He isn't related to any of the 14 people who were killed on the University of Texas campus 31 years ago. He didn't even know them actually. He was just a 10-year-old boy who read about it in his barber shop's 1966 copy of Life.

Three years ago, Lavergne watched an A&E television documentary about mass killers that mentioned Charles Whitman and the now-infamous tower incident.

That 1966 August day has plagued the UT campus with an eerie spirit of a former Marine and Eagle Scout who friends and family fondly called "Charlie." Some people have even referred to Whitman as the "All-American Boy."

But even All-American Boys keep daunting fantasies tucked away in secret places.

This one sure did. For a long time he camouflaged them like the polished Marine he was. They were revealed, though, when he told a campus psychiatrist that his fantasy included going to the top of the UT Tower to shoot people.

Wanting to learn more, Lavergne hunted for related books. The books, he says, didn't exist. And yet, his interest never died.

He craved the truth, plain and simple.

What wasn't so simple was answering the questions that were on his mind for so long: Was Charles Whitman more than just a wacko with a rifle who killed 16 people---including his mother and wife---and wounded 31 others on a sizzling summer day? Did the system fail Whitman or did Whitman fail the system?

"He killed because he wanted to," says Lavergne, whose book published earlier this year, A SNIPER IN THE TOWER, chronicles the events that led to Whitman's killing spree. "This guy carried out what was then the greatest mass murder in American History."

Lavergne's book offers several reasons for the killings: Whitman's relationship with his father caused him stress and anxiety, he took drugs toward the end of this life, he had a brain tumor. Whitman's training was also a culprit.

But those things, Lavergne says, don't account for what Whitman did. And while many questions have been explored in the book, one remains unanswered:

Could it happen again?

Silas Griggs thinks so. Captain of UT's police department, he knows the reality of mass murder -- that killings can take place almost anywhere at any given moment.

"Sure it could happen," Capt. Griggs says. "Not in that building (UT's tower) -- but in any high rise. It happens all the time."

If the Charles Whitman killing spree occurred today, the police department would take a different tactical approach than the one almost 32 years ago. The big difference: SWAT teams. The police department would call the Special Weapons and Tactics units, which don't exist in the form they do today.

"The 1966 incident was the event that caused police departments to took at their tactical assault and realize that they were not prepared for those kinds of situations," Capt. Griggs says. "The Los Angeles Police -- in looking at the tower incident -- thought 'what if it happened in Los Angeles?' They realized they would be in the same situation we were. They formed the first SWAT team in the country."

UT is officially the biggest single campus in the nation with 48,866 students. Most students today weren't alive when Whitman killed. His story, though, has become lore. To many, it's just another myth, another legend.

"It doesn't seem real," says Shelly Venable, an English senior. I wasn't alive when it happened. I've never experienced something like that. It's hard to fathom that another human being can do something that horrible, that monstrous. You don't think about it."

While many students don't think about the Whitman killings and don't obsess about mass murder, some worry. One event, in particular, that caused safety concerns was the speech made by former presidential nominee Jesse Jackson. Rev. Jackson visited the campus in September to denounce a comment made by UT law professor Lino Graglia. The speech was held in front of the tower where Whitman went ballistic 31 years ago.

According to some people who attended, Rev. Jackson was not properly guarded and lacked adequate security.

Capt. Griggs says eight people worked security that day. He admits that Rev. Jackson likes to be close to the audience.

"He likes public access," he says. "He was in a hometown crowd. He was in a friendly crowd."

Sitting in the office of his two-story Cedar Park home, Lavergne pulls out a copy of the same 1966 Life that he read in the barber shop as a child. It represents the last three years of his life, the late nights he stayed up reading countless articles and documents about the tower incident.

It's also a reminder of all of the phone calls from people who wanted to tell him where they were exactly at that moment in 1966. Telephone conversations ranged from those who were disturbed by Whitman to people who were pleased that a book was in the works.

There were even calls from psychics who said they speak to Whitman regularly.

"You have no idea how many people would call with theories of conspiracy and cover-up," says Lavergne, his voice a reminder of his native-Louisiana roots. "I'm happy to say that most of the calls were from people who were very grateful that the complete story has finally been told."

It began at Charles Joseph Whitman's birth in 1941. The eldest of three sons, Whitman grew to love guns. He became infatuated with them, actually.

According to Lavergne's book, Whitman's father, C.A. Whitman, bragged that "Charlie could plug a squirrel in the eye by the time he was 16." He would later use that proficiency to spray an unsuspecting campus with bullets.

