As the morning
announcements were being read at Sandy Hook Elementary School around 9:35 am,
Adam Lanza parked his mother’s car in the fire lane in front of the school,
took out his Glock 20SF 10mm handgun, Sig Sauer 226 9mm handgun, his .223
Bushmaster XM 115-E2S AR-15 rifle, and many magazines of ammunition, each with
thirty rounds in them. He was wearing a black T-shirt, black polo shirt, black
pants, black socks, black shoes, black hat, and an olive-green cargo vest which
held his extra ammunition. It was not known at this point, but before leaving
for Sandy Hook Elementary School, Adam had killed his mother in her bed with a
.22 rifle.
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| Adam's .223 Bushmaster XM 115-E2S Assault Rifle (responsible for 26 deaths) |
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| Glock 20SF 10mm |
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| Sig Sauer 226 9mm |
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| Ammunition and Magazines found on Adam's Body |
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| .22 Rifle Used to Kill Nancy Lanza |
Adam exited the car and
left behind three additional handguns and multiple rounds of ammunition. He
made his way to the front door of the school which had a sign that stated all
visitors needed to check in at the office.
Due to upgrades in the security, all
doors were locked after all students had arrived. To get around the locked
door, Adam pointed his assault rifle to the window on the right of the front
door and shot it out, giving him access to the interior of the building.
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| Window Shot Out by Adam to Gain Entry to the School |
The initial shots were
heard by some through the intercom system, and the shots were also heard by
principal Dawn Hochsprung, Mary Sherlac, and Natalie Hammond who were in the
conference room by the front office.
The three educators exited the conference
room to see the cause of the noise they heard and they stood staring at a
black-clad young man wielding weapons. As the three women turned to run, they
yelled, “Shooter!”, “Stay put!” At that same time, the school custodian, Rick
Thorne saw Adam and yelled, “Put the gun down!”
Adam wasted no time as
he brought his assault rifle up and aimed. He started firing multiple shots in
the direction of the three educators. Instantly, principal Hochsprung and Mary
Sherlac were killed, and Natalie Hammond was shot in the leg. As she was crawling
to the conference room door, she was shot again.
She made it into the room and
barricaded the door with her body. During this first altercation with the
gunman, a substitute Kindergarten teacher caught a ricochet in the foot as she
was closing her classroom door. Luckily, Adam did not follow her and did not
try to go into the Kindergarten classroom.
Instead, Adam turned and
entered the main office which was right by the conference room. By this time,
it was clear there was a shooter in the building and the staff of the school
office had hidden themselves, including the school nurse whose office was
within the main office.
Adam did not see the staff as he walked through, so
close that the nurse, Sarah (Sally) Cox could see him from under her desk no more
than twenty feet away. He turned and left the main office without firing a
single shot.
Immediately after Adam
had left the main office, Sally Cox and administrative assistant Barbara Halstead
called 911 which would become the first of several calls made to emergency
services that morning. At the same time, Rick Thorne was running down the
hallways alerting all classrooms that there was a shooter in the building and
to hide.
Adam then, by some
horrible chance of fate, chose classroom #8, a first-grade class that was being
taught that day by substitute teacher Lauren Rousseau. She had heard the
warnings and had quickly herded her students into the back of the room and told
them to hide.
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| Classroom #8 Where Lauren Rousseau and Fifteen Students Lost Their Lives |
Unfortunately, it was not enough because Adam burst in and
started firing at children hiding under desks and in the back of the room. He
fired multiple shots and even though Lauren Rousseau tried to protect her
class, it was in vain and she was killed along with fourteen other students in
the classroom. Later, a fifteenth child died in the hospital from gunshot
wounds.
There were a handful of
survivors from this class including one six-year-old girl. She recounted the
attack to her mother later and said, “Mommy, I’m okay, but all my friends are
dead.” This student apparently survived by acting dead while Adam was
systematically killing her classmates. She later described Adam as “a very
angry man.”
