Sasha Larkin speaks about how loneliness and social isolation is increasingly becoming the new normal among active shooters, citing the Route 91 Harvest music festival shooting which killed 60 people and wounded 411. Larkin, who led the Las Vegas PD incident response, points out that the shooter had none of the typical assumed motivations or labels such as violent religious or political extremism, mental health or financial issues, or any obvious grievance. This poses a unique challenge for law enforcement because such attacks include a compressed radicalization time frame with no preparation and no training, just inspiration. Larkin suggests that law enforcement build “communities of trust” through community engagement using community policing teams for outreach, awareness, and education. In addition, she says law enforcement should use the U.S. violent extremist mobilization indicators to identify “threatening behaviors” that could indicate the potential for a violent incident.
