Suspect’s writing ‘macabre’ and ‘twisted’

Classmates say English major was a loner who shunned friendly overtures

NBC, MSNBC and news services

Screenplays purportedly written by the suspected shooter in the Virginia Tech massacre offer a glimpse into the macabre and disturbed mindset of the 23-year-old senior Cho Seung-Hui.

The scripts, brought to public attention by a former classmate of the suspect, feature dialogue packed with obscenity and violence.

In the screenplay called "Richard McBeef," a young man accuses his stepfather of murdering his father to get his mother, and then accuses him of pedophilia when the stepfather puts his hand on the young man's leg, apparently in a friendly gesture.

"What are you, a Catholic priest," the character John rails at the older man in the play. "I will not be molested by an aging, balding, pedophilic stepdad named Dick. Get your hands off me, you sicko. Damn you, Catholic priest. Stop it Michael Jackson."

At the end of the play, the frustrated stepfather hits the 13-year-old stepson, killing him.

The plays, made available by Ian McFarlane, a former Virginia Tech student who now works for AOL.com, have been posted on AOL's "newsbloggers" site.

In a blog posted by McFarlane on Tuesday, he says that members of the class were asked to review each other's work.

"When we read Cho's plays, it was like something out of a nightmare," he writes. "The plays had really twisted, macabre violence that used weapons I wouldn't have even thought of."

Looking back, McFarlane says, Cho fit the "stereotype of what one would typically think of as a 'school shooter' — a loner, obsessed with violence, and serious personal problems."

Cho is suspected of carrying out a shooting spree that left 32 people dead on the Virginia Tech campus.

Referred to counseling
As an English major Cho's creative writing was so disturbing that he was referred to the school’s counseling service.

Professor Carolyn Rude, chairwoman of the university’s English department, said she did not personally know the gunman. But she said she spoke with Lucinda Roy, the department’s director of creative writing, who had Cho in one of her classes and described him as “troubled.”

“There was some concern about him,” Rude said. “Sometimes, in creative writing, people reveal things and you never know if it’s creative or if they’re describing things, if they’re imagining things or just how real it might be. But we’re all alert to not ignore things like this.”

She said Cho was referred to the counseling service, but she said she did not know when, or what the outcome was. Rude refused to release any of his writings or his grades, citing privacy laws.

News reports also said that he may have been taking medication for depression, that he was becoming increasingly violent and erratic, and that he left a note in his dorm in which he railed against “rich kids,” “debauchery” and “deceitful charlatans” on campus.

Information hard to come by
Cho arrived in the United States as boy from South Korea in 1992 and was raised in suburban Washington, D.C., officials said. He was living on campus in a different dorm from the one where Monday’s bloodbath began.

Police and university officials offered no clues as to exactly what set him off on the deadliest shooting rampage in modern U.S. history.

“He was a loner, and we’re having difficulty finding information about him,” school spokesman Larry Hincker said.

Rambling grievances
The Chicago Tribune reported on its Web site that he left a note in his dorm room that included a rambling list of grievances. Citing unidentified sources, the Tribune said he had recently shown troubling signs, including setting a fire in a dorm room and stalking some women.

Investigators believe Cho at some point had been taking medication for depression, the newspaper reported.

Cho was a South Korean immigrant who had been in the United States for 15 years and who held a green card signifying his status as a legal permanent U.S. resident, federal officials said Tuesday.

Cho was listed with a home address in Centreville, Va, a suburb of Washington, D.C., not far from Dulles International Airport.

Immigration records maintained by the Department of Homeland Security show that Cho was born in South Korea on Jan. 18, 1984 and entered the United States through Detroit on Sept. 2, 1992. He had last renewed his green card on Oct. 27, 2003.

Purchased a Glock last month
Cho was found with a backpack containing a receipt for a Glock 9mm pistol that he had bought in March. Ballistics tests by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms showed that one gun was used in Monday’s two separate campus attacks that were two hours apart.

Cho’s fingerprints were found on the two handguns used in both shootings, said two law enforcement officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because the information had not been announced. The serial numbers on the two weapons had been filed off, the officials said.

As a permanent legal resident of the United States, Cho was eligible to buy a handgun unless he had been convicted of any felony criminal charges, a federal immigration official said.

For Columbine survivors, anger and resignation

Those touched by Columbine violence say few lessons have been learned

Associated Press

When the topic turns to school violence, Tom Mauser usually lectures about guns.