There was another student
who was hiding in a bathroom with two teachers that could hear the events in
classroom #8. He stated that he could hear a boy in Lauren Rousseau’s class
pleading, “Help me! I don’t want to be here.” To which Adam replied, “Well, you’re
here.” After that exchange, Adam kept shooting.
Adam then headed to
classroom #10, a first-grade class taught by Victoria Leigh Soto. There are
multiple versions of what happened in this room and I have decided to share all
of them with you.
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| Classroom #10 Where Two Educators and Five Children Lost Their Lives |
The first account states that Ms. Soto concealed some
students in a closet or bathroom while other students were hiding under their
desks. Apparently, she ran back to lock the door when it burst open and Adam
enters. Adam then ventured to the back of the classroom and found the children
that were hiding under their desks. He then shot them. According to this same
account, Jesse Lewis, a 1st grader yelled to his classmates to run
and then he was fatally shot. At six or seven-years-old, he was already a
heroic person.
The second account was
given by one of the survivors’ fathers. He described what was told him and
stated that Ms. Soto had moved the children to the back of the classroom and
they were seated on the floor when Adam burst in, weapon raised. According to
this account, no one in the room spoke to each other.
Apparently, Adam stared
at a boy (survivor), pointed the gun at him, but for whatever reason, did not
shoot. The boy got up and ran out of the classroom having somehow earned an
unknown reprieve. After Adam stopped shooting, six more surviving children ran
out of the classroom. It is not clear why Adam stopped shooting, whether it was
because his gun jammed or he was reloading is unclear, but those are the
theories.
A third account that was
given by witnesses, state that Adam entered the classroom and Ms. Soto tried
some subterfuge and told Adam the children had retreated to auditorium. At that
moment, several of the students ran for safety and Adam fatally shot them. Ms.
Soto had thrown herself in front of Adam and another student and he fatally
shot her.
A teacher’s aide, Anne Marie Murphy was found covering six-year-old
Dylan Hockley, both were dead from gunshot wounds. Ms. Soto, Anne Marie Murphy,
and four students were found dead at the scene and one additional child sadly
lost their life at the hospital from the gunshot wounds.
There were six
students and a bus driver that hid in a nearby home. Nine children from Ms.
Soto’s class ran and survived and two more hid in a bathroom for hours. In
total, from Ms. Soto’s class, eleven children survived and five died.
There are also accounts
of the many that survived. Kaitlin Roig, a first-grade teacher had hidden
fourteen of her students in a bathroom and barricaded the door. She told them
to be silent. It is theorized that Adam had passed by this classroom because
during a safety drill, ironically in the event of a school shooting, a piece of
black construction paper was still in the window of the classroom door and Adam
may have thought the room was unoccupied.
Maryrose Kristopik, a
music teacher, had hidden her 4th grade students and barricaded the
door. Adam pounded on the door and yelled, “Let me in!” Luckily, he never
gained entry to this room.
Librarians Yvonne Cech
and Maryann Jacob hid eighteen children.
Two third -grade
students were in the hall and were pulled into a nearby room by a teacher to
hide before Adam could see them.
According to police, the
final gunshot was heard at 9:40:03 am. This shot was believed to be the fatal
self-inflicted bullet that killed Adam Lanza. He had shot himself with his Glock
20SF 10mm in classroom #10. His assault rifle was several feet from his body
and his unused Sig Sauer P226 9mm was found on him.
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| Adam's Hat After His Suicide |
Based on investigation, it
appears that Adam had reloaded many times, sometimes only firing fifteen of the
thirty shots in a given magazine. Further investigations showed that he had
shot all but two of his victims multiple times.
That day eight boys and
twelve girls all between the ages of six and seven lost their lives. The adult
educators killed were six women. There
were bullets found in at least three cars parked outside the school leading to
the supposition that Adam had fired at a teacher who was standing in front of a
window in one of the classrooms. Later, a teacher recalled hearing Adam curse
several times and yell, “Look at me! Come over here! Look at them!”
