Connecticut Elementary School Massacre

[compared2what?]

Not with a bang, but a bicker.

I blame lupercal myself for this.

Someone left the fake out in the rain. . .

.

lupercal, I really have nothing against you. And quite like you, in fact. But what is the what here? You're in the wrong. If you let it go, it wouldn't be any big deal.

[lupercal]

^ The post you're quoting is a response to barracuda. And 8bit is right, this bickering is most unseemly, not to mention off topic, so I hereby pledge to take the high road. Please join me.

[compared2what?]

^ The post you're quoting is a response to barracuda. And 8bit is right, this bickering is most unseemly, not to mention off topic, so I hereby pledge to take the high road. Please join me.

I hadn't left it. But I'm delighted to see you back where you properly deserve to be.
___________

ON EDIT: Sorry, that came out wrong. I meant: "Yes, let's not bicker, no implications on either side."

[barracuda]

I am Facebook friends with Ryan Lanza
And that gave me a front row seat as everyone rushed to ugly judgment about him -- and me
BY MATT BORS

I woke up late Friday morning and posted my latest comic before realizing no one would be talking about it or any other issue that day except the latest massacre unfolding before our eyes – this time involving children. Not “this time.” I mean “again.” As I had done not one week earlier when there was a mass shooting a few miles from my home in Portland, I watched the real time updates, trying to wrap my mind around being a part of the human race.

CNN named Ryan Lanza as the suspect before noon based on a police source. Within minutes, journalists at several outlets were not only reporting the name, but passing around a link to Ryan’s Facebook account. And people I knew were suddenly telling me, Dude, you are Facebook friends with the suspect.

His wall was set to private so I was one of the only people seeing Ryan post “Fuck you CNN it wasn’t me” and “IT WASN’T ME I WAS AT WORK IT WASN’T ME.” Networks were broadcasting photos pulled from the account on national television. Buzzfeed and Gawker, in a race to snatch traffic, ran headlines speculating if this was the shooter. (Headlines with question marks now being a thing that media does.) I posted a screen shot to Twitter and Facebook to let everyone know that this Ryan Lanza, at least, was not dead at the scene of the crime. That’s when things got crazy for me.

The screen caps spread fast and I found myself inundated with messages, some from journalists seeking confirmation, many from people saying angry and bizarre things to me or about Ryan. One demanded to know how I could be friends with such a monster. Could I help a random internet sleuth create a “psychological profile”? Did I see warning signs in Ryan? Why did I suspiciously post cartoons about mass shootings only days before? That was very tasteless. A text to my phone from an unknown number read “looks like this killer is a fan of yours.” A Twitter user declared me a “snitch” for sharing Ryan’s post. Someone accused me of having something to do with the killings, “which you take delight in,” they wrote, and hoped the FBI would hold me accountable.

I don’t know Ryan Lanza. I assume he’s like most of my Facebook friends in that he likes to follow my work, which is what my account is for. He’s someone who today is dealing with his brother murdering his mother before massacring school children, and the fact that he was accused of the killings.

There a lot of things we need to have a “national discussion” about in America — gun laws and access to mental health care being the two most important. For decades we’ve hidden our mentally ill in prisons and under bridges instead of dealing with them humanely. We’ve decided that access to guns is more important than our safety, that more guns equals safety, or that it’s a settled political issue. But another problem brought to light by this story is journalism in the age of the rolling news cycle, and how social media shapes not only coverage of breaking news, but us as people.

We have a problem with rushing to judgment.

News organizations racing to be first know that an article with a snappy headline thrown up when people are hungry for information can bring in incredible amounts of traffic – forget glory or prestige, keep the servers running ads. But accuracy and being first seem to conflict. Gawker’s first headline was “Is This Ryan Lanza, the Connecticut School Shooter?” which was later updated with my screen shot changed to “This ‘Ryan Lanza Facebook Profile Is The Connecticut Shooter’ Stuff Is Fucking Up Everything” (which seemed to admit they were fucking everything up). In response to criticism from Adam Serwer and Poynter, Buzzfeed’s editors detailed some of their thinking today.

