Virginia Tech massacre
The Virginia Tech massacre was a school shooting that unfolded as two attacks about two hours apart on April 16, 2007, on the Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg, Virginia, United States. Seung-Hui Cho killed 32 people[4] and wounded many more[3] before committing suicide,[5] making it the deadliest shooting in modern U.S. history.
Cho, a South Korean who had moved to the U.S. at age 8, was a senior majoring in English at Virginia Tech.[5] In 2005, he had been accused of stalking two female students[8] and was declared mentally ill by a Virginia special justice.[9] At least one professor had asked him to pursue counseling.[10]
The incident generated extensive coverage worldwide and sparked intense debate over the perpetrator’s state of mind as well as journalism ethics. Cho’s troubled history prompted speculation that yielded numerous conflicting after-the-fact diagnoses of his mental state and motivations.[11] After airing portions of the killer’s multimedia manifesto, sent on the day of the shootings, broadcast journalists received criticism from victims’ families, Virginia law enforcement, and the American Psychiatric Association.[12][13]
The massacre also reignited the gun politics debate in the United States. Cho, an individual adjudicated as mentally unsound two years before, was able to purchase two semi-automatic pistols despite federal law intended to prevent such purchases.[14] Prompted by the incident, within two weeks Virginia Governor Tim Kaine issued an executive order intended to close gaps between federal and state law that had allowed Cho to purchase handguns.[15] Proponents of gun rights and the Second Amendment argued that Virginia Tech’s gun-free “safe zone” policy ensured that none of the students or faculty would be armed and thereby able to stop Cho’s rampage. Internationally, the incident incited commentary and editorials critical of U.S. gun laws and gun culture throughout the developed world.[16]
Attacks
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Cho used two firearms during the attacks: a smallbore .22-caliber Walther P22 semiautomatic handgun and a 9 mm semiautomatic Glock 19 handgun.[17] The shootings occurred in separate incidents, with the first at West Ambler Johnston Hall and the second at Norris Hall.
[edit] West Ambler Johnston Hall shootings
About 7 a.m. EDT, Cho was seen loitering near the entrance to West Ambler Johnston Hall, a co-ed dormitory that houses 895 students.[17] The hall is normally locked until 10 a.m. and it is not clear how Cho gained entrance to the facility.
Cho shot his first victims around 7:15 a.m. in West Ambler Johnston Hall. A young woman, Emily J. Hilscher of Woodville, Rappahannock County, Virginia, and a male resident assistant, Ryan C. Clark of Martinez, Columbia County, Georgia, were shot and killed[5] in the room Hilscher shared with another student.[18] Cho left the scene and soon after mailed a package of writings and video recordings to NBC News; the package was postmarked 9:01 am.[19]
[edit] Norris Hall shootings
About two hours after the initial shootings, Cho entered Norris Hall, which houses the Engineering Science and Mechanics program, and chained the three main entrance doors shut. He then went to the second floor and began shooting students and faculty members.[2][20]
Aerial photo showing location of Norris and West Ambler Johnston Halls.
Erin Sheehan, an eyewitness and survivor of Norris 207, told reporters that the shooter “peeked in twice” earlier in the lesson and that “it was strange that someone at this point in the semester would be lost, looking for a class.” Shortly thereafter, Cho began shooting. Sheehan said that only four students in the German class were able to leave the room on their own, two of them injured. The rest were dead or more severely wounded.[21][22][23]
By the end of this second attack lasting nine minutes, Cho had fired about 170 rounds, killing 30 people and wounding many more, and still had ammunition when he killed himself.[24] Sydney J. Vail, the director of the trauma center at Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital, stated that Cho’s 9-mm hollow-point bullet rounds spread into petals “like a flower,” augmenting injuries to victims [1]. It took police nearly five minutes to gain entry to the barricaded building. When they could not break the chains, an officer shot out a dead-bolt lock leading to a stairwell.[17] As police reached the second floor, they heard Cho fire his final shot.[17][25] Cho was found dead in Jocelyne Couture-Nowak’s classroom, Room 211, from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the temple.[24]
Elementary French class students take cover in Holden Hall Room 212.
