Talovic motive a death wish?
"Given his actions, I think he'd resigned himself to that fact," says Salt Lake City Police Chief Chris Burbank.
The chief acknowledged it is possible that Talovic wanted to commit "suicide by cop."
"I don't know," he sighed. "That's one of those things that may just rest with him."
Another answer Talovic may also have taken to his grave is why he killed five people and wounded four others in a murderous rampage through the Trolley Square mall on Feb. 12. In an extensive interview Friday with the Deseret Morning News, Burbank said investigators are struggling to find any answers.
"Maybe we won't learn what the motive was," he said.
That doesn't mean detectives aren't trying. Police continue to question those who knew the 18-year-old Talovic in hopes of learning something about him that gives them insight into what set him off. So far, they have come up with nothing.
"We're looking at all those things," Burbank said. "We're not finding he had access to computers, not finding that's an influence in his life. We're looking at the whole Bosnian connection, not finding anything there. His religion ... nothing's coming to the forefront."
Even Talovic's own family is struggling for answers.
"No, I no have anything," an exasperated Suljo Talovic, his father, said in broken English. "Nothing. Nobody tell anything."
Profile of a killer
The chief said investigators are assembling a profile of the young man, drawing upon what little physical evidence they have and interviews with those who knew the killer.
Law enforcement agencies have contributed what they have been able to glean about Talovic. Burbank said it includes information about his guns, his relationships, his life and his life history in the United States and Bosnia, where he was born.
While the chief would not reveal much, the profile appears to show a loner who didn't have much going for him.
"Not a lot of friends," Burbank said. "He went to work and did his thing. He wasn't real active anywhere. He wasn't anyone who had friends anywhere. Nobody that we've found has had significant input in his life that would have caused this, or anyone who would have told us why he did what he did."
Even the person who appears to be his closest confidant — a 17-year-old girl in Amarillo, Texas, named Monika — is baffled.
"He never told me about hurting nothing," she said. "I mean, he was nice to everybody."
Monika (who asked the Deseret Morning News not to use her last name) was introduced to Talovic over the phone. Their lengthy conversations grew into a sort-of "relationship." She spoke to him the night before the shooting, when he told her she would be mad at him the next day.
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