We are feeling our way through very new ecosystem, and trying to understand how breaking news ought to work in the era of social. And this is not solely a media story about getting things wrong: In the end, social media got to the answer of who Ryan Lanza is much more quickly than a dozen local reporters would have done. But social media also creates a world in which we are watching the investigation — and reporting — unfold in real time.

“Social Media” didn’t get anything wrong or right. Reporters got things wrong – people who made choices about what to post and how to headline it – and they looked like fools for doing so. You might as well credit phones and typewriters for everything reported correctly before 1999. I got out what information I had as accurately as I could and people reported on that. Lanza’s ability to post about his innocence, and mine to see it and relay it to people, is only a social media success story if you don’t question the necessity of dragging an alleged suspect’s possible Facebook profile into the limelight where he’ll be called a mass murderer of children. Other than that, yeah, tweeting’s fun. Social media is simply a tool, and from what I saw, not one that’s bringing out anything social in us.

The outpouring of vitriol directed at me I’m still trying to figure out. I was feeling shitty about the human race due to the shooting, this wasn’t helping, and as someone used to getting their share of criticism and trolls, it was on a level that surprised me. People all over the web were immediately passing around unverified nonsense, creating fake profiles of Lanza, burn-in-hell Facebook pages, raging on people they don’t know – like me – with the most tenuous connection imaginable to Lanza.

We’re not thinking straight.

Social media purports to connect us but it often does the exact opposite. The barrier, the anonymity, the lack of accountability; all encourage the worst in people.

We’re operating in a world with less agreed upon facts by the day, with the complete erosion of trust in media, trying to tackle problems like gun control and mental health. It’s not going to work well. The solutions are far more complex than a simple political fix – as if we’re even capable of that. We’re passing along claims that cause damage to real people, that deliver traffic to craven unethical websites, saying things that later make us look like fools. Social media has put zero seconds between events and public reaction. People are firing from the hip, unloading into the crowd – whatever tasteless gun metaphor works here – without much thought or empathy on every daily outrage we’re served. The next one is a moment away. We could start thinking about it now.

Not two hours after accusing me being involved in the killing of 20 children, the man on Facebook was back: “I apologize for jumping the gun.”

[Iamwhomiam]

c2w?, Thanks for your earlier comments, re lawsuit and Pete Yost. I really couldn't say who could be held liable. A settlement for the reasons you state I agree would be most likely.

Lupe, I appreciate your saying that. "It's always good to get your perspective on these insane events IAWIA." Let's hope you will honor your words.

Though I explained that I had gotten the schools' names mixed up, and sincerely apologized for doing so, you should realize the name switch wasn't all that relevant to the questions posed, really, or the others I asked. And you didn't waste your time answering me, though you focused on only the school and failed to acknowledge any of the other questions I asked of you.

And I did not appreciate this at all, "So the point is that I think you're misreading or misunderstanding a lot of what I've written because you're letting your feelings color your perceptions. That's natural, human, and perfectly normal, but as you also mention, it's not very rigorous, and we need to be. Hope that helps! Not misunderstanding anything you've written.

Nor this, "p.s. where on earth did you get this teabagger tax theory? Seriously, that's insulting. In any case I can assure you that taxpapers do not pay for building or rebuilding parochial schools."

Lupe, you claimed that a 40 year long period of building schools was primarily to profit from the sales of asbestos. And frankly, that's nuts. The 40 year long school building spree was not restricted to building only parochial schools, but also included public schools. And most were built to deal with the tremendous post-war baby boom. And all buildings then utilized asbestos.

Now maybe if you had picked a more expensive material, like plumbing, it would be more rational, but still only fantasy. And building all those schools, like the Main school, were built with taxpayer dollars, and those like Our Lady, by tithe and tuition.
More public schools = more taxes.
(All that took place around p.32)
I won't revisit this, but I would appreciate your comments. And I still love you!