Virginia Tech student Jamal Albarghouti used his mobile phone to capture video footage of a part of the attack from the exterior of Norris Hall; this was later broadcast on many news outlets.[26]
Student Nikolas Macko described to BBC News his experience at the center of the shootings.[27] He had been attending an issues in scientific computing computer science class (near the German class) taught by graduate student Haiyan Cheng, who substituted for the professor that day.[28] They heard gunshots in the hallway. At least three people in the classroom, including Zach Petkewicz, barricaded the door using a table. At one point, Macko said, the shooter attempted to open the classroom door and then shot twice into the room; one shot hit a podium and the other went out the window. The shooter reloaded and fired into the door, but the bullet did not penetrate into the room. Macko stated there were “many, many shots” fired.[20][29]
In the aftermath, high winds related to the April 2007 nor’easter prevented emergency medical services from using helicopters for evacuation of the injured.[30] Victims injured in the shooting were treated at Montgomery Regional Hospital in Blacksburg, Carilion New River Valley Medical Center in Radford, Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital in Roanoke, and Lewis-Gale Medical Center in Salem.[31]
[edit] Victims
During the two attacks, the shooter killed five faculty members and 27 students and wounded many more. Eleven students died in an intermediate French language class in Norris Room 211. Nine students died in an advanced hydrology class in Room 206. Four students died in an elementary German language class in Room 207. One student died in a solid mechanics class in Room 204.[25] Police reports indicate that 25 people were injured; some by Cho’s bullets, others when they jumped from second-story windows to escape.[3]
[edit] Resistance
Several people tried to help others during the attack, including:
- Professor Liviu Librescu held the door of his classroom, Room 204, shut while Cho attempted to enter it. Librescu was able to prevent the shooter from entering the classroom until his students had escaped through the windows, but he was shot five times and killed.[32][33]
- Couture-Nowak tried to save the students in her classroom, Room 211, after looking Cho in the eye in the hallway. Colin Goddard, one of the six known survivors of the French class,[34] told his family that Couture-Nowak ordered her students to the back of the class for their safety and made a fatal attempt to barricade the door.[35]
- In Room 206, Waleed Shaalan, a Ph.D. student in civil engineering and teaching assistant from Zagazig, Egypt, though badly wounded, distracted Cho from a nearby student after the shooter had returned to the room. Shaalan was shot a second time and died.[36]
- Also in Room 206, Partahi Mamora Halomoan Lumbantoruan from Indonesia protected fellow student Guillermo Colman by diving on top of him;[37] Colman’s various accounts make it unclear whether this act was intentional or the involuntary result of being shot. Multiple gunshots killed Lumbantoruan but Colman was protected by Lumbantoruan’s body.[38][39][40][41]
- Student Zach Petkewicz barricaded the door of Room 205 with a large table after alternative instructor Haiyan Cheng and an unidentified female student in the same class saw Cho heading toward them. Cho shot several times through the door but failed to force in. No one in that classroom was wounded or killed.[42][43][25]
- Katelyn Carney, Derek O’Dell, Trey Perkins, and Erin Sheehan barricaded the door of Room 207, the German class, after the first attack and attended to the wounded. Cho returned minutes later but O’Dell and Carney prevented him from re-entering the room. Both were injured.[44][45][46][47]
- Hearing the commotion on the floor below, Professor Kevin Granata brought 20 students from a nearby classroom into an office, where the door could be locked, on the third floor of Norris Hall. He then went downstairs to investigate and was shot by Cho. Granata died from his injuries. None of the students locked in Granata’s office were injured.[48]
[edit] Perpetrator
One of the photographs of Seung-Hui Cho sent to NBC News on the day of the massacre.