Mauser became a national advocate of gun control after his 15-year-old son, Daniel, was among those slain in the April 20, 1999, shootings at Columbine High School.

But resignation punctuated Mauser’s remarks Monday when he learned of the killings at Virginia Tech.

“I am not going to just say gun laws are going to take care of this,” he said.

“I think my primary thought is about anger. Anger and suicide. Why do we have so many people who think they have to take others’ (lives) with them when they take their own?”

Other Columbine victims and experts on school violence expressed similar thoughts about the Virginia killings.

Brooks Brown, a former Columbine student who knew the gunmen and repeatedly tried to warn authorities about threats they had made, said the Virginia slayings didn’t surprise him.

“Once you’ve reached the point where you have lost everything it is not hard to be pushed in any direction,” he said of campus shooters.

Brian Rohrbough, whose son, Danny, 15, died at Columbine, blames school shootings on a society that tolerates, even glorifies, violence.

“We teach students that anything you want to do is up to you and you can decide whether anything is right or wrong,” he said.

Incomplete probe?
Rohrbough said the investigation of the Columbine tragedy was incomplete and left unanswered questions about the psychology of school shooters.

Authorities did learn that Columbine killers Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold played violent games, made violent videos at school, and were the victims of bullying because they befriended the Trench Coach Mafia, a group of students who clashed with school athletes.

Rohrbough and others have fought for public disclosure of depositions given by the teens’ parents, Wayne and Kathy Harris and Tom and Susan Klebold.

They argue the depositions could provide valuable insights into the home lives of the two teens, who killed 12 fellow students and a teacher before killing themselves.

But a federal judge two weeks ago ordered the depositions sealed for 20 years.

“That is why we were fighting so hard to get that information — because we need to know what was going on inside the heads of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold,” said Delbert Elliott, director of the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence at the University of Colorado.

‘The main motive is revenge’
Killing others before committing suicide is not a new phenomenon, though the Virginia Tech numbers are shocking, said Tom McIntyre, coordinator of the Graduate Program in Behavior Disorders at Hunter College in New York.

“Freud said homicide is just suicide turned inside out,” said McIntyre, who began studying school violence after Columbine. “The main motive is revenge.”

In the past, a pre-suicide killing usually involved a specific target — as in the case of a husband finding his wife with a lover, Elliot said.

The victims in the Columbine and Virginia Tech shootings appeared to be random targets, he said.

“I don’t know how many times we have to go through things like this before we can try to learn what is going on,” Elliot said. “I think there is an element of wanting to go out and creating a huge media effect, although that is only a part of what is going on.”

Virginia Tech gunman left note

By Aamer Madhani, Tribune national correspondent


The suspected gunman in the Virginia Tech shooting rampage, Cho Seung-Hui, was a troubled 23-year-old senior from South Korea who investigators believe left an invective-filled note in his dorm room, sources say.

The note included a rambling list of grievances, according to sources. They said Cho also died with the words "Ismail Ax" in red ink on one of his arms.

Cho had shown recent signs of violent, aberrant behavior, according to an investigative source, including setting a fire in a dorm room and allegedly stalking some women.

A note believed to have been written by Cho was found in his dorm room that railed against "rich kids," "debauchery" and "deceitful charlatans" on campus.

Cho was an English major whose creative writing was so disturbing that he was referred to the school's counseling service, the Associated Press reported.

Professor Carolyn Rude, chairwoman of the university's English department, said she did not personally know the gunman. But she said she spoke with Lucinda Roy, the department's director of creative writing, who had Cho in one of her classes and described him as "troubled."

"There was some concern about him," Rude said. "Sometimes, in creative writing, people reveal things and you never know if it's creative or if they're describing things, if they're imagining things or just how real it might be. But we're all alert to not ignore things like this."

She said Cho was referred to the counseling service, but she said she did not know when, or what the outcome was.

Cho, from Centreville, Va., a rapidly growing suburb of Washington, D.C., came to the United States in 1992, an investigative source said. He was a legal permanent resident.

His family runs a dry cleaning business and he has a sister who attended Princeton University, according to the source.

Investigators believe Cho at some point had been taking medication for depression. They are examining Cho's computer for more evidence.

The gunman's family lived in an off-white, two-story town house in Centreville.