Mac, you're so damned grouchy! I do appreciate your condolences and those offered by all. But we're gonna have to let that stuff go by in the future, I'm good with it.

You may not perceive your arguments as attacks but I did and some others may have as well. It was more your gruff and abrupt attitude I found unnecessary. I hope you know I have no hard feelings and I do respect you. Maybe that's my real gripe; that someone I respect was behaving less than respectfully.

I still think that photo is completely irrelevant. Because it is a picture, not an identification, except to the public that is. Not anymore an identification then that of my son at 15 years. Anyway, it might have been his uncle who misidentified him as the wrong brother.

Perhaps because I absorbed from the web as much as I could for a few days before leaving for Seattle I'm a bit sensitive to what your doing, harping on this picture, wanting to know its source.
I may be projecting just a bit and saying what I feel a parent from Sandy Hook would tell you. "Fuck that asinine photo and wherever it came from, my kid's fucking dead!"

Hey, it's fine to question and discuss, but tell me Mac, why is the source of that photo of some importance to you that I just cannot perceive? Please explain for us its importance to you.

I assure you he was identified, most probably by his brother, from a mortuary photograph. They don't like dealing with emotions and actions that erupt when a relative personally views a body. But then again, sufficiently proving he was indeed Ryan, would there be a need to id the corpse as Adam? Process of elimination?

I think we're just dealing with an OCD kid of privilege who didn't get his way and erupted. That simple.

But just to show you how fucking sick I am, I'll share this with you, about my experience with the King County coroner and the detective who had me id my son's body.... and please note I've shared this with less than a handful of people.

All I knew is that my son was killed with a gunshot. I did not know if he had been shot more than once or where on his body he was wounded. I did not know if he had been shot by the shotgun, the .40 ca Ruger or both. I asked for the photo to be shown to me first. I wanted to spare them the horror it might have caused them to live out their lives with that last image of him, while eradicating all others, had he been horribly mutilated. Without saying all that I just said it would be better for me to view it first.

And so, the detective handed me the manila case file folder. I took a deep breath and opened it. The only wound was to his head, above and behind his left ear. It was substantial, but certainly not as bad had he been shot in the face, like the 14 year-old was, with the shotgun. His face was immediately recognizable, though the internal bleeding had caused extensive bruising around his eyes and his face looked deathly drawn. I didn't know if I should share it with my daughter or ex, and because my daughter's a tough cookie and a nurse, I handed it to her saying aloud, I don't know Cher, what do you think?

She opened it and with the biggest eye roll I ever personally received, she said to me, Daddy, that's his make-up. I had momentarily forgotten he had been made up as a zombie to get a $5 discount at the door at the "Better Off Undead" zombie rave.

Go ahead and Laugh. I did!

After identifying his body I was able to retrieve most of his possessions he had with him at the time of the shooting. I had access now to his cell phone and sure as shit, there were MOM and DAD listed and I never got a fucking call from the cops. It was a good web capable camera equipped Nokia.

When we, the senior detective handling the case, the 'victim's rights' officer and the parents all gathered at one of the parents houses specifically to get the straight story about what actually happened, we were given incorrect information. The detective told me my son had been shot multiple time.

So now I had his phone which I really did not know how to use. So at a particularly tense moment, his phone, locked on speaker, began to ring and ring, but let me tell you about his ring-tone... it was a sound bite from an old movie saying loudly, over and over again, "It all happened a long, long time ago."

Embarrassed, I split into another room while trying to shut the damn thing off, not noticing that it caused more than a few laughs which really helped break the tension.

When I went to get the autopsy report from the coroner, he was most congenial while handing it to me. He said he'd be right back. When her returned, he gave me a King County Coroner's office pen, as a Momento mori, a remembrance that we will all die at sometime.

I was polite and accepted his token while thinking, "Like my kid's autopsy report or his ashes wouldn't be enough to remember!"

