VT. I think the cops are lying....

[Joanne98]

They were afraid to pursue the shooter after he shot the first two so they told VT that they had the situtation under control. The cops told VT that it wasn't neccessary to close the U. This has alot to do with the shooting of last August..


snip>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Morva
Escape and capture
While in jail awaiting trial for attempted armed robbery, Morva was taken to Montgomery Regional Hospital on August 20, 2006 for a sprained ankle and wrist. After using a hospital bathroom, he assaulted and knocked a deputy unconscious using a metal toilet-paper container. He seized the deputy's gun and shot Derrick McFarland, a hospital security guard who was running to the deputy's aid. McFarland died from his wounds.<8><9>

This initiated a manhunt for Morva, who on the morning of August 21, 2006 shot and killed a Montgomery County sheriff's deputy, Cpl. Eric Sutphin, on the Huckleberry Trail near the Virginia Tech Campus. Police evacuated and searched Squires Student Center on the campus after someone fitting Morva's description was seen inside. However, this sighting turned out to be unfounded.<2><10> Virginia Tech canceled classes and closed campus.<11>

At 3:36 p.m. EDT August 21, 2006, Montgomery County police reported over the police scanner that Morva was captured and taken into custody. He was found hiding in a brier patch about 150 yards from where Sutphin was fatally shot.<2>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Morva

This guy shot and killed a deputy. The cops closed the campus UNNECCESSARLY. Which they probably heard shit for. So THIS TIME. The cops made sure THEY WERE SAFE FIRST and did a CYA on the campus closing issue. The U probably just took their word for it.

That's my take on it anyway. I know it's early to make a prediction. I could be wrong due to lack of info, but I can SMELL it already.

SOMEBODY is going to get blamed for the two hour delay. The MSM is already steering the blame toward the U. I don't think they should be allowed to get away with that.

[MADem]

1. We've got a young one coming up who will be ready for college in a few years, and that school

was--note the past tense--on the list.

So much for bucolic settings in rolling hills...you're just as safe dodging baaastids barreling down the road blind drunk on Huntington Avenue or Beacon Street, it seems...

[Joanne98]

7. I do suspect the University of something.. They've become more "bidness" like

Now that they've decided it's so much more important to increase the value of their endowments. It's perfectly reasonable to assume they made a "bidness" decision when they decided not to close the campus.

[Union Label]

24. Yes heres part of the first signs of CYA

snip-
Steger said at a briefing for reporters that administrators and police initially believed the first shooting was an isolated domestic incident and did not see a need to close the university. Steger said they believed the gunman had fled the campus.

“We can only make decisions based on the information you had on the time. You don’t have hours to reflect on it,” he said.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18134671/?GT1=9246

[mike_c]

9. that's too bad-- it's a wonderful school and not in any way responsible...

...for what happened today.

[MADem]

36. I just don't get a good vibe. I know it is a great school. But between this incident,

and that one at Appalacian School of Law, it's looking like the rolling hills are as rough as Kenmore Square, frankly. At least in the city a youngster is already on the defensive.

And then, there's this bit--where's the closest prison to that joint?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/21/AR2006082100324.html?nav=emailpage

[Ilsa]

27. I dunno, MADem, maybe after this gets sorted out, VT might

be one of the safest places to go. Maybe they'll go overboard in setting up the safest place to live and attend class.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

2. "I could be wrong due to lack of info."

I believe the phrase you're looking for is "Complete and total lack of any information to support my theory whatsoever."

But have fun stormin' the castle.

[Joanne98]

4. Time will tell.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

13. Hey, who needs to wait?

You've already made up your mind.

[Joanne98]

15. How do you know I'm not right? Have you made up your mind?

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

19. I don't know that you're not right.

All I know is that you're engaging in speculative nonsense. I wish people would just calm down and wait for the facts to come out. Jesus, it's like short attention span theatre in here.

[Joanne98]

23. I'm going to bed. How's that for calm?

[Name removed]

37. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Ian David]

3. A two hour delay? Were they busy reading, "The Pet Goat"? n/t

[Joanne98]

14. LOL! Seriously. What were they doing? The pictures the students took

should provide some info. It looked like they were hiding behind cars and bushes to me.

