Chapter One
Definition of Mass Murder
This book will only concern itself with Mass Murder, aka Mass Shootings. There will be no information dealing with Serial Killing or Spree Killing.
Finding a true definition of Mass Murder will not be as easy as one might expect; for there are different groups and agencies with their own definitions of what constitutes a Mass Murder to them. Therefore we will use the general classification as listed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The FBI uses the following basic definition which states that; One, a mass murder must involve four or more murders which occur during the same incident or attack. Two, there should be no distinctive period of time between the murders, and Three, the murders usually occur in the same basic location or area during the ongoing attack.