CASE STUDY-VA TECH KILLINGS

Case Study-VA Tech Killings



Abstract

The paper tries to explore the event of Virginia Tech Killings in a holistic context. The paper discusses the cause and consequences of the event and also the response of the general public and of the government. The event involves a student who killed 32 students and faculty members of the university and then killed himself.

Case Study-VA Tech Killings

Introduction

The Shooting of Virginia Tech University took place on 16 April 2007, on the campus of the University at Blacksburg in the state of Virginia, and it made thirty-three people killed. This event is one of the deadliest school massacres in the history of the United States after the bombing of Bath Consolidated School which occurred in 1927.

Description and Analysis

The first shooting occurred on April 16, 2007 at West Ambler Johnston Hall, a dormitory that houses 895 students combined, where two people were killed. One witness reported hearing about thirty shots. The firing continued in a class of Norris Hall, the building is dedicated to engineering sciences.

All classes during the day and next day were canceled and students were asked to stay indoors, and away from windows. Indeed, two bomb threats occurred at Virginia Tech the week before the shooting: Torgersen Hall was the first and second was when multiple buildings of the engineering classes. The university offered five thousand dollars to the person who could provide information on these alerts. It is unclear however if these alerts to the bombs were linked to the killings. Strong winds produced by a violent storm on the east coast, would have prevented the police to use helicopters to perform medical evacuations.

Early reports announce one death, and the death toll mounted to twenty-two, then twenty-three dead. The number was still rising for some more time. The Associated Press announced the number of thirty-one victims, MSNBC, CNN, CBS, the BBC, NBC, and CBC, while ABC News announced twenty-nine. The university president Charles W. Steger then announced that the killings had been thirty-three dead. With regard to the wounded, they are in number twenty-nine CNN, twenty-one for Fox and ten for the BBC. Of these, there are two students who were injured by jumping from a window on the third floor of West Ambler Johnston Hall to escape the fire (Egger, 2002).

Chronology

7 hr 15mn: police called in the West Ambler Johnston Hall, one of several residence halls on campus. A man and a woman were shot dead.

Between 7hr and 15hr 9mn: compiles the shooter's "manifesto" and goes to the post office to send it to the NBC. The postmark indicates that the shipment was done precisely 9hr 1mn.

7hr 30mn: two injured were transported to Montgomery Regional Hospital, the nearest hospital campus.

8hr: Classes begin for most of the nine thousand students staying on campus and thousands of external. Police evacuated the dorm, made the first surveys of inquiry and begins to question witnesses. Thinking that the shooter left the campus, she decided, in agreement with the university, to treat the case ...