"He was very quiet, always by himself," neighbor Abdul Shash said of the gunman. Shash said the gunman spent a lot of his free time playing basketball, and wouldn't respond if someone greeted him. He described the family as quiet.

Marshall Main, who lives across the street, said the family had lived in the townhouse for several years.

According to court records, Virginia Tech Police issued a speeding ticket to Cho on April 7 for going 44 mph in a 25 mph zone, and he had a court date set for May 23.

Cho was found among the 31 dead found in an engineering hall. Police said the victims laid over four classrooms and a stairwell.

"He was a loner," said Larry Hincker, a university spokesman, who added that investigators are having some difficulty unearthing information about him.

A law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the information had not been announced, said Cho was carrying a backpack that contained receipts for a March purchase of a Glock 9 mm pistol.

Ballistics tests by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms showed that one gun was used in Monday's two separate campus attacks that were two hours apart.

As a permanent legal resident of the United States, Cho was eligible to buy a handgun unless he had been convicted of any felony criminal charges, a federal immigration official said.

Police said Cho killed 30 people in a Virginia Tech engineering building Monday morning and then killed himself.

Another two students were shot to death two hours earlier in a dorm room on the opposite side of the university's sprawling 2,600-acre campus, bringing the day's death toll to 33.

Students at Harper Hall, the campus dormitory where Cho lived, said they had little interaction with him and no insight into what might have motivated the attack.

Officials said the same gun was used in the attack in the dorm room and the larger-scale classroom killings.

"At this time, the evidence does not conclusively identify Cho as the gunman at both locations," said Col. W. Steven Flaherty, superintendent of Virginia State Police.

All classes at Virginia Tech will be closed for the remainder of the week, said school President Charles Steger.

'Horrible coincidence' of two gunmen

Fairfax County, Va., police investigators said today that Cho was a 2003 graduate of the same high school attended by an 18-year-old who went on a shooting rampage last year at a Virginia police station, killing two officers.

Michael Kennedy, armed with an AK-47, fired more than 70 rounds in the parking lot of the Sully District police station on May 8, killing Det. Vicky Armel and Master Police Officer Michael Garbarino. Kennedy was shot to death by police.

Cho and Kennedy lived in Centreville and graduated from Westfield High School, said Officer Courtney Thibault of the Fairfax County Police Department. She said Cho graduated four years ahead of Kennedy.

Once Cho's identify was released by police in Blacksburg, Thibault said Fairfax County police launched an investigation to determine if there was any connection between the two shooters. She said they found nothing tying the two young men together.

"It's just a horrible coincidence," she said. "It's hard to believe."

Kennedy's father, Brian Kennedy, was charged earlier this month with helping his son obtain the AK-47 used in the rampage. Federal prosecutors claim he was illegally in possession of a small arsenal of weapons, including rifles, shotguns, handguns and more than 2,500 rounds of ammunition.

Campus holds convocation

The new details were revealed as the university underwent a day of mourning.

Thousands of people gathered in the basketball arena, and when it filled up, thousands more filed into the football stadium, for a memorial service for the victims. President Bush and the first lady attended.

"Laura and I have come to Blacksburg today with hearts full of sorrow," he said in six-minute remarks. "This is a day of mourning for the Virginia Tech community and it is a day of sadness for our entire nation.

Steger received a 30-second standing ovation, despite bitter complaints from parents and students that the university should have locked down the campus immediately after the first burst of gunfire. Steger expressed hope that "we will awaken from this horrible nightmare."

Many students showed up for the memorial service hours ahead of time, some in tears or carrying flowers. There was already an overflow crowd at the arena by early afternoon, and many people arriving were turned away.

Some victims' names released

Among the dead was a professor, Liviu Librescu. Students who were in Librescu's engineering class at Norris Hall told the Tribune late Monday that the professor tried to protect the students in his class when they realized a gunmen was loose in the building.

Alec Calhoun was in Librescu's solid mechanics engineering class when gunfire erupted in the room next door. He said Librescu, went to the door and pushed himself against it in case the shooter tried to come in.

Librescu, an Israeli, was born in Romania and was known internationally for his research in aeronautical engineering.

Also killed were:

- Ross Abdallah Alameddine, 20, of Saugus, Mass., according to his mother, Lynnette Alameddine.

- Christopher James Bishop, 35, according to Darmstadt University of Technology in Germany, where he helped run an exchange program.

- Ryan Clark, 22, of Martinez, Ga., biology and English major, according to Columbia County Coroner Vernon Collins.

