Since being diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder in July 2011, her son had been in and out of Veterans Affairs clinics, she said. He showed no progress in two years, and his erratic behavior continued to spiral out of control.
Jodi Routh worked as an aide at the same Midlothian, Texas, elementary school that Chris Kyle’s children attended. Kyle, of course, wrote “American Sniper,” the basis for the blockbuster Clint Eastwood film, and she had heard that The New York Times bestselling author worked with fellow veterans who were having a hard time adjusting to life back home.
“She approached Chris Kyle as he was dropping off his children and asked him if he would help her son. At that point, she had been trying to get (her son) care at the VA, and he was only getting worse,” according to Laura Beil, author of the ebook, “The Enemy Within: The Inside Story of Eddie Routh, the Man Accused of Killing Legendary ‘American Sniper’ Chris Kyle.”
After the deaths of Kyle and his friend, Chad Littlefield, Beil, who also is a contributing editor for Men’s Health magazine, spent almost four months with Eddie Routh’s family detailing the Marine’s struggles after serving in Iraq and Haiti.
“At the end of the conversation, (Kyle) said, ‘I’m going to do everything I can to help your son.’ She actually cried at that point because it was the first time in over a year that anyone had said that,” Beil told CNN.
Eddie Ray Routh, 27, grew up in the Dallas suburb of Lancaster, about 20 miles east of Midlothian, Kyle’s hometown. He faces murder charges in the 2013 deaths of Kyle, 38, and Littlefield, 35.
The two men had picked Routh up that fateful day and, as a form of therapy, took him to a remote 11,000-acre resort with a gun range in Glen Rose, Texas.
Shortly after his apprehension, Routh confessed to authorities and family members that he killed both men, police said. After becoming aggressive with guards and refusing to give up a spork and dinner tray, he was placed on suicide watch under 24-hour surveillance in the Erath County Jail.
–
The cocktail of pharmaceuticals “made Eddie worse,” his father told the magazine. “I ain’t no doctor. I ain’t no rocket scientist or nothing, but I could tell a difference in him.”
Before the gag order, Beil said, Routh’s family and girlfriend were apprehensive about sharing details of his life. His mother didn’t want to come across as disrespectful of the Kyle and Littlefield families, or appear to be making any excuses for her son.
“I guess for them it was kind of like watching a car crash in slow motion. You can see things getting worse and worse, but you feel powerless to help. And that’s how she felt and then it ended in this tragic way, so she was pretty devastated. The whole family is,” Beil said.
So, does anyone have insight into what could have driven Routh to commit the crimes of which he’s accused?
Capt. Jason Upshaw of the Erath County Sheriff’s Office told reporters a day after the shootings that only Routh knows the answer to that question.
“I don’t know that we’ll ever know,” he said.
The Kyle and Littlefield families — along with a captivated America — will be hoping for a better answer as Routh’s trial gets underway this week. But two years after Kyle’s and Littlefield’s deaths, it’s unclear if they will learn any more of the haunting details that led to the killings at Rough Creek Lodge.
CNN’s Ed Lavandera, Greg Botelho, Joe Johns and Ted Metzger contributed to this report.
