Alex Hribal, Penn. stabbing suspect, like 'deer in headlights,' no targets known

Alex Hribal had no history of mental illness or troublemaking, didn't abuse drugs and was no outcast at school, where the lawyer described him as a B or B-plus student.

The 16-year-old boy accused of stabbing 22 people at his high school was dazed "like a deer in the headlights" hours later and doesn't fully grasp what he did, his attorney said Thursday as he sketched out the beginnings of a possible mental health defense.

Deepening the mystery of what set off the violence, attorney Patrick Thomassey said Alex Hribal had no history of mental illness or troublemaking, didn't abuse drugs and was no outcast at school, where the lawyer described him as a B or B-plus student.

"In a case like this, it's pretty obvious to me that there must be something inside this young man that nobody knew about," Thomassey told The Associated Press.

The local prosecutor, meanwhile, said Hribal remained an enigma.

"We have very little information about him," Westmoreland County District Attorney John Peck said, "except for the fact that he was a student, his age, and how he was as a student."

A police chief says no evidence has surfaced yet to show a 16-year-old boy charged in a stabbing rampage at a high school outside Pittsburgh was targeting any particular student.

Chief Thomas Seefeld says a motive for the attack Wednesday remains unknown.

Seefeld says reconstructing what happened remains difficult because suspect Alex Hribal isn't talking to police at the advice of his lawyer, and many victims are still recovering.

A prosecutor had said that when Hribal was apprehended, he suggested he wanted to die.

The chief says the boy said "he wanted someone to kill him."

President Barack Obama offered his sympathy and gratitude to the principal of a Pennsylvania school where a teenager stabbed 22 people. The White House said Thursday that Obama called Principal Ron Suvak of Franklin Regional High School as the president flew home from a two-day trip to Texas.

White House spokesman Jay Carney said Obama offered his deepest sympathies to those affected. He says Obama talked about the heroism of students, teachers and staff whose actions saved lives.

Ten boys remained hospitalized, three in critical condition.

On Thursday, authorities seized the computer belonging to the suspect's family as they searched for clues to Wednesday's rampage at Franklin Regional High, outside Pittsburgh. Authorities said Hribal armed himself with two kitchen knives and stabbed 21 students and a security guard before an assistant principal tackled him.

The slender, dark-haired boy who looks younger than his years was jailed without bail on four counts of attempted homicide and 21 counts of aggravated assault. Authorities are prosecuting him as an adult, but Thomassey said he will try to have the case moved to juvenile court.

He said he plans to get his client examined by a psychiatrist before a preliminary hearing on April 30.

"I think his mental state now is unstable. I'm not sure that he recognizes the enormity, if that's the word, of what has occurred," Thomassey said. "And I think in his own mind he's trying to figure out what happened here, as we all are trying to figure out what the heck happened here."

The attack seemingly came out of nowhere, the attorney said.

But a school security consultant said it is often the case that school attacks are perpetrated by kids who officials say weren't on their radar.

"In incident after incident, when you start peeling back the onion, you find there were some indicators, there certainly were some issues. But it takes some time to find," said Ken Trump, president of National School Safety and Security Services.

"Often times, it's not the kid who's the class clown or acting out the most, but the kid who's changed, who's turned more introverted or withdrawn," he said. "I think the one consistent theme across all of these is mental health."

Police and doctors said one victim, a 17-year-old whose name was not released, had surgery again overnight and was in very critical condition after suffering a serious stab wound.

Another student, Brett Hurt, 16, told of being stabbed in the back.

"What was going through my mind?" Hurt said at a hospital news conference. "Will I survive or will I die."

As for the assailant, Hurt said he hopes that someday "I can forgive him, and everyone else who got hurt can forgive him. First of all, he needs to forgive himself."

A day after the rampage, students pondered what comes next for their school, which could reopen Monday after the blood-spattered floors and walls are cleaned up.

"It will never be the same, but you want it to be as close to the same as possible," said Jacob Roberge, a junior.

Roberge said that while "people are definitely mad" at Hribal, "more so, people want him to get help."