Of course I miss my son, but I do not mourn for him. But I can't help having sympathetic feelings for those who are now experiencing that ungodly pain of loss. It's like when someone says "Blue" you just cannot do other than see blue with your mind's eye. Someone say 'mass murder' and I want to cry because I know that hurting pain in my throat, they're feeling it too.

Ok, enough!

I doubt this was some MK operation, but that will remain unknowable.

A few years before my son's death I found myself engaged with another mass murderer. I had been his first missed target, him breaking into my neighbors having forgotten which was mine. I heard him and actually witnessed him crashing through the window with a machete.

Him not finding me and seemingly oblivious to all the family photos of black folk hanging about, he left a chopped-in-half bunch of bananas just inside the door. A token. And I waited for him to exit onto our shared stoop with my softball bat with which I planned to take off his head. I stupidly chose instead to call the cops, rather than traumatize his 8 year-old son and his ex who was my girlfriend whom were with me having lunch at the time. America's most wanted aired an episode or a few. Maybe someday I'll share more about how the man who hated farmers wound up a vegetable. But not right now. It's a pretty fantastic story and will not be believed by most, but I swear to you everything I will tell you will be true. He long believed me to be his nemesis, but as it all turned out, I was his savior.

edited once to correct misspelling of 'then' as 'that'

[82_28]

Fucking Jesus, Iam. You bring me to tears and then you fuck with my head with another story.

[Iamwhomiam]

Sorry, 82. Certainly laughter at my expense was my purpose in sharing and not to make anyone sad.

Yeah, the other story is very far out. The guy was brilliant, two masters degrees. It's a true story of the continuing battle of darkness against the light. Complete with characters representing those of the Sons of Belial battling against those of the Sons of the Law of One.

Kinda like the gun control debate; service to self vs service to others.

[lupercal]

IamwhoIam, heartfelt thanks for sharing that story. I didn't know much about it before this, other than an occasional reference you've made now and then, and all I can say right now is that I'm really sorry that happened to you and your family.

About the OLA fire: I guess there are two conclusions I arrived at after looking into it seriously in spring 2006: first, that it was state-sponsored arson, based on a set of circumstances surrounding the fire and subsequent investigation. As far as I know the cause is still officially undetermined and the Chicago fire department investigation records are sealed, but the unofficial theory pushed by the FBI and other agencies is that one of the students started it. As I mentioned this was given its most thorough public treatment in a 1996 book called "To Sleep with Angels" co-written by Chicago firefighter named David Cowan:


link: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/to-slee ... 632171&r=1

In June 2005 Cowan was arrested for setting fire to a church in Chicago:

The many who still remember the ghastly 1958 fire at Our Lady of the Angels school in Chicago scarcely believed the news last week that the author of a respected book on the blaze had just been arrested -- for arson. Police said David Cowan, 41, co-author of "To Sleep With the Angels: The Story of a Fire," was spotted running away from a fire in a storage shed at St. Benedict's Church.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 00909.html

In December 2005 Cowan was convicted and sentenced to three years on one count of arson: http://articles.latimes.com/2005/dec/20 ... briefs20.1

So that led me to suppose there might be more to the story than spontaneous combustion which was the original theory put forward in fire journals and popular articles like the one I read in 4th grade. I found a website dedicated to the fire with a ton of clippings and photos and a section where survivors post their memories. A lot have over the years and I concluded from the info there that a) the student charged by Cowan et al. couldn't have done it and b) there had been evidence of accelerants and suspicious activity like a fire door in one hall that was normally kept closed during classes (apparently everyone was aware that that part of the school was a firetrap) and found propped open after the fire. Lots more weirdness as I've mentioned.

The second part is the asbestos theory. That's based on looking into who know what when and it turns out that until the late 50s the mesothelioma link was widely known but hadn't been epidemiologically proven until researchers in Africa finally published irrefutable studies. Asbestos was already banned domestically in places like Germany and it looked like the end was near. (This from a book published in the late 2000s by U California Press. I'll put the link up later.) Intentionally or not the OLA fire helped to obliterate that problem and asbestos made a huge comeback. Yes, brand new schools were built, fireproofed to the gills of course, but old schools public and private were condemned under new firecodes and had to be torn down, rebuilt, heavily refurbished or just closed. Many closed. A few were refurbished, true, and decked out with fire escapes and so on, but in any case the school-building industry boomed and the asbestos industry got a peacetime reprieve.