- Jocelyn Couture-Nowak, a French instructor, according to her husband, Jerzy Nowak, the head of the horticulture department at Virginia Tech.

- Daniel Perez Cueva, 21, killed in his French class, according to his mother, Betty Cueva, of Peru.

- Kevin Granata, age unknown, engineering science and mechanics professor, according to Ishwar K. Puri, the head of the engineering science and mechanics department.

- Caitlin Hammaren, 19, of Westtown, N.Y., a sophomore majoring in international studies and French, according to Minisink Valley, N.Y., school officials who spoke with Hammaren's family.

- Jeremy Herbstritt, 27, of Bellefonte, Pa., according to Penn State University, his alma mater and his father's employer.

- Emily Jane Hilscher, a 19-year-old freshman from Woodville, according to Rappahannock County Administrator John W. McCarthy, a family friend.

- Jarrett L. Lane, 22, of Narrows, Va., according to Riffe's Funeral Service Inc. in Narrows, Va.

- Matthew J. La Porte, 20, a freshman from Dumont, N.J., according to Dumont Police Chief Brian Venezio.

- G.V. Loganathan, 51, civil and environmental engineering professor, according to his brother G.V. Palanivel.

- Daniel O'Neil, 22, according to close friend Steve Craveiro and according to Eric Cardenas of Connecticut College, where O'Neil's father, Bill, is director of major gifts.

- Juan Ramon Ortiz, a 26-year-old graduate student in engineering from Bayamon, Puerto Rico, according to his wife, Liselle Vega Cortes.

- Mary Karen Read, 19, of Annandale, Va. according to her aunt, Karen Kuppinger, of Rochester, N.Y.

- Reema J. Samaha, 18, a freshman from Centreville, Va., according to her family.

Family background of Virginia Tech gunman

President comforts Virginia Tech after student kills 32 and himself

MSNBC and NBC News

President Bush joined Virginia’s governor and dozens of other state and national officials Tuesday to bring comfort to the students, faculty and staff of Virginia Tech a day after a 23-year-old student shot 32 people to death Monday before killing himself.

“Laura and I have come to Blacksburg today with hearts full of sorrow,” the president said. “This is a day of sadness for our entire nation.”

The president and Gov. Timothy Kaine, who flew back overnight from a trade mission in Asia, decided to join a convocation for a university and town reeling after the worst mass shooting in American history. So many people showed up for the session in the school’s basketball arena that the overflow was sent to Lane Field, the university’s 50,000-seat football stadium.

“I hope you know that people all over this country are thinking about you and asking God to provide comfort for all who have been affected,” Bush said.

Kaine said the world had been inspired by the response of the campus and the surrounding community.

“It’s not just you that needs to maintain that spirit, but the world needs you to,” he said. “The world saw you and saw you respond in a way that builds community. The world needs that example before it.”

Zenobia Hikes, the university’s vice president for student affairs, captured that spirit when she said: “What has happened to these beloved members of our family has brought us closer together in our grief and our shared sense of disbelief.”

She added: “We will eventually recover, but we will never ever forget.”

Police: Bomb threat found
At least 26 people were taken to hospitals, some of them seriously injured. after Monday's shooting. Twelve students remained in hospitals in stable condition Tuesday, and most were expected to be released soon, NBC News’ Michelle Kosinski reported from Montgomery Regional Medical Center.

Police identified the shooter as Cho Seung-Hui (pronounced Choh Suhng-whee), of Centreville, Va., a resident alien who immigrated to the United States from South Korea in 1992, who was a senior in the English Department at Virginia Tech.

Police sought a search warrant for Cho’s room in Harper Residence Hall, saying in a court affidavit that they had found a “bomb threat note ... directed at engineering school department buildings” near his body, The Washington Post reported on its Web site. “The note is connected with the shooting incident,” the affidavit said.

Police said that there had been bomb threats on campus over the past two weeks but that they had not determined a link to the shootings.

After the shootings, all campus entrances were closed, and classes were canceled for the rest of the week. The university set up a spot for families to reunite with their children.

Student alarmed instructors
Instructors, meanwhile, said Cho’s creative writing was so disturbing that he was referred to the school’s counseling service.

Professor Carolyn Rude, chairwoman of the university’s English department, said she did not personally know the gunman. But she said she spoke with Lucinda Roy, the department’s director of creative writing, who had Cho in one of her classes and described him as “troubled.”

