Report: Concerns about Navy Yard shooter never reported
Contractor failed to disclose his condition
Co-workers, su
WASHINGTON pervisors and associates of Washington Navy Yard shooter Aaron Alexis raised concerns about his mental health, but those fears were never reported to the government, according to Pentagon investigations into the shootings released Tuesday.
If the contractor
for whom Alexis worked had told the government about his troubles, the report said, “Alexis’ authorization to access secure facilities and information would have been revoked.”
But Alexis’ clearance was not revoked, and on Sept. 16, 2013, he entered Building 197 at the Navy Yard with a shotgun and killed 12 people before police shot and killed him. The report also found that security procedures were insufficient at the naval facility near downtown Washington.
A key finding of the report: Leaders of his employer, technology subcontractor The Experts, “decided not to inform the gov- ernment of adverse information concerning Alexis’ emotional, mental, or personality condition, even when they had concerns that Alexis may cause harm to others.”
A call Tuesday to The Experts, based in Fort Lauderdale, was not returned.
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel ordered several changes to Pentagon policy, including automated checks of personnel with access to military facilities or classified information and the establishment of an “In- sider Threat Management and Analysis Center.”
“Open and free societies are always vulnerable,” Hagel said, adding that the Pentagon was doing all it could to keep its facilities safe.
The reports show a troubled young man whose violent outbursts and unreliability was known to his neighbors, police and creditors but never fully explored by the Navy or the contractor who hired him.
Alexis’ bizarre behavior was apparent to his supervisors — and to the Navy — when he traveled from Virginia to Rhode Island where he was working for the contractor at the Naval Station Newport on Aug. 4.
A hotel clerk asked Newport naval police to come to the Navy Gateway Inns & Suites in case Alexis hurt someone.
Officers “learned that Alexis had taken apart his bed, believing someone was hiding under it, and observed that Alexis had taped a microphone to the ceiling to record the voices of people that were following him,” according to the report. He also complained about a chip in his head and microwave signals.