Navy Yard killer carved bizarre phrases on shotgun

Navy Yard killer carved bizarre phrases including 'better off this way' and 'my ELF weapon' on shotgun... as his mother apologizes to all this victims

Aaron Alexis, the Washington Navy Yard shooter, carved bizarre phrases referencing microwave communication into the shotgun he used to kill 12 people on Monday morning as they arrived for work - as his mother made an emotional public apology for her son's murderous actions.
Officials with knowledge of the investigation revealed that Alexis, 34, had etched 'Better off this way' and 'My ELF weapon' into the stock of his Remington 870-Express-Tactical shotgun.
While officials said they can't be sure what he meant, they said that ELF usually stands for 'extremely low frequency' and can be used to refer to the weather, or communications.
This is significant to investigators because of yesterday's revelation that Alexis made a disturbed report to Rhode Island police on August 7th, in which he alleged three people were following him and were using a 'microwave machine' to send vibrations through his body and keep him awake in his hotel room.

The law enforcement officials said they do not know if he was referring to those vibrations in his carvings.
Meanwhile in Brooklyn, New York, the mother of Washington Navy Yard shooter Aaron Alexis made an emotional public statement this morning to apologize to his victims and express her own frustration and relief that he can no longer harm anyone.
Cathleen Alexis appeared in front of a lone CNN reporter in New York only to read a brief statement in which she said, 'I don't know why he did what he did, and I'll never be able to ask him why.'
She took no questions and afterwards local religious leader, Bishop Gerald Seabrooks appeared outside her Brooklyn home to speak to the media and present a copy of the statement.

Still raw two days after her son gunned down 12 people in cold blood, Cathleen Alexis added, 'To the families of the victims, I am so, so very sorry that this has happened. My heart is broken.'
'His actions have had a profound and everlasting effect on the families of the victims,' she said outside her home in Brooklyn.
This is the first time that Cathleen Alexis has spoken to the media since her son entered Building 197 of Washington D.C.'s Naval Yards on Monday morning and opened fire with a shotgun.
Twelve innocent office workers aged from their 40s to their 70s were killed and another eight were seriously injured.
Alexis, 34, a former U.S. Navy reservist who was working as a defense contractor was reportedly suffering from severe mental illness prior to the shocking attack.

However, despite allegedly being treated by the Veterans Administration in August for paranoia and possible schizophrenia, Alexis was still in possession of a 'secret' level security pass for the base and entered with a disassembled shotgun in a bag.
And earlier on Wednesday, a woman who Alexis spent time with in Thailand on a 45 day vacation during which he frequented prostitutes and massage parlors said that he was crazy 'in a positive way'.