Whitman visited UT's mental health center toward the end of March 1966. Dr. Maurice Dean Heatly was assigned to Whitman. According to A Sniper in the Tower, Dr. Heatly described his first impression of the former Marine as someone "who seemed to be oozing with hostility." Whitman shared his secret desire with Dr. Heatly that day "about going up on the Tower with a deer rifle and shooting people."

Dr. Heatly wasn't shocked by the admission. He had heard several students in the past make tower references.

That day would be Whitman's only attempt at help. He never returned to the mental health center.

According to Lavergne, there were three options Dr. Heatly could have chosen. He could have determined that Whitman wasn't a psychiatric case. He could have diagnosed Whitman as "psychotic and committed him involuntarily."

He could have also scheduled more appointments for further observation, which he tried to do. "Serial visits, however, are voluntary and must be agreed to by the patient," Lavergne says.

Dr. Dave Drum, who heads UT's mental health department, feels the standard of care is elevated now and there are more medical options available. He also believes there are more pressures not to deprive people of their liberty unless, he says, "there is a compelling societal reason to do so."

"The standards for hospitalization have dramatically increased," Dr. Drum says. "Hospitalizing somebody now -- one does it much more cautiously. There are some trends that say that your ability to spot and detect a person who will act more on violent impulses has probably improved, but still far from perfect."

The Dallas Morning News reported Nov. 2 that nearly 700,000 people with diagnosed mental illness are taken to jail each year, more than nine times the number found in public mental hospitals at any one time.

But was Whitman mentally ill? His autopsy revealed that he had a brain tumor. According to the book, Dr. Coleman de Chenar, who discovered the tumor, "did not think that the tumor had any correlation to psychosis or persistent pains..."

Mental illness or not, Whitman wasn't diagnosed as psychotic during his visit to the mental health center. Today, there's not a high probability that someone would be willing to be hospitalized, according to Dr. Drum.

"The likelihood that someone would stay in a hosptal for more than a couple of days -- voluntarily or even involuntarily without a history of violence or a clear and present danger to society -- is very remote," he says. "The question would be, 'would that have changed his (Whitman's) actions at all?' We don't know."

Dr. Drum says the mental health center has close to 1000 visits a week. People visit the center with a number of reasons, ranging from depression, physical health concerns and anger to eating problems, relationship difficulties and self-esteem issues. There is no charge for the consultation.

Counselors are available about 90 hours a week, he says. Another 20 or 25 hours are available for more "in-depth" evaluations, if needed.

"We're quite fortunate that most people seek us out because they experience some discomfort or problems that they understand is dramatically influencing their ability to profit from the university..." Dr. Drum says.

"A very small fraction who come to us come because other people want them here. By far the most frequent person is someone who just made a hard decision, feeling that they are going to need some assistance in sorting their way through what's in front of them."

Lavergne says Whitman's wife, Kathy, must have persuaded him to visit the mental health center. Although it's been 31 years since Whitman murdered from atop the tower, Dr. Drum feels there still are people who can't deal with certain life struggles.

"I don't know that it differs today from Whitman's time," he says. "There are obviously people who are struggling to cope with the kinds of things that are happening in their life. A certain percentage of those folks who are struggling to cope with those things are going to not get a grip on that and they're going to attempt to take it out on others.

"Clearly, that's present in every work environment or study environment. I think we understand that if we get a person who is coming to us and we can them to talk those feelings out and work them through, then we are clearly helping to promote a safer environment for everybody."

Dr. Drum is reluctant to discuss any conversations that take place during therapy sessions, about whether people confess secret desires of killing like Whitman did. He doesn't want to talk about specific -- or even broad generalizations -- because it would interfere with the client-therapist confidentiality.

"I would rather not venture into that territory in fear that it does compromise people who may currently come in and talk about those things," he says. "But it wouldn't be uncommon. The bottom line is this is a place where you can talk about those kind of feelings and fears."

Whitman was killed that August day by Austin police. No other event has had such a dramatic impact on the city as the Whitman rampage. It was 99 minutes of terror, as some have called it.

But other murders have plagued this town. Lavergne wrote his last chapter about Whitman, but he may delve into the life of another brutal killer: Kenneth Allen McDuff. McDuff kidnapped -- and later killed -- a person from a car wash on 5th St.

The book would "not necessarily be a chronicle of is very gruesome crimes, but a book exploring the effects of what he did -- like, of course, his victims' families," Lavergne says. "...I think he made Austinites understand that you can be doing something very simple, very innocent like washing your car.