Colorado Shooting

[kalon]

[quote=Chase Squires, AP writer, off of yahoo news]BAILEY, Colo. - A gunman took six girls hostage at the high school in this mountain town Wednesday, using them as human shields for hours before he shot and fatally wounded a girl and then killed himself as a SWAT team moved in, authorities said.

The gunman, believed to be between 30 and 50 years old, was cornered with the girls in a second-floor classroom, and he released four of them, one by one.

Park County Sheriff Fred Wegener said authorities decided to enter the school to save the two remaining hostages after the man cut off negotiations and set a deadline. He said the gunman had threatened the girls throughout the four-hour ordeal and had shielded himself with the hostages.

The man was not immediately identified, and the sheriff was at a loss to explain a motive.

"I don't know why he wanted to do this," Wegener said, his voice breaking.

The wounded girl was taken to a Denver hospital in critical condition, but was declared dead, a hospital spokeswoman said. She did not release the girl's name.

The last hostage was unharmed and talking with authorities.

After the suspect entered the building, hundreds of students at Platte Canyon High School were evacuated in a scene that recalled the horror at Columbine, just a short drive away.

Students said the bearded suspect wore a dark blue hooded sweat shirt and a camouflage backpack. The sheriff said the man threatened to set off a bomb he claimed to have in the backpack. The man was also toting a handgun.

Tom Grigg said his 16-year-old son, Cassidy, was in a classroom when the man walked in, fired a gun and began telling some students to leave and others ? all girls ? to stay.

"He stood them up at the blackboard," Grigg said. "He hand-picked the ones he wanted to get out."

The gunman told Cassidy to leave, but he said he wanted to stay with the girls, Grigg said.

"The guy flipped him around and put the gun in his face and said, 'It would be in your best interest to leave,'" Grigg said.

Authorities had what they described as "sporadic" negotiations with the suspect and urged him to contact them for more discussion. Officers eventually crept close to the building, and there were reports of an explosion inside.

Lynn Bigham, who said she was a family friend of the girl who died, said her friend had just turned 16.

"She's real bubbly. Every time you see her, she gives you a hug," she said.

The sight of students fleeing the high school in long lines, and of frantic parents scrambling to find their children, evoked memories of the 1999 attack on Columbine High School, where two students killed 13 people before committing suicide.

Students described a chaotic scene inside after the intercom announced "code white" and everyone was told to stay in their classrooms.

The high school and a nearby middle school were soon evacuated. Jefferson County authorities ? who also handled the attack at Columbine ? sent a bomb squad and SWAT team to the high school.

"I'm just terrified. I'm terrified," said Sherry Husen, whose son plays on the high school football team and was told not to return to school from his part-time job. "I know so many kids in that school."

Students from the two evacuated schools were taken to another school for a head count. Ambulances were parked in the end zone of the high school's football field, and a tank-like SWAT team vehicle was parked nearby on a closed highway.

Parents pressed authorities for details but had little information on their children.

Bill Twyford said he received a text message from his 15-year-old son, Billy, a student at the high school, at about 11:30 a.m. It said: "Hey there, there's a gun hijacking in school right now. I'm fine, bad situation though."

Michael Owens, who has one son at the middle school and another in the high school, said the anxiety was worse because of the memory of Columbine.

"Things that are out of your control," he said. "It's like an earthquake."

Tom Mauser, whose son Daniel was among the students slain at Columbine, said: "Any adult who holds kids hostage is reprehensible."

The schools are in a narrow, winding canyon carved by the South Platte River about 35 miles southwest of Denver. They have an enrollment of about 770 students, with 460 in the high school.

Husen's family moved to Bailey from suburban Denver about 14 years ago.

"We moved up here for the mountain solitude, and I just never thought this would happen in this school, but it happens everywhere," she said.[/quote]
Dear lord. Another school shooting, only it was not a student but an adult. And so close to Columbine. My sympathy goes out to the family and friends of the victim. They are lucky--if you can call anything in this sort of situation "luck"--that only one student was killed.

This is pointless violence, and I can't understand what drives these people to do this. Apparently, no one else knows too much at the moment, either. Somehow, though, this sort of thing cannot shock me anymore. It seems like there is so much of this going on all the time that I am almost numb to it.

Thoughts?

[visualkei]

I'm just shocked that the media didn't cover it more! I saw like a 15 second brief on the situation when I came home today around 4, and didn't hear about what was going on again until some time around 9 for like another 15 seconds! What the hell! I can't believe something this serious could be reported about in such a light manner!

Poor kids.

[Gavin]

[SIZE=1]Interesting, most interesting.

I really don?t know what to think, I suppose it?s only a matter of time before American police and sheriff forces are actively deployed in schools to prevent this sort of thing from occurring again, and again, and again. It just seems that there?s relatively little anyone can do to prevent a maniac from getting a gun and either taking hostages and then killing one when he/she realises they?re backed into a corner.

The hostage-taker disgusts me, all of his kind do. It?s a shame he didn?t survive, he deserved to be locked up in a small room for the rest of his life for being such a coward as to kill a child. At least he?s dead and can?t hurt anyone every again.[/SIZE]

[Domon]

[SIZE=1]I agree. This was a horrible and just evil act of violence. However there had been reports of a sixteen-year-old boy who was with the criminal when he took some of the girls but was kicked out of the room. He was interviewed by the Today Show the day after the shooting. However his mother came forward to the media saying that her son had in fact lied. He had not been there with the girls but he in fact had wanted to be there.

Matt Lauer that day that they said the boy lied said "The Generous side of me wants to believe that he didn't mean any harm. But the not-so-generous side of me thinks that what he did was a dispicable act and can't be forgiven." I tend to agree with the second half of what Lauer said. I mean he lied, how wrong is that?[/SIZE]

[DeadSeraphim]

[quote name='Gavin][SIZE=1']I really don?t know what to think, I suppose it?s only a matter of time before American police and sheriff forces are actively deployed in schools to prevent this sort of thing from occurring again, and again, and again[/SIZE][/quote]
[size=1][color=indigo][font=arial]These things aren't nearly common enough to justify putting cops in schools. They are one offs, really, even if they have happened a bit more frequently than they have in the past. For every school that has a shooting, a thousand more never even have a gun on the premises. It's not gonna happen.

I applaud the media for not making another Columbine out of this. Columbine was covered far too much, and almost ([i]almost[/i]) deified the shooters, especially when they started blaming everyone BUT the shooters. While this is a catastrophe, the best thing they can do for all involved is try and keep it as low key as possible.[/font][/color][/size]

[Retribution]

[quote name='DeadSeraphim][size=1][color=indigo][font=arial]These things aren't nearly common enough to justify putting cops in schools. They are one offs, really, even if they have happened a bit more frequently than they have in the past. For every school that has a shooting, a thousand more never even have a gun on the premises. It's not gonna happen.[/font][/color'][/size][/quote]
[size=1]Very true, but there are cops in particularly troubled high schools. I know in Washington, D.C., many public schools have metal detectors you pass through, as well as police within the school. I think this is more to preempt gang violence than anything else, though.

But the places where school shootings like Columbine occur have never experienced violence before, so there's no way to really stop things like this from happening. Except gun control.[/size]