The shooter was identified as 23-year-old Seung-Hui Cho,[5] a South Korean citizen with U.S. permanent resident status living in Virginia. An undergraduate at Virginia Tech, Cho lived in Harper Hall, a dormitory west of West Ambler Johnston Hall. A spokesman for Virginia Tech has described him as “a loner.”[2] Several former professors of Cho have stated that his writing was disturbing, and he was encouraged to seek counseling.[10][49] He had also been investigated by the university for stalking and harassing two female students.[8] In 2005, Cho had been declared mentally ill by a Virginia special justice and ordered to seek outpatient treatment.[9]
According to Cho’s great-aunt in South Korea, Cho’s parents said his behavior was the result of autism,[50] however there exists no known record of Cho being diagnosed with autism.[51][52][53] Cho’s flat emotional affect was evident through middle and high school years, during which he was bullied for speech difficulties.[54] “Relatives thought he might be a mute. Or mentally ill,” reported the New York Times.[55] Cho’s underlying psychological diagnosis remains a matter of speculation.[11] Media outlets routinely compared Cho’s motives and mental state to those of the Columbine killers, despite the fact that Harris and Klebold’s motives and mental states were not even similar to each other.[56]
Early reports had suggested that the killing resulted from a domestic dispute between the killer and his supposed former girlfriend Emily Hilscher, whose friends said had no prior relationship with Cho. In fact, there is no evidence that Cho had ever met or talked with Hilscher.[57] In the ensuing investigation, police found a suicide note in Cho’s dorm room that included comments about “rich kids”, “debauchery”, and “deceitful charlatans”. On April 18, 2007, NBC News received a package from Cho time-stamped between the first and second shooting episodes. It contained an 1,800-word manifesto,[58] photos, and 27 digitally recorded videos, in which Cho likened himself to Jesus Christ and expressed his hatred of the wealthy.[19]
[edit] Responses to the incidents
[edit] University response
Virginia Tech canceled classes for the rest of the week and closed Norris Hall for the remainder of the semester.[1] The University also offered counseling assistance for students and faculty and held an assembly on Tuesday, April 17, 2007. Also that day, a candlelight vigil was held. Additionally, the Red Cross dispatched several dozen crisis counselors to Blacksburg to help Virginia Tech students cope with the events.[1]
[edit] Student response
Virginia Tech students mourn the victims at a candlelight vigil.
Some Virginia Tech students questioned why the University had not been locked down after the first shooting.[4] The University first informed students via e-mail at 9:26 AM, over two hours after the first shooting, warning them of the danger and canceling classes.[59] After becoming aware of the incident, students communicated with their family and peers about their conditions, using telephones and social networking services;[60][61] some bodies were found with cell phones and PDAs still ringing.[62] Many students created Facebook memorial pages for fellow students.[63]
Tech students of South Korean descent initially feared they would be targeted for retribution.[64][65] However, no cases of discrimination against Asians were reported in the weeks following the shootings.[66]
A student-led emergency-response relief group called “Hokies United”, an alliance of student organizations (principally Student Government Association, the Class System, the Student Alumni Associates, Fraternity and Sorority life), was activated immediately[67] to help the Virginia Tech student body and families of the victims through the Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund.[68]
[edit] Government response
Government leaders at all levels offered their condolences.[69][70] President George W. Bush and his wife Laura attended the convocation at Virginia Tech the day after the shootings.[71] The Internal Revenue Service and Virginia Department of Taxation granted six-month extensions to individuals affected by the shootings.[72] Virginia Governor Tim Kaine returned early from a trip to Tokyo, Japan,[59] and declared a “state of emergency” in Virginia, enabling him to immediately deploy state personnel, equipment, and other resources in the aftermath of the shootings.[73] Governor Kaine later created an eight-member panel, including former U.S. homeland security secretary Tom Ridge, to review all aspects of the Virginia Tech massacre, from Cho’s medical history to the school’s widely criticized delay in warning students of danger.[74]
The incident also caused Virginia Commonwealth elected officials to re-examine gaps between federal and state gun purchase laws. Within two weeks, Governor Kaine had issued an executive order designed to close those gaps (see Gun Politics, below).