However, she added that she was totally stunned and shocked to hear that he was responsible for the deaths of 12 people during his gun rampage which ended when SWAT and FBI response teams shot him dead. Om Suthamtewakul, who is the sister of Nutpisit Suthamtewaku the owner of the Happy Bowl Thai restaurant in White Settlement, Texas, and friend of Alexis said that he showed no signs of anger during a month and a half that he stayed with her. 'So I can’t really believe how he can shoot those people,' she said in Thai to an NBC News reporter. 'He looked kind of like, you know, bonkers, crazy, in a positive way, like funny, but, so I really can’t believe this.' According to Suthamtewakul, Alexis liked Thailand, “loved Thai woman” and wanted to go back. She told NBC News that she and Alexis went on outings in Bangkok and that they went to massage parlors in the evening. 'I wait and then we go home. Go to bed. This is like a routine, what we did,' she said. She said that she never saw him show cruelty. Authorities in Washington D.C. said that they were still examining any motive for the attack they could find. However, since New York native Alexis carried out the massacre at the headquarters of the Naval Sea Systems Command, his troubled mental history has been emerging. Indeed, just over a month ago police in Newport, Rhode Island, Alexis called police to his room and said that he had changed hotels three times that night because three people were chasing him and keeping him awake by sending microwave vibrations through the walls of his room. He believed people were following him, using a microwave machine to send vibrations to his body. He changed hotels once, then again. But he called police and told them he couldn't get away from the voices. On August 7th, police alerted officials at the Newport Naval Station about the naval defense contractor's call. But officers didn't hear from him again. By August 25th, Alexis had left the state. The 34-year-old arrived in the Washington area, continuing his work as an information technology employee for a defense-related computer company. Again, he spent nights in different hotels. He suffered from serious mental problems, including paranoia and a sleep disorder, and was undergoing treatment from the Department of Veterans Affairs, according to the law enforcement officials. But Alexis wasn't stripped of his security clearance, and he kept working. On Saturday, he visited Sharpshooters Small Arms Range in Lorton, Virginia, about 18 miles southwest of the nation's capital. He rented a rifle, bought bullets and took target practice at the 16-lane indoor range, then bought a shotgun and 24 shells, according to the store's attorney. Two days later, as the workweek dawned, Alexis entered the sprawling Washington Navy Yard, a 41-acre labyrinth of buildings protected by armed guards and metal detectors where employees must show IDs to get past doors and gates. Authorities believe he drove a rental car there. He was equipped with his pass for base access - and the shotgun. Within minutes, it would create mayhem. He stepped inside the massive Building 197, home to some 3,000 employees. He opened fire around 8:15 a.m., raining shotgun blasts down from a fourth-floor overlook and third-floor hallway into a glass-walled cafeteria where employees were eating breakfast. Trained tactical officers arrived, bursting through the building within seven minutes of the first 911 call, and Alexis shot at them, too. Fire alarms blared, and officers had a hard time hearing one another. A voice came on the overhead speaker telling workers to seek shelter - and later, to head for the gates at the complex. A U.S. Park Police helicopter flew overhead, plucking a wounded woman from the roof with a rescue basket while a crew member armed with a rifle provided cover. We have a report on the fourth floor, a male with a shotgun, multiple shots fired, multiple people down. We're still waiting for the OK that the scene has been secured," an ambulance crew member says on emergency transmissions posted on Broadcastify.com, a source of live public safety audio feeds. More dispatches followed: Shooter known to be in the main gate area. Officer down on the third floor. Female on the roof, shot in the shoulder. Once inside, Alexis picked a handgun off an officer and, armed with two weapons, terrorized the building's occupants. He fired relentlessly not only at police who engaged him but at the workers inside: a 61-year-old marine engineer and grandfather who immigrated to the U.S. years ago from India, a Navy veteran and avid pilot who had once been stationed at Pearl Harbor, a die-hard Washington Redskins fan known for generous bear hugs. A Washington police officer was shot multiple times in the legs but survived. 'We just started running,' said Patricia Ward, who was in the cafeteria when the shooting began. She said she heard three gunshots in a row, followed by several more. On Wednesday, Alexis' mother read a brief statement inside her New York home, her voice shaking. She did not want to appear on camera and did not take questions from a reporter. 'I don't know why he did what he did and I'll never be able to ask him why. Aaron is now in a place where he can no longer do harm to anyone, and for that I am glad,' Cathleen Alexis said. 'To the families of the victims, I am so so very sorry that this has happened. My heart is broken.' Descriptions from witnesses and police paint a portrait of harrowing gun battles inside - all for more than half an hour. The FBI, which launched a nationwide active shooter training program for local law enforcement after last December's Connecticut elementary school massacre, says the average mass shooting is over within minutes and often ends once police arrive. But this gun battle kept going. As the chaos unraveled inside, police in the nation's capital shut down the surrounding area. Nearby schools went on lockdown, flights were halted at Reagan National Airport, and even after Alexis was mortally wounded by a police officer, officers chased leads that a second and possibly a third gunman had been working with him. Twelve victims died - a body count that police say could have been much higher, even after they determined that the gunman had worked alone. Eight were injured, with all expected to survive. The Navy said several garages and all surface parking lots at the Washington Navy Yard would open Wednesday for employees to retrieve their private vehicles. But the military installation would reopen for business for Mission Essential personnel only. In a posting on its Facebook page, the Navy said the yard remains an active crime scene. Access to Building 197, the site of Monday's shooting, was prohibited. More than 24 hours after the shooting, the motive remained a mystery. U.S. law enforcement officials told The Associated Press that investigators had found no manifesto or other writings suggesting a political or religious motivation. Ron Machen, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, ticked off some of the unanswered questions Tuesday. 'What caused this individual to kill so many innocent men and women? How did he carry out and plan this attack? How did he get access to the weapons? What could have been done to prevent this tragedy? And most importantly, whether anyone else aided or assisted him either wittingly or unwittingly in this tragedy?' Machen added, 'We're not going to stop until we get answers to those questions.'