Virginia Tech killing: more than 30 dead

http://www.suntimes.com/news/343354,...041607.article

Terrible.

My friend sitting next to me in class, a '06 V-Tech alum, said that was her dorm.

Yikes.

I was waiting to post about this because I wanted to see how everyone else would handle it. And I was correct. You posted it in the political forum.

Pathetic.

A terrible tragedy and you want to discuss it in a political forum.

Awfulness beyond words.

Jesus.

Too harsh by far. And uncalled for.

The alternative would be AO and that is traditionally too light for this sort of occurrence. Imho.

I think that in cases such as this most of us know better than to politicize the issue - not immediately anyway.

USAToday has a refresh blog up.

Don't go to the college's website. If you have friends or need info check the other local news site for information.

My one question. If the first shooting occured at 7:00 AM and then the rampage at 9:00 AM, why didn't they raise the security alert after the first one?

They have had a shooting at this college last year!

"The shootings came three days after a bomb threat Friday forced the cancellation of classes in three buildings, WDBJ in Roanoke reported. Also, the 100,000-square-foot Torgersen Hall was evacuated April 2 after police received a written bomb threat, The Roanoke Times reported."

wHAT?

Can you imagine that...

2 or 3 minutes would feel like an eternity.

This is where it belongs. Too intense for other forums.

You, Mr. I Have Three Posts to my Name, would presume to lecture Powerdoc. That's what's pathetic. FOAD, noobie.

What's pathetic is to complain about how someone posted this. He probably just posted it in the wrong forum or thought it would be better here.

I can't beleive it. You know they will be beefing up their security 10-fold after this. And to top it all off it looks like they have been receiving bomb threats for the last couple weeks. What's going on here? Disgruntled student/faculty member?

The BBC is saying 30 dead now.

[CENTER]

Illegal handguns
High caliber handguns & Ammunition
Automatic Weapons[/CENTER]

Good job, Artman...


Sad...

It sounds like it was a student...

Apparently they have had four bomb threats in the last week. Two on separate days last week and then two this morning.

A proposition to the reason behind the two hours between the shootings is that the PD arrested an asian man in a dark jacket thinking that he was the shooter and they thought that everything was fine.

That's giving yourself and others far more credit than you deserve.


Enough said.


Quite a statement.


Terrible tragedy, and you all belittle it by considering it political and reducing it to political BS. It's a sad shame.

Oh shut the fuck up, El Capitan.

You dishonor the dead by attempting to separate yourself from the real intellectual meat of the matter:

Obviously these kids deserved to die, placing themselves in front of the bullets like that.

[/sacasm, as if you needed a reminder]

IRT Topic,

Wow, this is just incredibly sad and unfortunate for the victims!

Just found out about it recently, been doing stuff all day and been away from the internet and TV (thank goodness).

IMHO this is the right forum for this, since the relevant topics (gun control, particularly if the gun was legally owned by the shooter) will certainly turn political, and already have on TV/radio.

I don't feel that I have to post my emotions and sympathies (well there, I did) about this tragedy. It happened. It will happen again and again and again...

Yeah I can feel you there.

There is kind of a "forum-morality" that creeps into threads like this where everyone has to express some kind of outrage or sympathy or else they're castigated. Everyone feels pretty sickened by stuff like this-- just not everyone wants to post about those feelings. That said, if someone doesn't want to discuss any corollary topics that tend to flow from events like this, then you know, don't.

I'm all for banning handguns in light of these tragedies and the mini-tragedies with handguns that happen everyday.

In January, the bill to allow students the right to defend themselves was defeated in committee in Virginia. They were sitting ducks, denied their right to self defense by their elected officials. Even trained and background-checked students were denied the basic right of self defense.

My handgun saved my life in 2001. Banning handguns will not prevent committed, insane people from acts like this. It will simply disarm law-abiding people, as they were disarmed in this situation. Disarmed victims cannot stand up and prevent this, nor can kneejerk calls to "take them all away."

Still, a very sad and awful situation.

Illegal handguns are already, uh, "illegal." Please, define "illegal handgun"

Define "high caliber"

Automatic weapons are already registered with the ATF and take a huge amount of government paperwork and tens of thousands of dollars to acquire.

Please, educate yourself about your terminology.

Not really...

By making hand guns harder if not impossible to acquire and possess, there will rapidly be a lot fewer hand guns out there. Whether this is a good solution to a much deeper problem is debateable, but all arguments about victims are inherently idiotic as in a gun battle your chances of survival are slim and the likelihood of hitting a non-intended target high...

Jube,

You may be making a practical argument about self-defense, but that bill in no way eliminates "self-defense" as a valid legal defense.

We are still talking about Virginia here, which is not exactly a 9th Circuit kind of place.


Well said.


Just found this.

Students on their way to classes at 7:15am? What kind of college is this?

correction: How large a campus is this?

25k full-time over 2600 acres.

I imagine they share the common trait of thinking it'll never happen to you (even when it happens to you!)...

Well still no shortage of dangerous luney tunes out there.

I work at a university and when I hear something like this I wonder if someday it could happen there.