[hedgehog]

25. I think until the second set of shooting started, it looked like a typical case

of someone shooting his girl friend and a chance bystander. I'm not even sure if the police knew for certain they weren't looking at a murder/suicide. Given the nature of the two sets of crimes, it would be odd but not surprising if they actually were coincidental and unconnected.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

5. a campus of 26,000 is like a medium town, small city.

there are murders each and every day in towns that size. Are you demanding that they close every town of 26,000 or fewer, just because a murder occured?

Hey, let's forget the constitution all together. Crime investigations are far more important.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

That comparison really doesn't hold.

A university like VT doesn't have bad neighborhoods. It doesn't have highways or hit&run accidents - not like a normal city, anyway. It is not a normal city. Murder is not a normal part of the daily routine at VT.

It seems quite clear that the police at the very least badly misjudged the situation. But unlike the OP I'm willing to wait to hear what they have to say before accusing them of being a bunch of fucking liars.

[EFerrari]

16. Well, on any campus there are safer and less safe places.

And while it's not like a "normal" city, it has all the same problems -- usually, without the same resources. :(

All those admins must be in some kind of shock right now.

[smalll]

20. Exactly.

Today was a terrible day, but I know already how this will go, America can't help itself anymore. The "VT Families" will end up going on a crusade to radically beef up campus security so that This Can Never Happen Again. Before you know it, tuition will rise for all the extra watchmen and high-tech (and privacy-invading) surveilance and security equipment every campus will have to buy and use. Getting onto a college campus will approach getting onto a plane.

A terrible thing happened. Someone snapped and massacred many dear people today. It so happened that it happened at a college (rather than at a mall, an office building, a factory, etc.). It so happened that it happened at VT. (The murderer is now dead. I think it would not make much sense for anyone to avoid going to VT rather than any other place because of this.) AND, it so happened that this man happened to shoot people in one building, then go accross campus and shoot people in another building. It so happened that the police thought the shooter was still in the original building. It's all chance, it's all the coincidences of the universe. The only constant is the fact that, every now and then, some lost, crazy person will do something like this. Want more gun control? I could get behind that.

But wait for it, the VT "Families" will end up being subtly goaded and guilted by the media and our modern-day yellow-ribbon culture of mourning to devote their lives to a new Campus Security Crusade to "make sure" that no one, ever again, at a college campus, can shoot people in two locations rather than one, attempting to close one particular barn door in the infinite stables of human life, when that horse is, sadly, tragically, long gone.

I hope and pray that as many as possible of the relatives of those who died today will be able to avoid that trap. I hope they can mourn, heal, and go on with life, and remember and focus on the LIVES of their loved-ones with those who knew them, rather than end up focussing on how their loved-ones happened to die, interminably, and in public.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

26. wow, great thoughts. I hope you do your journal.

i like your logic and the way you frame issues.

[smalll]

28. Thank you so much. I haven't journaled yet though! /nt

[dweller]

6. there's a live broadcast right now w/ police chief

discussion of 2 shooters, or persons of interest.

nbc-17 is covering it, other nbc stations may also.

actively pursuing all leads that there are 2 persons of interest, one w/probable cause.
the other obviously dead
not sure if they are related.

hmmm
dp

[Joanne98]

8. I heard that. But I can't tell if he's saying they have someone in custody.

He's being very secretive!

[dweller]

11. well, not sure, but sounds like

they are looking for someone suspected to be involved w/ the dorm incident.

dp

[Marrah_G]

29. I think I can explain what he is saying

After shooting one they went to question a person they thought might be involved.

While questioning that person the second shooting started.

They think the gunman from the second shooting did the first shooting and the first suspect wasn't involved.

They cannot rule out suspect 1 in the first shooting until ballistics come back linking the two shootings.

I believe they know the two shootings were done by the shooter who killed himself but they cannot say so officially until they confirm it with ballistics.

They are just being very, very careful about not stating things they have not completely confirmed yet.

I would be willing to bet tommorrow they will say the the gunman in the second shooting was the gunman in the first also and that the original oerson they questioned was not involved.

[MADem]

39. Thank you for that. NT

[Wickerman]

10. The nice thing about playing Monday morning QB is at least you

had the chance to watch the game on TV. Here, we don't even have any facts, let alone instant replay -but don't let that stop ya.

