Ex-Girlfriend: Don't Blame Me for Loughner's Meltdown

When Kelsey Hawkes dated Jared Loughner he liked to play clarinet and Super Mario Bros. They did their homework together. They shared a love of classic rock. She once taught him how to make French toast. He was, in other words, a “completely normal” 16-year-old during the 10 months they dated, Hawkes tells the Wall Street Journal. “I wouldn’t have dated him if there was anything wrong.” And she had no reason to believe that breaking up with him was what sent him over the edge.

“Some people are getting the idea that Jared became who he is today because five years ago I ‘broke his heart,’” Hawkes says. “It’s not fair to pin that on me.” After the breakup, she and Loughner stopped talking. They’d wait for the bus together in silence, sit apart during class. “I knew he was really sad, but he mostly kept it to himself.” After graduation, she mostly lost track of him. “I heard he was drinking and that he wasn’t doing so well.”

Click here to watch an earlier interview with Hawkes. (More Jared Lee Loughner stories.)