About guns I was just talking to a coworker the other day about this issue. He said " Well if you make guns illegal then there will still be knives. If you make knives illegal there will still be wooden bats. "

My reply was " Well if they make guns illegal there will still be guns sold on the black market just like alcohol was during prohibition. However not as many out there. Also nobody has been killed by a knife straying through their living room wall. The same with bats ".

Also in this case a person couldn't kill or injure as many people with a knife before someone stopped him.

I have a feeling the ban on guns is coming someday soon.

Uh, illegal as in on the street and available to anyone? Therefore they should be removed from the streets including the sellers. Ban. Prohibit. Stop.


Like the ones described here that blew the heads off some of these students today? Ban. Prohibit. Stop.


Yes. And you know that they can be bought illegally too? Search for drug dealer's weapons caches or "lone quiet man" basement cache of weapons. Ban. Prohibit. Stop.


Educate yourself with the reality of the situation.

That's probably right.

More "someday" than "soon" though.

People will always kill other people, sometimes in lunatic rages. But yes, it would be more difficult to kill large numbers of people without a gun...

That being said, if I, a law abiding citizen, trained in firearm use, with no criminal record, wants to own a pistol for plinking at the shooting range, (I don't, but we're talking in principle) I should be able to. There are already a plethora of gun laws on the books that would keep guns out of the hands of criminals, or gun using criminals behind bars, but they are rarely enforced, for various reasons. (too much prison crowding, 'feel-goody' judges, those who think repeat criminals can be re-integrated into society, etc.)

My two cents:

It is tempting to ban handguns. I agree. However, I really don't think it will solve our gun violence problems. I don't think doing so will reduce the numbers of guns in the hands of people that commit crimes. I have to agree with Jubelum in that it would take guns away from the law abiding people that own them for self defense. Criminals would still get them, unless you're going to ban the manufacture of handguns too? If someone makes them, someone will buy them...the wrong someone.

That said, it's sort of a moot point. There is no way such a ban would be consistent with the second amendment. No way. We've already "infringed" on gun owners rights to a high degree. Notice the amendment doesn't say "shall not be banned". It says "infringed". There is certainly a reasonable argument in that the government has already "infringed" on the right to keep and bear arms...extensively (not that I favor someone's right to hunt squirrel with an AK-47, believe me).

Next, a little more on topic: If the facts as released today concering VT's conduct are true, I think VT is going to be sued out the ass. Perhaps there may even be criminal charges. It seems the University took no action to protect students for about four hours. They knew of a morning shooting and did not know where the suspect was, if he would strike again, etc. Yet there was no warning. There was no "lockdown." They let the University operate on a business-as-usual schedule (again, according to what has been released so far). If these facts hold up, the University President and all upper level persons responsible for student saftey and security should be 1) fired and 2) sued into oblivion. If in fact the University took no action, I would also support criminal negligence charges. It's very possible these officials got another 30 people killed.

Your thoughts.

"A patient hit in the head by a smaller, .22-caliber bullet might live 36 hours, while a similar wound from a 9mm might be fatal in an hour."

I'm for banning what I feel are crucial to what occurred today. High caliber handguns are more designed for self-defense from lions, tigers and bears. Not some crackhead with a tire iron. A small caliber weapon (when used correctly with training and practice) can put an intruder down. There will always be unusual cases, but I think it's unusual to have someone carrying a weapon that only a police officer or a Marine in Iraq should have.

Help me out people...is there a three strike law for illegally possessing, selling a weapon(s)? I know the three strikes law involves federal offenses so I'd think it would (should) in those cases.


I mentioned the 2 hour lag time too. I haven't wanted to discuss this until the facts and evidence come out clearly, not from a sputtering talking head. If the allegations are true, there should be an investigation and justice for the victims and families.

I know much more about the 2nd Amendment, gun usage, and self defense than you probably care to admit. We all have our "single issue" and this one is mine. I have personally trained over 400 people in the safe and proper usage of their 2nd Amendment rights to defend themselves, their families, and their homes against criminals like the one we saw today. I prevented a capital crime while exercising my right to possess a handgun.

I am well versed in the reality of the situation, Artman. The reality is that taking guns from law abiding people does not take them from the hands of criminals. Someone willing to rape, rob, murder, or do another criminal act will not be deterred from it simply because they would break yet another law concerning gun possession. The innocent victims will be left defenseless, like they currently are in Britain and Australia. Both nations have seen an increase in violent crime since their guns were banned for use by law abiding people.

All the gun laws in the world will only work when CRIMINALS obey the law. The net effect of such feel-good legislation is to strip peaceful citizens of their ability to defend themselves while the criminals are free to terrorize.

So... in your mind, we are going to make sure this never happens again by making it "more" illegal than it already is, regardless of the effect on the rights of average people. Nonsense.

Guns are not available "on the street" and "to anyone" - the Federal Govt tracks gun sales, and people that should not be able to by are caught and prosecuted by the FBI through the NICS system. Again, please educate yourself in how this stuff works. "Ban them all" will not stop gun crime- it will increase it because criminals will have nothing to fear from their victims.

I don't think banning high caliber guns would change much. .22s are still lethal.

As for the "facts" well I've seen several students interviewed. Those who were on campus, in class, using the VT facilities etc. say they knew nothing of the first shooting. All this could change, but I have a feeling there is going to be major fallout wrt to the University's lack of action.