UPDATED Connecticut elementary school shooting - 20+ dead (incl gunman)

[mkats]

Beyond awful. I don't know what to say

CNN has a running timeline of school violence, and scrolling through it I learned that Mitchell Johnson and Andrew Golden, the two boys who were responsible for the 1998 Arkansas shooting, have both been released and Golden tried to apply for a concealed weapons permit under a new name Thank goodness he was caught and denied.

[skipaway]

President Obama's statement was very emotional. He had to stop several times and occasionally wiped his eyes. He looked devastated. It's shocking the mass shootings he sited: Connecticutt, Wisconsin, Oregon, Aurora: all in the last 6 months. I will write my Senators and Congressman to address this continuing problem in our country.

[Susan1]

ArtisticFan, good points about the pressure the news anchors are under. A few times, I've heard their voices shake as if they are trying not to break down but they have to keep it together on the air. I think it's made all the worse by how many young children were taken away from their families.

Whoever the NBC News anchor is, he got choked up talking to some "expert" they were interviewing in the studio, and the President was also wiping away tears as he was speaking. How could you not?

[skipaway]

Now they're reporting it was not Ryan, but his brother Adam Lanza who is the shooter and the 2 weapons used were his mother's weapons.

[Lacey]

I have four grandchildren in elementary school, and two more in nursery school, today, OMG. Those poor kids and their parents.

[ballettmaus]

I wish the news anchors would stop saying how horrible it is right before the holidays. Why do people say that? I've heard that before in other cases. Losing a family member in such a senseless violent way wouldn't be any easier in the middle of the summer. Geez. Maybe they don't mean it that way but it's just bothering me.

It's horrible at any time of the year but I think they say that because Christmas is, even though not intentionally, the time for kids. In my home it was always more or less all about me. My mom was making Christmas presents with me, I had the advent calendar, we were baking cookies... Then Christmas Eve and the two holidays we have afterwards in Germany were all about family. You don't really have that sense of togetherness and family during the rest of the year and I don't think the focus is on the child as much as it is during the holidays during the rest of the year. Whether or not that's right or not is another matter.
The family members who have died so far in my family were most missed during Christmas Eve/the two holidays because the lack of their presence is the most obvious then. They're not there for dinner, you don't have to get gifts (and I'm sure those parents who lost their kids and those who lost their loved ones already had gifts, so that's going to be hard, too), they're just not there when everyone else is physically present.

To me, Christmas is a very special time and instead of celebrating those families will most likely be mouring, or, if they have other children, have a very tuned down Christmas, I would guess.
So, losing the child/family member isn't any harder but I still think it's different because the time is sort of a special time right now.

[Anita18]

The thing that gets me is that he was such a sniveling piece of cowardly TRASH that he had to have a GUN to go after CHILDREN. When you go after someone with a knife, you have to get close to them, you could get hurt yourself. You can be stopped much more easily by others. And it's more likely you won't kill anyone. The knife attack in China was terrible, but no one died.

Any coward with a gun could go and kill someone. And that's what he was. A big childish coward. Violence does not make you powerful. Violence does not make you a man. It makes you the lowest piece of trash on this earth.

If anything, THAT needs to be the culture we teach our children. Games are one thing, thinking that violence will solve real-world problems are quite another.

[milanessa]

I agree with balletmaus. It's also likely some of their homes have already been decorated in a festive, happy manner and this time is anything but for them.

[Silver Lining]

It is worse at Christmas. My mother died unexpectedly just before Christmas when I was 13 and we had to open her presents on Christmas morning. We were finding gifts she had hidden but not yet wrapped for months afterward. These parents probably couldn't wait to see their children's eyes light up on Christmas morning when they saw what Santa brought them and watched them shake the presents under the tree. They will always be reminded of this at this time of year.

[Lacey]

18 children, six adults, and the perpertrator all dead at the school, so 25 at scene, two children died at hospital, so 27 total, one dead (relative?) at another location in the same town, and one injured at hospital, so 28 grand total and one injured. No mention of NJ?

Sounds like he might have killed a family member (father?, brother?) at home, went to school where his mother was a teacher, killed her and the kids in her kindergarten class. Might not be Ryan Lanza, might be his brother Adam.

[genevieve]

Now they're reporting it was not Ryan, but his brother Adam Lanza who is the shooter and the 2 weapons used were his mother's weapons.

this is all I could find on that - the info is all over the place. This report says Ryan is the one being talked to by police
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/p...8TXwSYYsVGkYLO

20 children, six adults, and the perpertrator all dead at the school, so 27 at scene, one dead at another location in the same town, so 28 total, and one injured at hospital. No mention of NJ?

New Jersey? I'm not following...

[Jenny]

The police spokesman would likely not report on something outside his jurisdiction.

[Southpaw]

New Jersey? I'm not following...

I read that the gunman's brother lives in Hoboken and he killed him, too.

[Vash01]

[QUOTE=genevieve;3771425]this is all I could find on that - the info is all over the place. This report says Ryan is the one being talked to by police
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/p...8TXwSYYsVGkYLO


New Jersey? I'm not following...[/QUOTE]

From what is being reported, Ryan Lanza is from Hoboken, NJ. Earlier report said that one of his parents was found dead at their NJ home. Since his mother was teaching school in CT, I am assuming that it was the father who was killed in NJ. I don't think it's been verified yet. There have been conflicting reports.

Since news is still coming in, it may be a while before they figure out what really happened.

[skatingfan5]

New Jersey? I'm not following...

As with all breaking news stories, there is a lot of partial and misinformation reported in the early hours. Someone had posted earlier in this thread that the shooter had first killed his mother in New Jersey and then come to the Connecticut school. Later reports mentioned his father and a family home in Connecticut.

ETA: Southpaw and Vash have added other versions of the purported New Jersey connection.

[Southpaw]

http://www.nj.com/hudson/index.ssf/2...rt_maj-story-1

[Lacey]

I know it's a big story, but I wish they would take the photos and videos of the surviving kids off the television, they deserve their privacy.

[genegri]

Sandy Hook is the name of a well known state park in NJ. I totally jumped to conclusion that it happened in NJ until I read further.

I feel the worst for the poor parents. Don't know how they can cope. I know I wouldn't be able to.

[Tesla]

I messed up.

[Tesla]

http://www.wtnh.com/dpps/news/nation...0#.UMuTVKwW7wd

The official also said Ryan Lanza's girlfriend and another friend are missing in New Jersey.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, the official said the suspect is dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Why can't these lunatics kill themselves before taking other lives?