:eyes:

[Joanne98]

12. I have to go to bed pretty soon so I can't wait all night for the cops to

give some answers. but you probably won't get any tonight either since the cops are being SO evasive!

[jus_the_facts]

17. Don't question....just drink your koolaid and believe whatever the media tells you...

:banghead:

[Wickerman]

18. I can wait

I'd rather they complete the investigation than get all paranoid about something that is indeed tragic, but is only one of many, many evils that happened today. The answers will wait - I'm afraid the wild speculation will run rampant regardless of what the police release.

[Joanne98]

22. The reporters aren't asking the right questions anyway....

Kinda like WH press briefings....worthless!

[Wickerman]

21. I can wait

I'd rather they complete the investigation than get all paranoid about something that is indeed tragic, but is only one of many, many evils that happened today. The answers will wait - I'm afraid the wild speculation will run rampant regardless of what the police release.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

31. damn straight.

we need the pros to do their jobs, not spend their time in front of a camera.

many of my friends and acquaintences are in that field, and their biggest gripe on a hot case is that the press interferes and makes things worse. On the other hand, I have never met a cop who would not use the pressbeast when he/she/it thought it would help them find a culprit.

I, too, can wait.

[Tin Man]

30. For the same reason, I refuse to send my girls to Amish school.

Nope, those Amish schools aren't safe...

Fifth girl dies after Amish school shooting
POSTED: 6:10 a.m. EDT, October 3, 2006

PARADISE, Pennsylvania (CNN) -- A heavily armed truck driver who was prepared for a long standoff barricaded himself in a one-room Amish schoolhouse Monday, killing five girls execution-style before killing himself, police said.

Six other girls were bound and critically wounded in the attack, which police said appeared to be a revenge killing for an unspecified incident that occurred when the gunman was a boy.

The attack was the nation's third deadly school shooting in a week. (Watch what happened in schoolhouse, community's reaction -- 2:21 Video)

The gunman, 32-year-old Charles Carl Roberts IV, carried three firearms -- a shotgun, a semiautomatic pistol and a rifle. State Police Commissioner Jeffrey Miller said Roberts also had a stun gun, two knives and a bag holding 600 rounds of ammunition.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/10/02/amish.shooting/index.html

[MADem]

38. Well, there was that escaped prisoner at VT awhile back, and the

law school shooting in the same region--the shooter got the DEAN that time and a few others. http://archives.cnn.com/2002/US/01/16/law.school.shooting/

Oddly enough, the shooter in that case was also a foreign national. That's gotta be some serious cognitive dissonance for the right (Concealed carry, sure---foreigners, no!!!).

I've only heard of one single Amish school shooting, ever. However, this is the third serious incident that has come to my attention about that "pastoral region" in the last few years, and the second one involving VT. Like it or not, it creates an impression, and impressions can be lasting.

When was the last time someone went and shot up BC or Northeastern? Hell, you could be hit by a car on Huntington Ave, or get mugged in Kenmore Square, but these are KNOWN risks. When you send your kid to school in the country, you aren't thinking "school shooter" right off the bat.

[wtmusic]

32. They likely assumed the shooter had fled

and were pursuing leads off campus to determine his whereabouts.

[Irreverend IX]

33. I don't think the cops prepare to deal with stuff like this...

Really, who could expect them to? There's practically no serious violence on university campuses; most of their time is spent busting kids for MIPs, weed and skateboarding. Outfitting a "campus SWAT team" would cost millions upon millions of dollars, and the team would be used maybe once every couple decades.

[undeterred]

34. When I lived on University of Chicago campus

I was very particular about who I called for what.

Noisy undergrads- University of Chicago police.

Anything potentially armed- Chicago police.

One of the first years I lived on campus there was a guy acting crazy at his house- a neigbor across the street called the University of Chicago police. One went to the front door and the other to the back. Well the crazy guy disarmed the cop at the front door and stabbed him with a kitchen knife. Then he went to the back door and shot the other University policeman. The one who was stabbed died and the other one lived. Just a crazy guy but he took down 2 University cops.

So I only called them to deal with student stuff, never with really crazy situations, because I worried about them getting hurt.

Edit: Chicago police aren't as shy about using their guns when its called for.

[seabeyond]

35. two deaths in a room does NOT = murdering rampage.

our cops are not psychic