ORDERED
TO KILL

Topics: Denial; Evil; Feelings; Guidance; Hearing God; Murder; Satan; Temptation

References: Exodus 20:13; John 8:42–47; 2 Corinthians 11:14–15

In 1992, Wayne Lo, a sophomore at Simon’s Rock College in Massachusetts, killed two people and injured four others with a semiautomatic rifle. During the first years of his imprisonment, he said God had chosen him to commit carnage. Now he calls that a period of denial.

“At the time I thought I did the right thing,” he said recently. “But as I look back, it doesn’t make sense to me. I ask myself, why? Why did I do it?”

In December 1992, Lo said God told him to go to the gun store, order a weapon and ammunition with his mother’s credit card, and then shoot people. He raged at his lawyers during his trial because they insisted that he was insane. He argued that his lawyers should have investigated his victims to uncover why a heavenly power had selected them to be shot.

After Lo realized God would not have chosen him to inflict so much pain, he struggled to understand what made him a killer. He remains convinced that it was something outside of himself. Perhaps it was a supernatural or satanic force. Either way, he appears not to be taking personal responsibility for the killing.

—William Glaberson, “Man and His Son’s Slayer Unite to Ask Why,” The New York Times (April 12, 2000)