Ticker	Volume	Price	Price Delta
DJIA	13,135.00	-35.71	-0.27%
S&P 500	1,413.58	-5.87	-0.41%
Nasdaq	2,971.33	-20.83	-0.70%

Ticker	Volume	Price	Price Delta
STOXX 50	2,630.54	+2.88	0.11%
FTSE 100	5,921.76	-7.85	-0.13%
DAX	7,596.47	+14.49	0.19%

Ticker	Volume	Price	Price Delta
Nikkei	9,737.56	-5.17	-0.05%
Hang Seng	22,606.00	+160.40	0.71%
S&P/ASX 200	4,583.11	+0.32	0.01%

Connecticut Shooting Leaves 28 Dead, Including 20 Pupils

By Esmé E. Deprez, Phil Mattingly & Freeman Klopott - 2012-12-15T01:42:10Z

Twenty-eight people are dead in Connecticut after a gunman walked into a Newtown elementary school and opened fire, killing 20 children in the second-worst mass shooting in U.S. history.

The killer was among those found dead at Sandy Hook Elementary School, where his mother was a teacher, according to two law-enforcement officials briefed on the matter. Adam Lanza, 20, is the suspect, they said. The officers asked for anonymity because the investigation is continuing.

The shooting brought chaos and worldwide attention to the town of 28,000 about 60 miles (97 kilometers) northeast of New York City. Students recounted cowering in the corners of the school of 700, while parents told of rushing to the scene to discover whether their children were among the dead. Officials have yet to announce a motive.

Slideshow: Mass Shooting at Connecticut School, Dozens Killed

It’s the worst U.S. massacre since the 2007 rampage at Virginia Tech university, and the latest in a deadly year. Just three days ago, three died after a gunman opened fire inside a mall in suburban Portland, Oregon. In August, a shooter took the lives of six people at a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin, before being killed by a police officer. In July, a masked gunman opened fire at a midnight movie in Aurora, Colorado, killing 12 and injuring 58.

“As a country, we have been through this too many times,” President Barack Obama said in a news conference, holding back tears. “Our hearts are broken today.”

School Call

Shortly after 9:30 a.m., police received a call from the elementary school, where students from kindergarten through fourth grade attend, Lieutenant Paul Vance of the Connecticut State Police said in a news briefing. The shooting took place in two rooms in a single section of the school, he said.

C.J. Hoekenga, a Sandy Hook fourth-grader, was in music class watching “The Nutcracker” when he heard bangs, heavy breathing and then gunshots. His teacher told them to get into a closet, the youngster said.

“At first I thought it was practice,” C.J. said. “Then we realized it wasn’t.”

He and classmates said prayers until a police officer arrived. They then exited single-file and ran to a nearby fire station, he said.

“I’m relieved that most of the children got out and the man behind this is dead,” C.J. said.

Crime Scene

The bodies will remain where they fell until they are all identified, Vance said. Parents haven’t been allowed into the school to see their children because the location remains a crime scene, he said.

The Newtown school district instituted a systemwide lockdown after the shooting. In homes across the city, automatic telephone calls alerted parents. Janet Ziperstein, 39, raced to the school to find her children, who are in fourth and second grade, unharmed.

“It was an eerie, odd, cold chaos,” she said.

The gunman was believed to suffer from a personality disorder, the Associated Press reported, citing a law- enforcement official briefed on the investigation and not authorized to publicly discuss it. The suspect killed his mother, Nancy, at their home before driving in her car to the school, the news agency said.

Older Brother

Catherine Urso, a Newtown resident and piano teacher, said her son Nicholas went to Newtown High School with Adam Lanza. She said she used to see Adam at school dressed in Gothic garb and described him as quiet and reclusive.

Lanza’s older brother, 24-year-old Ryan Lanza of Hoboken, New Jersey, is being questioned by police, the news agency said. He told law enforcement he hadn’t been in touch with his brother since about 2010, the AP said. Ryan Lanza isn’t believed to have any involvement in the incident, the service reported.

In Newtown, authorities recovered two 9 mm handguns on the scene, one Glock and one Sig Sauer, said a federal law- enforcement official who requested anonymity because the investigation was continuing. The AP reported that a .223- caliber rifle was also found.

Kindergarten Class

Many killings took place in a kindergarten class, according to the Hartford Courant. The school recently installed new security measures including visual monitoring at the entrance, CNN said.

“The majority of those who died today were children, beautiful, little kids between the ages of 5 and 10 years old,” Obama said. “They had their entire lives ahead of them, birthdays, graduations, weddings, kids of their own. Among the fallen were also teachers, men and women who devoted their lives to helping our children fulfill their dreams.”

As residents mourned, businesses in Sandy Hook’s town square, including Sandy Hook Hair Co. and the Toy Tree, shut their doors early. Relatives filed into Mass at St. Rose of Lima Church, the local 3,500-member parish, said Brian Wallace, a spokesman for the Bridgeport diocese.

“This is a small town, very knit together and everyone knows everyone,” he said. “We’re here to pray with them and guide them through.”

The deadliest shooting in the U.S. in recent years is the Virginia Tech campus rampage of 2007, in which Seung-Hui Cho took 33 lives, including his own. In 1999, two students shot 12 classmates and a teacher in Columbine High School in suburban Denver before killing themselves.

“Evil visited this community today,” Governor Dannel Malloy said at a press conference. “And it’s too early to speak of recovery.”

To contact the reporters on this story: Esme E. Deprez in New York at edeprez@bloomberg.net; Freeman Klopott in Newtown, Connecticut at fklopott@bloomberg.net;

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Stephen Merelman at smerelman@bloomberg.net

Enlarge image

Connecticut School Shooting

Melanie Stengel/The New Haven Register via AP Images

A woman waits to hear about her sister, a teacher, following a shooting at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.

A woman waits to hear about her sister, a teacher, following a shooting at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. Photographer: Melanie Stengel/The New Haven Register via AP Images

On the Ground: CT School Shooting Aftermath