[barracuda]

Collated timelines of events of Friday December 14th. I have omitted some items that seemed superfluous, such as perfunctory announcements by various politicians regarding their emotional responses and legislative desires. Any additions are welcome.

_________________________________________________________________________


-- 9:30 a.m., as announcements were read over the loudspeaker to the students, shots were heard across the school.

-- 9:35:53 a.m. - Dispatch: “Sandy Hook School, Caller’s indicated she thinks someone is shooting in the building.”

-- 9:36:15: “The individual I have on the phone is continuing to hear what he believes to be gun shots.”

-- 9:38:10: “The shooting appears to have stopped. The school is in lock down.”

-- 9:38:50: “We’ll stage up the SWAT and go from there.”

-- 9:39:05: “Reports that teachers saw two shadows running, past the building, past the gym.”

-- 9:39:20: “Yeah, we got ‘em. They're coming at me.”

-- 9:40 a.m. “You’ll need two ambulances.”

-- 9:40:30: “Shooter’s apparently still shooting in office area. Dickerson Drive.”

-- 9:40:55: “Troop 8 personnel, take Exit 10, left on 34, turn on Riverside Drive. Make sure you have your vests on.”

-- 9:41 a.m.Connecticut State Police dispatch SWAT to Newtown.

-- 9:43:45: “We have one female in Room 1 who has gunshot wound to the foot.”

-- 9.45am SWAT team arrives; checks building

-- 9:46:20: “We’ve got an injured person in Room 9 with numerous gunshot wounds.”

-- 9:47 a.m. Hartford Courant reports that state police received the call on Newtown shooting, call of numerous shots fired near room number nine.

-- 9:49:05: “Negative on description. Shots were fired about three minutes ago.”

-- 9:53:25: “Newtown’s reporting one suspect down. The building has now been cleared.”

-- 9:55 a.m. One of first tweets about shooting goes out, from breaking news editor of Hartford Courant. “Police are at an incident on Dickinson Drive in Newtown – details are sketchy but Sandy Hook Elementary is on the same street.” https://twitter.com/StephenBus

-- 9:55:25: “Be advised, we have multiple weapons. One rifle and a shotgun”

-- 9:57:25: “Any plain clothes responding, make sure you have your raid gear on, your raid gear on.”

-- 10:00:15: “Ask the custodian, get a team up on the roof and clear the roof.”

-- 10:00:40: “We need (inaudible) up here right away. Call Danbury of you have to.”

-- Indeterminate time, helicopter footage of police chasing the man in the woods.

-- 10:01:40: “You might want to see if surrounding towns can send EMS personnel. We’re running out pretty quick.”

-- 10:03: “What is the number of ambulances you will require?” “They don’t know, they’re not giving us a number.”

-- 10:04: “We have staging area for the student, the personnel and the parents. Outside by the street.”

-- 10:12:45: “Set up a triage area up by the fire house.”

-- 10:28: “Roger, Closet in the kitchen, you have some victims. Let us know, we’ll call the number so you know they’re coming.”

-- 10:30 a.m. ET] Breaking news coming in - Connecticut State Police are responding to reports of a shooting at a Newtown elementary school in southwestern Connecticut, according to police spokesman Lt. Paul Vance.

-- 10.30 am Police announce the shooter is dead

-- 10:58 a.m. CBS tweets that the shooter is dead, per law enforcement sources

-- 11:10 a.m. Powerful first image of children evacuating school, taken by Newton Bee. PHOTO: http://twitpic.com/blx20g

-- 11:34 a.m. ET] The shooter is dead, a source with knowledge of the investigation, tells CNN’s Susan Candiotti.
Police have recovered two weapons from him, the source added.
It's not known whether police killed the alleged shooter or he took his own life.