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| Bullet Hole in Display Case |
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| Bullet Hole in Picture Frame |
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| Bullet Holes in Classroom Window |
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| One of the Cars Shot |
Here is the first
responders’ timeline according to 911 evidence and eyewitness accounts:
9:35 am It is believed Adam first entered the
school
9:35:39 am First call to 911 at Newtown Police
Station
9:36:06 am 911 dispatcher broadcasts shooting to law
enforcement
9:37:38 am Connecticut State Police dispatched to the
school
9:39:00 am First Newtown Police officer arrives
behind the school
9:39:13 am Two more Newtown police officers arrive on
scene
9:40:03 am Last shot heard, probable suicide of Adam
Lanza
9:42:39 am Newtown police report shooter’s license
plates
9:44:47 am Newtown police enter the school
9:46:23 am Connecticut State Police arrive at the
school
9:46:48 am Connecticut State Police enter the school
According to police
reports, there were no shots fired by the police even after they locked down
the school and searched at least four times for additional shooters. Law
enforcement had mobilized SWAT, bomb squad, police dogs, and a helicopter to
search the area.
By 10:00 am, Danbury
Hospital saw the need for additional triage and sent extra medical personnel to
the school. The medics evacuated three wounded by gunshots to the hospital, two
died at the hospital (the previously mentioned children from classroom 8 and
10), and one unidentified adult.
New York medical examiners sent a portable
morgue to the site to allow the bodies of the deceased to be removed and
identified. Connecticut State Police assigned one trooper to each family of the
victims.
In Adam’s autopsy, there
was no evidence of influence of drugs or alcohol and he had no physical brain abnormalities.
He had no altercations with anyone at the school, and contrary to some belief,
Adam’s mother had no connection with working at Sandy Hook Elementary School.
A
damaged hard drive was found in Adam’s room and it showed that he had
researched the 2011 Norway shooting, West Nickel Mines School Shooting in 2006,
and Columbine High School Shooting in 1999. He had created a 7x4 foot
spreadsheet listing around 500 mass shootings, as well as an article about the
Norther Illinois Shooting.
After investigation, it
is clear that Adam acted alone and had isolated from everyone in his life,
resorting to hiding in his basement and using that for target practice.
In the official
report from the state regarding his state of mind it stated, “significant
mental health issues that affected his ability to live a normal life and to
interact with others, even those he should have been close…What contributions
this made to the shooting, if any, is unknown as those mental health
professionals who saw him did not see anything that would have predicted his
future behavior.”
“The evidence clearly shows Adam Lanza planned his actions,
including the taking of his own life, but there is no clear indication why he
did so, or why he targeted SHES.”
So many unanswered
questions. Is that better or worse. Would knowing his motives have eased the
pain of those who lost someone? I think not. You see, Adam didn’t leave a
suicide note and his motive was never established. In less than 7 minutes, Adam
had ended the lives of twenty-six innocent people. To end this post, I have
chosen to list the names of the victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School
Shooting.
Charlotte Brown, 6 Daniel Barden, 7 Olivia Engel, 6
Josephine Gay, 7 Dylan Hockley, 6 Madeleine Hsu, 6
Catherine Hubbard, 6 Chase Kowalski, 7 Jesse Lewis, 6
Ana Márquez-Greene, 6 James Mattioli, 6 Grace McDonnell, 7
Emilie Parker, 6 Jack Pinto, 6 Noah Pozner, 6
Caroline Previdi, 6 Jessica Rekos, 6 Avielle Richman, 6
Benjamin Wheeler, 6 Allison Wyatt, 6 Rachel D’Avino, 29 (Teacher’s
Aide)
Dawn Hochsprung, 47 (Principal) Anne Marie Murphy, 52 (Teacher’s Aide)
Lauren Rousseau, 30
(Teacher) Mary Sherlack, 56
(School Psychologist)
Victoria Leigh Soto, 27 (Teacher)
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