The youth, 14-year-old Barry Loukatis, was tried as an adult and found guilty after an insanity defense failed. Efforts to identify the factors that contributed to this tragedy have proven elusive. Some factors can be linked to the risk of future violence, such as a history of past offending, behavioral problems, parental aggression, rejection and punitiveness, substance abuse, and, for adults, a history of psychiatric hospitalization. Transient variables such as situational distress, relational problems, and other triggering events are also important. Almost none of these factors were present for Loukatis. The elusive factor that may hold the key to his behavior is the process by which an individual, from his/her perspective, chooses to find meaning and navigate in a social context. This arena of human thought, feeling, and decisionmaking may escape clear cause-and-effect analysis. Another variable that is missed in discussions of teen violence is the assessment of "connectedness," or social interest. This trait seems to have been missing with Loukatis. Those who spent time talking with him as well as with other murderers, both juvenile and adult, are often struck by their lack of empathy, remorse, or identification with the victims of their violence. Decisions and behavior are apparently not influenced by any consideration of how their actions will hurt or help others. There has been no research which specifically attempts to correlate social interest, i.e., level of interest in others, with violence. Adlerian concepts of people are briefly discussed as relevant to such research. 1 reference