-- 12:05 p.m. CNN reports that the shooter’s body is in a classroom.

-- 12.10 p.m. First reports mistakenly naming killer as Ryan Lanza, 24

-- Indeterminate time after 12:10 p.m. Ryan Lanza was working at his desk at the Ernst & Young when he saw TV news reports that he had killed 30 people at an elementary school in Connecticut. Lanza quickly told his boss: 'I need to go.' He then walked out of his Times Square office, according to a co-worker who spoke to MailOnline on condition of anonymity.

--12:20 p.m. ET] A third-grader describes the shooting to WTNH

-- 12:36 p.m. The Hartford Courant reports that 20 shot, multiple dead.

-- Thirty minutes after Ryan leaves work police storm Ernst & Young (?)

-- 12:52 p.m. Associated Press reports that there are 27 known fatalities and 18 are children.

-- Indeterminate time, Ryan Lanza begins posting his innocence to Facebook from his seat on the bus to his apartment.

-- 1:21 p.m. CBS reports that official have a potential second shooter in custody.

-- 1:41 p.m. ET] Police have now begun their first briefing on the shooting.

-- 1:42 p.m. ET] Connecticut State Police Lt. Paul Vance said the shooter is dead inside the school.

-- 1:45 p.m. CNN reports that a male is being questioned, but is not called a suspect.

-- 1:51 p.m. ET] We have just learned that the suspected shooter is 20-years-old, a law enforcement source with knowledge of the investigation tells CNN’s Susan Candiotti.

-- 2:00 pm Police arrive at Ryan Lanza's Hoboken apartment.

-- 2:00 pm Authorities announce a body was discovered at killer's Newtown home.

-- 2:11 p.m. ET] CNN's Susan Candiotti has just reported that a law enforcement official tells her the suspect is named Ryan Lanza and he is in his 20s.

-- 2:12 p.m. Ambulance arrives at home of suspected gunman. WTIC-TV posts photo. PIC: pic.twitter.com/ke6bV0lS

-- 2:20 p.m. ET] We are now hearing from CNN's Mary Snow, who is reporting from outside the suspect's home, that dozens of law enforcement officials are on the scene.

-- Between 2 and 3 pm. Ryan arrived at Hoboken and is "grabbed" by authorities.

-- 2:26 p.m. CBS confirms Lanza’s mother was a teacher and that many of the victim’s were her students.

-- 2:27 p.m. Hartford Courant reports that the shooter’s parent was found dead in New Jersey.

-- 2:31 p.m. Mediaite posts Ryan Lanza's Facebook account photo.

-- 3:00 Feds arrive at Ryan Lanza's Hoboken apartment and begin searching Ryan's apartment for bombs with the robot.

-- 3:09 p.m. ET] The suspect's mother was shot and killed at the school, according to source close to the investigation. She was a teacher there.

-- 3:15 p.m. AP is reporting that two people close to Ryan Lanza are missing in New Jersey, his girlfriend and another friend.

-- 3:22 p.m. ET] A senior law enforcement official familiar with the investigation says a brother of the alleged shooter was found dead in a home searched in Hoboken, New Jersey.

-- 3:51 p.m. ET] A federal law enforcement source tells CNN's John King the information from the scene is that the shooter arrived and headed directly toward and to his mother’s classroom.

-- 4:08 p.m. CBS reports that Adam Lanza is actually the deceased shooter and that Ryan Lanza is the older brother, age 24.

-- 4:23 p.m. ET] We have learned that Connecticut police have searched the suspected gunman's home and place of employment in the wake of Friday's mass shooting, Connecticut State Police Lt. Paul Vance told CNN's Wolf Blitzer. They have also interviewed his friends, relatives and "everyone who possibly had any connection with him whatsoever," he said.

-- 4:54 p.m. CNN reports that “We are now being told there was no body found in the Hoboken, New Jersey, home as had been previously reported.” Instead, a suspect was taken from the home.

