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Illinois massacre 6 Dead 16 wounded
Police say they have no motive for the rapid-fire assault, carried out by the gunman who fired indiscriminately
into the crowd with a shotgun and two handguns as students dove to the floor and ran toward the exits. At least two of the wounded were hospitalized in critical condition.
"I kept thinking, `Oh God, he''''s going to shoot me. Oh God, I''''m dead. I''''m dead. I''''m dead,''''" said Desiree Smith, a senior journalism major who dropped to the floor near the back of the auditorium.
"People were crawling on each other, trampling each other," she said. "As I got near the door, I got up and I started running."
University President John Peters said four people died at the scene, including three students and the gunman, while the other two died at a hospital. The teacher, a graduate student, was wounded but was expected to recover.
"It appears he may have been a student somewhere else," University Police Chief Donald Grady said. Authorities did not release any other details about the gunman or identify the victims.
Witnesses said the skinny gunman, dressed in black and wearing a stocking cap, emerged from behind a screen on the stage of 200-seat Cole Hall and opened fire just as the class was about to end around 3 p.m.
Lauren Carr said she was sitting in the third row when she saw the shooter walk through a door on the right-hand side of the stage, pointing a gun straight ahead.
"I personally Army-crawled halfway up the aisle," said Carr, a 20-year-old sophomore. "I said I could get up and run or I could die here."
She said a student in front of her was bleeding, "but he just kept running."
"I heard this girl scream, ''''Run, he''''s reloading the gun!''''"
Student Jerry Santoni was in a back row when he saw the gunman enter a service door to the stage.
"I saw him shoot one round at the teacher," he said. "After that, I proceeded to get down as fast as I could."
Santoni dived down, hitting his head the seat in front of him, leaving a knot about half the size of a pingpong ball on his forehead.
Eighteen victims were brought to Kishwaukee Community Hospital, where one died, according to the hospital''''s Web site. One male was transferred in critical condition and died at OSF St. Anthony Medical Center in Rockford, an official said.
Dan Parmenter, a 20-year-old sophomore from Elmhurst, Ill., was one of those killed, his stepfather, Robert Greer, told the Chicago Tribune.
"I''''m not angry," Greer said. "I''''m just sad, and I know that right now what I need to do is comfort my wife."
Minutes after the shooting erupted, students phoned each other and sent text messages even before school officials could warn them, many said. The school Web site announced a possible gunman on campus within 20 minutes of the shots and locked down the campus, part of a new security plan created after a student at Virginia Tech killed 32 people last year.
"This is a tragedy, but from all indications we did everything we could when we found out," Peters said.
Michael Gentile was meeting with two of his students directly beneath the lecture hall when the shootings happened. He could hear the chaos a few feet above his head.
"The shotgun blast must have been so loud," said Gentile, a 27-year-old media studies instructor. "It sounded like something was dropping down the stairs... We had no idea what this was."
Then, shorter, sharper noises he recognized as handgun shots.
"There was a pretty quick succession ... just pow, pow, pow," said Gentile, who didn''''t leave his office for about 90 minutes. He used a surveillance camera just outside his office to confirm that the people knocking on his door were police.
George Gaynor, a senior geography student, who was in Cole Hall when the shooting happened, told the student newspaper the Northern Star that the shooter was "a skinny white guy with a stocking cap on."
He described the scene immediately following the incident as terrif
Published: February 15, 2008
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