[edit] Responses from other educational institutions
Penn State students pay tribute to the fallen Hokies at the Nittany Lions spring football game
In addition to official condolences from many universities, both inside of the United States and abroad, many universities have initiated examinations of existing and possible local response procedures.[75] Some schools provided housing for officers, cash assistance, and other emotional support.[76][77][78][79][80]
Adjunct professor Nicholas Winset, at Emmanuel College in Boston, re-enacted the shooting during a classroom discussion, and was summarily dismissed,[81] provoking some debate.[82]
[edit] South Korean response
When the citizenship of the shooter became known, South Koreans expressed shock and a sense of public shame.[83] A candlelight vigil was held outside the Embassy of the United States in Seoul. South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun expressed his deepest condolences.[84] South Korea’s ambassador to the U.S. and several Korean American religious leaders called on Korean Americans to participate in a 32-day fast, one day for each victim, for repentance.[85][86][87]
The foreign minister, Song Min-soon, announced that safety measures had been established for Koreans living in the U.S., in apparent reference to fears of possible reprisal attacks against Koreans in the U.S.[88] A ministry official expressed hope that the shooting would not “stir up racial prejudice or confrontation.”[89] As of late April, no public backlash was evident.[66]
Some commentators contrasted the lack of a backlash in the U.S. to the South Korean public’s virulently anti-American response when a U.S. military vehicle in South Korea accidentally killed two girls, and was found not guilty on two counts of manslaughter in the United States Military Court. News reports noted that South Koreans seemed relieved that American news coverage of Cho focused not on his nationality but rather on individual aspects, such as his psychological problems.[83]
[edit] Media response
The incident generated extensive coverage worldwide and sparked intense debate for several days over the state of mind of the perpetrator, American gun control, and journalism ethics. Editorial response in international newspapers of record was almost unanimously critical of U.S. gun laws and gun culture.[16] A Times editorial,[90] which also appeared on the front page of the Ottawa Citizen,[91] lamented America’s tolerant attitudes towards guns and advocated tougher gun controls; in Sweden, Göteborgs-Posten called the killings “preventable,”[16] in Japan, the Asahi Shimbun said gun fatalities were “disturbingly common in the United States.”[92] The Canadian Globe and Mail said it was “uniquely American” to label 220 school shootings in six years as “rare.”[93] Commentators from both the BBC[94] and The Economist[95] predicted little chance of tougher gun laws or changes to the U.S. gun culture.
[edit] Other responses
- Some of Cho’s family members expressed sympathy for the victims’ families and described his history of mental and behavioral problems. Cho’s maternal grandfather was quoted in The Daily Mirror referring to Cho as a person who deserved to die with the victims.[52] On Friday, April 20, Cho’s family issued a statement of grief and apology, written by his sister, Sun-Kyung Cho.[96]
- Many heads of state and international figures offered condolences and sympathy,[97] including Pope Benedict XVI[98] and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.[99]
- Sporting teams and leagues at both the college and professional levels, as well as sports figures from football, baseball, hockey, soccer, and NASCAR racing, paid their respects and joined fundraising efforts to honor the victims.[100][101][102][103] [104][105][106][107]
[edit] Gun politics debate
- See also: Gun politics in the United States
The massacre reignited the gun politics debate in the United States, with proponents of gun control legislation arguing that guns are too accessible, citing that Cho, a mentally unsound individual, was able to purchase two semi-automatic pistols. Proponents of gun rights and the Second Amendment argued that Virginia Tech’s gun-free “safe zone” policy ensured that none of the students or faculty would be armed and thereby able to stop Cho’s rampage. Others argued that coherent and consistent federal and state laws combined with adequate communication between government entities could have prevented Cho from acquiring weapons without compromising Second Amendment rights.
