Investigators found a copy of
Just Look Me in the Eye in
Adam Lanza's house.
WSHM in Springfield, Massachusetts, interviews the author, John Robison, who has Asperger's.
"It is important to remember that just because somebody like that might have had Asperger's, that does not mean that he does not have other problems," Robison stated. "Asperger's does not protect you from any number of other potentially serious disorders."
At its root, Robison said autism is a communication disorder. For someone like Lanza, it could make it difficult to understand what people are trying say.
"It can make you lonely," said Robison. "It can make you depressed. It can make you anxious. It can make it hard for you to learn. There is nothing in the profile of autism, in any of its forms, that predicts violence towards other people."
That is why Robison, who just last year was appointed to the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee by the secretary of health and human services, believes gun control is a tough issue. He said for every child diagnosed with autism, there are two adults who have the disorder but do not know it.
"Some of those adults that are not diagnosed are policemen, security guards, some are all manner of other emergency responders," said Robison. "Some are soldiers in the military. Should we take guns away from them? Of course not. Most of those people are valuable members of society."
Robison said something that gets overlooked in all of the Sandy Hook reporting is that two of the 20 children who were killed were also in the autism spectrum.
CBS 3 Springfield - WSHM