-- 5:01 p.m. ET] Law enforcement officials are not prepared to identify the shooter right now, Connecticut State PoliceLt. J. Paul Vance said in a press conference.

-- 5:14 p.m. ET] The mother of the suspected shooter was found dead in her son's residence in Newtown, a law enforcement source with detailed knowledge of the investigation told CNN. CNN had previously identified the mother as Nancy Lanza, a teacher at the Sandy Hook Elementary, according to law enforcement sources.

The source also told CNN there was no body found in the house searched by authorities in Hoboken, New Jersey. Two law enforcement sources say a man was taken away from questioning from that house. He is believed to be the brother of the shooter, according to the sources.

-- 6:44 p.m. ET] Three U.S. law enforcement officials, from different agencies, separately tonight identified the suspected shooter as Adam Lanza, contrary to what investigators had said previously.

-- 6:44 p.m. Update on Ryan Lanza, the older brother of suspected shooter. He is not listed as a suspect CNN reports, but he has not been released either. The father was also taken in for questioning.

-- 9ish p.m. Associated Press is reporting that “At least one parent said Lanza’s mother was a substitute teacher there. But her name did not appear on a staff list. And the law enforcement official said investigators were unable to establish any connection so far between her and the school.”

SATURDAY

-- 1:11 p.m. Investigators have been told that alleged Connecticut school shooter Adam Lanza had some sort of altercation with some people at the school a few days before the killings, according to a law enforcement official.

-- 6:14 p.m. CNN reports that police refute earlier reports that there had been altercations between Lanza and adults at the school.

_________________________________________________________________________

Sources:

http://www.nhregister.com/articles/2012 ... 744261.txt

http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2012/12/14/sh ... ry-school/

http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-ne ... ary-school

http://wtvr.com/2012/12/14/timeline-of- ... -shooting/

http://cliffviewpilot.com/conflicting-a ... onnection/

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... ooter.html

[compared2what?]

Collated timelines of events of Friday December 14th. I have omitted some items that seemed superfluous, such as perfunctory announcements by various politicians regarding their emotional responses and legislative desires. Any additions are welcome.

Thanks. That must have been a lot of work.

To me, the biggest stand-out conflict is the one between this sequence:

-- 12.10 p.m. First reports mistakenly naming killer as Ryan Lanza, 24

-- Indeterminate time after 12:10 p.m. Ryan Lanza was working at his desk at the Ernst & Young when he saw TV news reports that he had killed 30 people at an elementary school in Connecticut. Lanza quickly told his boss: 'I need to go.' He then walked out of his Times Square office, according to a co-worker who spoke to MailOnline on condition of anonymity.

[snip]

-- Thirty minutes after Ryan leaves work police storm Ernst & Young (?)

[snip]
-- 1:21 p.m. CBS reports that official have a potential second shooter in custody.

[snip]

-- 1:45 p.m. CNN reports that a male is being questioned, but is not called a suspect.

and this:

-- Between 2 and 3 pm. Ryan arrived at Hoboken and is "grabbed" by authorities.

But it doesn't take two hours to get from Times Square to Hoboken. It's only about a twenty minute bus ride, station-to-station. So the later time pretty much has to be a mistake, I think.

It's less explicable that way than the other contradictory and wrong information, though. Because most of the rest of it could just be the product of LE from different agencies and multiple precincts in different states and cities heedlessly issuing public pronouncements about what was thought to be known from wherever the hell they were at the time without pausing to reflect on how criminally irresponsible that was.

Which sounds like the press and the cops doing business as usual to me. So I wouldn't call it incompetence. That's systematically how they are, imo. More or less by design. Serves the interests of power.

But mine is a minority opinion in that regard, I know.

