A man who laid siege to a one-room Amish schoolhouse in Pennsylvania, killing five girls, told his wife shortly before opening fire that he had molested two young girls who were his relatives decades ago a nd was tormented by "dreams of molesting again," authorities said yesterday.
Charles Roberts, 32, may have planned to molest the girls at the Amish school, but police have no evidence that he actually did, State Police Commissioner Jeffrey Miller said.
He said Roberts had sexual lubricant and flex-tie plastic handcuffs with him when he took the students hostage, and that he chained the girls together in a line at the blackboard after sending the boys and adults away.
Roberts also had the weapons and supplies for a long stand-off, he said.
"He states in his suicide note that he had dreams about doing what he did 20 years ago again," Miller said.
He said police could not confirm Roberts's claim about molesting young relatives when Roberts would have been just a child or adolescent himself, and he said Roberts's family members knew nothing of molestation in his past.
Roberts left one note for his wife, one for each of his three children and a note and checklist in his truck.
The note to his wife talked about his anguish over the loss of the couple's newborn daughter, Elise, in 1997, Miller said.
"The wife's note talks about the good memories together, the tragedy with Elise, his hatred toward himself and his hatred towards God as a result of that event."
"Later in the note he talks about having dreams for the last couple of years about what he did 20 years ago and in those dreams he says he wants to do those things again."
When his wife spoke with Roberts by mobile phone from inside the school before the shooting started, he "told her he had molested two minor relatives 20 years prior and that was how she put all of that together," Miller said.
