College gunman disturbed teachers, classmates

Bush marks ‘day of sadness’
Virginia Tech began the recovery process Tuesday afternoon at a packed convocation in the school’s 10,000-seat basketball arena. So many people showed up that thousands of students watched the event on screens at Lane Field, the 50,000-seat football stadium.

After debating overnight whether his presence would cause too many logistical headaches, the president decided early in the morning to join Gov. Timothy Kaine, who flew back overnight from a trade mission in Asia, in speaking at the convocation to help comfort a university and town left reeling after the tragic events.

Bush said he and his wife, Laura Bush, “have come to Blacksburg today with hearts full of sorrow.”

“Those whose lives were taken did nothing to deserve their fate,” Bush said in somber six-minute address. “They were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. ...

“I hope you know that people all over this country are thinking about you and asking God to provide comfort for all who have been affected,” he added.

Kaine said the world had been inspired by the response of the campus and the surrounding community.

“It’s not just you that needs to maintain that spirit, but the world needs you to,” he said. “The world saw you and saw you respond in a way that builds community. The world needs that example before it.”

Zenobia Hikes, the university’s vice president for student affairs, captured that spirit when she said, “We will eventually recover, but we will never, ever forget.”

Nikki Giovanni, the widely known poet who is a distinguished professor at Virginia Tech, led a standing ovation for University President Charles Steger, whose administration has been criticized for waiting two hours before warning students and staff Monday that an armed killer was at large. A student at the convocation held a sign reading, “SUPPORT STEGER.”

Instead of leaving the arena after the service, hundreds of students remained in their seats cheering and chanting, “Let’s go, Hokies,” invoking the school’s mascot.

On Tuesday night as darkness fell, thousands , faculty and area residents poured into the center of campus to grieve together. They held thousands of candles aloft as speakers urged them to find solace in one another.

Most of the vigil was devoted to silence and quiet reflection. As the silence spread across the grassy bowl of the drill field, a pair of trumpets began to play taps. A few in the crowd began to sing Amazing Grace.

Ballistics evidence points to student
The massacre ended Monday morning with Cho’s suicide, stamping the campus in the picturesque Blue Ridge Mountains with unspeakable tragedy.

Wielding two handguns and carrying multiple clips of ammunition, Cho opened fire about 7:15 a.m. on the fourth floor of West Ambler Johnston, a high-rise coeducational dorm, then stormed Norris Hall, a classroom building a half-mile away on the other side of the 2,600-acre campus. Some of the doors at Norris Hall were found chained from the inside, apparently by the gunman.

Law enforcement officials told The Associated Press that Cho’s fingerprints were found on the two guns used in the shootings. The serial numbers had been filed off.  Flaherty said Cho bought the guns legally.

Federal law enforcement officials told NBC News that the first, a Walther P-22, was bought Feb. 9 at a pawnshop in Blacksburg.

The second, a 9mm Glock, was bought March 13 at a gun shop in Roanoke, about 25 miles from Blacksburg, they said. Cho presented an immigration card as identity when he paid about $570 for the gun, ammunition and a 15-round magazine, NBC’s Pete Williams reported.

As a permanent legal resident, Cho was eligible to buy the guns unless he had been convicted of a felony. Immigration officials told NBC affiliate WSLS-TV of Roanoke that they would not have approved renewal of his green card in late 2003 if he had a criminal record. 

‘He didn’t say a single word’
As the gunman made his way through Norris Hall, students jumped from windows in panic.

Trey Perkins, who was sitting in a German class in Norris Hall, told MSNBC-TV on Monday that the gunman barged into the room about 9:50 a.m. and opened fire for about a minute and a half, squeezing off 20 to 30 shots.

The gunman first shot the professor in the head and then fired on the students, said Perkins, 20, of Yorktown, Va., a sophomore studying mechanical engineering. “He didn’t say a single word the whole time.”

Angry students said there were no public-address announcements after the first shots. Many said they learned of the first shooting in an e-mail message that arrived shortly before the gunman struck again.

Steger, the university’s president, defended officials’ conduct, saying Monday that authorities believed that the shooting at the dorm was a domestic dispute and mistakenly thought the gunman had fled the campus.

Kaine, the governor, said after talking with Steger on Tuesday that he would appoint an “independent law enforcement authority” to review police agencies’ handling of the matter. He stressed that the move was routine and that no criticism should be read into his decision.

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