Pa. Gym Shooter George Sodini Attended Dating Classes

By Germain Lussier on August 7th, 2009

Actress Erin Micklow, courtesy of her MySpace

George Sodini, who killed three women in a shooting Tuesday at a gym outside of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, attended classes on how to date women in Los Angeles, according to an actress who was part of the class.

Erin Micklow, a model and actress, was part of the self help class taught by R. Don Steele and attended by Sodini in early 2008. The class, which took place for three days in eight hour shifts, was aimed to let guys ask beautiful women questions about their wants, needs and hopefully make them seem more approachable.

“He was really, really quiet, he took a lot of notes,” Micklow told CNN. She said that while many of the guys loosened up after taking the class, Sodini didn’t. “George was pretty much just as nervous.” (Video of Sodini in the class is online and can seen in part at the Village Voice Web site.)

Months later, Sodini’s inability to find a girlfriend seemed to be a contributing factor in his horrific crime during which he murdered Heidi Overmier, 46; Elizabeth Gannon, 49 and Jody Billingsley, 38.

“Girls and women don’t even give me a second look ANYWHERE,” Sodini wrote on his infamous blog. “There is something BLATANTLY wrong with me that NO goddam person will tell me what it is.”

“George didn’t seem like a bad person,” Micklow said. “He was there for self improvement.”