year at Sabino.
They said Delich was a “pretty normal” teenager, albeit quiet and reserved. He wasn’t involved in any clubs or sports but was generally accepted by his peers. He “experimented” with drugs such as marijuana, mushrooms, cocaine, LSD and Ecstasy, they said.
According to online court records, Delich has been arrested six times since 2002 on misdemeanor charges, including accusations of liquor-law violation, marijuana possession and disorderly conduct. Five of the charges were dismissed. He was placed on probation last July after pleading guilty to criminal trespass in Ajo Justice Court.
Around his senior year, Delich began isolating himself and became more unstable, Corrie and Wood said.
“He started to get gradually crazier and crazier, and started saying some crazy stuff later on,” Corrie said.
He would say he was a descendant of Jesus and had a hole in his neck that marked him as having direct lineage to Jesus. He also would tell people that he could make the wind move and then take them outside and say, “Can you feel that?”
After high school, he didn’t work or go to college, they said.
“He never did anything except sit around and think weird, crazy thoughts,” Corrie said.
Neither Corrie nor Wood had seen Delich in the past few years, but they kept in touch with him through e-mails and MySpace, they said.
The brothers learned of Delich’s love of guns, resentment toward girls and hatred of authority from his e-mails and his “Bogoljub” MySpace account.
So Delich was a crazed stoner who sat around getting high and convincing himself that the elaborate fantasy world he wanted to live in was real and telling people he was a god. He was arrested numerous times and never received a significant punishment, or treatment. And his parents gave him money to buy guns and drugs I assume since he didn’t work. Sounds like a lot of people dropped the Ball on this one.
We may never know if anyone could have prevented this tragedy, but we do know that Delich announced his intentions on the Internet, and we should have taken him at his word.