[barracuda]

Because we can't pin down the time at which Ryan Lanza saw the CNN news report, I simply listed it as "after 12:10", i.e. sometime after the very first report hit the air. But he was at work, so it seems possible that he may have seen the report as late as after 1:00. Until some interviews with Ernst & Young associates come out, I can't intelligently comment, except to conjecture that if I were in his shoes, I might dally around on my way to catch a bus considering my options. One of which would have been to simply turn myself in to the nearest policeman. Even without this conjectured dalliance, and given the twenty minute bus ride, there's other time snippets to take into account - the time between seeing the report and leaving work, the walk to the bus terminal, waiting for the next bus, and the walk from the bus stop in Hoboken to his home. So I can easily grant him at least a half hour to forty minutes from work to home even if he went straight to get on a bus.

[Iamwhomiam]

Yes, good work, fish.

I would think he would have called his mother first, or maybe Adam, and then his father after leaving work.

[JackRiddler]

It can take 20 minutes just for the bus to get out of the Port Authority. The tunnel line is often as long.

[MacCruiskeen]

barracuda, thanks for the timeline and for the work that went into it. Thanks too for that very illuminating article by Ryan Lanza's Facebook friend.

So...How many dozen or hundred ordinary people* knew that Ryan Lanza was still alive LONG before the police even started searching his apartment? And why the fuck were they searching his fucking apartment at all when they must have known very shortly after 10 am (remember they had found his ID on the gunman and were all over his mother's house) that he worked for E&Y in Times Sq?? And why were they still letting the media spread that grotesque and dangerous disinformation about Ryan being the dead culprit?

How could the police not have known that Ryan was still alive, within minutes of the discovery of the gunman's body and the ID, AND his mother's body and their investigation of a house that must have been full of evidence of Ryan's current life?

*And when I say "ordinary people", I mean: civilians without the police's huge and sophisticated instant-search-and-locate resources. Remember that we are talking about one of the worst massacres in US history, and remember that local AND state police were IMMEDIATELY involved in the investigation, as well as the FBI. Not to mention the world-famous NYPD.

If we're really expected to believe that they really suspected Ryan was a potentially dangerous accomplice-at-a-distance (!!), then:

(a) Why did the police not even arrive at Ryan's apartment before 2pm?

(b) Why did the FBI start farting around with robots there a full hour later, while THE SUSPECTED DANGEROUS TERRORIST-ACCOMPLICE OMFG!!! was sitting in his office at Ernst&Young, texting his friends, posting to Facebook, chatting to his boss and colleagues, wandering the streets of mid-town Manhattan, waiting for the fucking bus, and then sitting on that fucking bus (crowded? with innocent unsuspecting passengers?) for at least fucking 20 minutes till it arrived in fucking Hoboken?

We're talking hours here. A SUSPECTED DANGEROUS TERRORIST-ACCOMPLICE ON THE LOOSE FOR HOURS OMFG!!! And all over the news, worldwide. And still uncontacted by any police officer from any police force anywhere.

Yes, good work, fish.

I would think he would have called his mother first, or maybe Adam, and then his father after leaving work.

Certainly. And the police were all over his-mother-and-Adam's house! All morning!! It was a crime scene. There was a murder victim lying there! The mother of the alleged multiple-childkiller, "Ryan Lanza, 24"!

Did none of those cops answer the phone when it rang?

Meanwhile, the father (Peter Lanza) was not dead after all. He was alive and well, and being informed of his recent double bereavement by - guess who? Local police? State police? The FBI? No: A reporter in his driveway.... wrong son, but hey,who's poifect? And besides, that reporter was quoting "a senior law enforcement official" quoted by AP and CNN.

Jesus christ almighty. It's unreal. It is literally incredible, the whole yarn.


PS No apologies for the swearing or the sarcastic all-caps or the multiple exclamation marks. No apologies for complete incredulity, not when it's absolutely justified. Anyone who's not incredulous by this point is not paying attention. That's plain common sense.

[MacCruiskeen]

Btw, my active time on this thread is very limited right now, and will be for the next couple of days at least. I have other quite urgent stuff to deal with both on- and offline, plus I really need a rest from this bizarro farrago.

Thanks in advance for any further useful info and rational comment.