[edit] Background
Law enforcement officials have described finding a purchase receipt for at least one of the guns used in the assault.[108] The shooter had apparently waited one month after buying a Walther P22 pistol before he bought a second pistol, a Glock 19.[109] Cho used a 15-round ammunition magazine in the Glock.[110] The Federal Assault Weapons Ban, which expired in 2004, prohibited the manufacture of new magazines holding more than 10 cartridges during its 10-year life.[111] The serial numbers on the weapons were filed off, a felony, but the ATF National Laboratory was able to reveal them and performed a firearms trace.[110]
The sale of firearms to permanent residents in Virginia is legal as long as the buyer shows proof of residency.[112] Additionally, though, Virginia has a law that limits purchases of handguns to one every 30 days.[113] Federal law requires a criminal background check for handgun purchases from licensed firearms dealers, and Virginia checks other databases in addition to the Federally-mandated NICS. Federal law also prohibits those “adjudicated as a mental defective” from buying guns, and this exclusion may have been applicable to Cho after a Virginia court declared him to be a danger to himself in late 2005 and sent him for psychiatric treatment.[14] Because of gaps between federal and Virginia state laws, the state did not report Cho’s legal status to the federal National Instant Criminal Background Check System.[14]
Virginia Governor Timothy Kaine addressed this problem on April 30, 2007, by issuing an executive order intended to close those reporting gaps.[15]
The shootings also renewed debate surrounding Virginia Tech’s blanket ban on possession or storage of firearms on campus, even by state-licensed concealed weapons permit holders. In April 2005, a student licensed by the state to carry concealed weapons was discovered possessing a concealed firearm in class. While no criminal charges were filed, a university spokesman said the University had “the right to adhere to and enforce that policy as a common-sense protection of students, staff and faculty as well as guests and visitors.”[114]
In 2006, a bill intended to prohibit public universities from banning of weapons on campus was introduced into the Virginia House of Delegates by delegate Todd Gilbert. The university opposed the bill, HB 1572, which died in subcommittee in January 2006.[115]
[edit] Domestic response
The response to how gun law affected the massacre was divided. The White House issued a statement saying “The president believes that there is a right for people to bear arms, but that all laws must be followed.”[116][5] The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence said that it was easy for an individual to get powerful weapons and called for “common-sense actions to prevent tragedies like this from continuing to occur.”[117] The New York Times editorial called for more gun control, saying that “some of the gravest dangers Americans face come from killers at home armed with guns that are frighteningly easy to obtain.”[118] Gun rights activist and National Rifle Association board member Ted Nugent, commenting on CNN, called for an end to gun-free zones and contrasted the Virginia Tech massacre with other incidents in which mass shootings have been ended by law-abiding gun owners.[119] In response to the Virginia Tech incident, Texas Gov. Rick Perry has proposed that licensed gun owners be allowed to carry their weapons anywhere in Texas, allowing individuals to protect themselves “whether they’re in church or whether on a college campus or wherever.”[120] Virginia Governor Tim Kaine condemned the gun politics debate following the massacre, saying: “To those who want to make this into some sort of crusade, I say take this elsewhere.”
Source: wikipedia
Thank you for the comprehensive look at the VA Tech situation and gun issues. As a graduate from VA Tech, it’s hard to say where the gun control situation stands for me. Is it mental illness or the guns that are causing these issues. Thanks for making good points and keeping a good dialogue going.
[...] at Virginia Tech. The recent shootings at VA Tech continue to fuel the debate about bullying. The Ezine Blog does a good job of summarizing the issues, the biggest one being gun [...]
Its not the guns that are bad its the people that have the guns. How are we going to keep the guns out of the hands of those who use them to harm others is the problem. I do agree that it is to easy for anyone to acquire guns especially criminals. I’d like to see some current data on the guns.
There are students that will never forget what happened on their campus. Why would anyone ever want to take another’s life is beyond me. I simply don’t understand what was going on in him mind. His picture he left behind, makes him look deranged. It is a shame he was turned loose from the mental health center.
How could teachers, police, students…not know what was happening..did they not hear the gun shots? I pray for those who lost their lifes on that day, and for the familys that lost their child. Its amazing to me how someone could just take 32 lifes away like that. It just blows my mind! Its rediculous. God bless you students, Rest in peace.