“There was some concern about him,” Rude told The Associated Press. “Sometimes, in creative writing, people reveal things and you never know if it’s creative or if they’re describing things, if they’re imagining things or just how real it might be. But we’re all alert to not ignore things ike this.”

She said Cho was referred to the counseling service, but she said she did not know when or what the outcome was. Rude refused to release any of his writings or his grades, citing privacy laws.

Otherwise, Cho was a young man who apparently left little impression in the Virginia Tech community. Few of his fellow residents of Harper Hall said they knew the gunman, who kept to himself.

“He can’t have been an outgoing kind of person,” Meredith Daly, 19, of Danville, Va., told MSNBC.com’s Bill Dedman.

‘Very quiet, always by himself’
In Centreville, a suburb of Washington where Cho’s family lived in an off-white, two-story townhouse, people who knew Cho concurred that he kept to himself.

“He was very quiet, always by himself,” said Abdul Shash, a neighbor. Shash said Cho spent a lot of his free time playing basketball and would not respond if someone greeted him. He described the family as quiet.

Rod Wells, a postal worker, said that characterization of Cho did not fit the man’s parents, who, he described as “always polite, always kind to me, very quiet, always smiling. Just sweet, sweet people.”

“I talk to particularly everybody here,” Wells told NBC News. “So I guess nobody had any intimation that he was like that. I don’t think the parents did, because they were quite the opposite.”

South Korea’s Foreign Ministry expressed its condolences, saying that there was no known motive for the shootings and that South Korea hoped the tragedy would not “stir up racial prejudice or confrontation.”

Ballistics evidence points to student
The bloodbath ended Monday morning with Cho’s suicide, bringing the death toll from two separate shootings — first at the dormitory, then in a classroom building — to 33 and stamping the campus in the picturesque Blue Ridge Mountains with unspeakable tragedy.

Wielding two handguns and carrying multiple clips of ammunition, Cho opened fire about 7:15 a.m. on the fourth floor of West Ambler Johnston, a high-rise coeducational dorm, then stormed Norris Hall, a classroom building a half-mile away on the other side of the 2,600-acre campus. Some of the doors at Norris Hall were found chained from the inside, apparently by the gunman.

Col. Steve Flaherty, superintendent of the Virginia State Police, said it was reasonable to assume that Cho was the shooter in both attacks but that the link was not yet definitive.

“There’s no evidence of any accomplice at either event, but we’re exploring the possibility,” he said.

Two law enforcement officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because the information had not been officially announced, said Cho’s fingerprints were found on the two guns used in the shootings. The serial numbers had been filed off, the officials said.

Law enforcement officials told NBC News that Cho was carrying a backpack that contained receipts for the purchase of a Glock 9mm pistol in March.

As a permanent legal resident, Cho was eligible to buy a handgun unless he had been convicted of any felony criminal charges. Immigration officials told NBC affiliate WSLS-TV of Roanoke that they would not have approved renewal of his green card in late 2003 if a criminal record had shown up.

‘He didn’t say a single word’
As the gunman made his way through Norris Hall, students jumped from windows in panic.

Trey Perkins, who was sitting in a German class in Norris Hall, told MSNBC-TV on Monday that the gunman barged into the room about 9:50 a.m. and opened fire for about a minute and a half, squeezing off 20 to 30 shots.

The gunman first shot the professor in the head and then fired on the students, Perkins said, who added: “He didn’t say a single word the whole time.”

“He didn’t say, ‘Get down.’ He didn’t say anything. He just started shooting,” said Perkins, 20, of Yorktown, Va., a sophomore studying mechanical engineering. “I got on the ground, and I was just thinking, like, there’s no way I’m going to survive this. All I could keep thinking of was my mom.”

Students angry at university’s response
Students said there were no public-address announcements after the first shots. Many said they learned of the first shooting in an e-mail message that arrived shortly before the gunman struck again.

University President Charles Steger defended the university’s conduct, saying authorities believed that the shooting at the dorm was a domestic dispute and mistakenly thought the gunman had fled the campus.

Steger emphasized that the university closed off the dorm after the first attack and decided to rely on e-mail and other electronic means to spread the word, but he said that with 11,000 people driving onto campus first thing in the morning, it was difficult to get the word out.

“We can only make decisions based on the information you had at the time. You don’t have hours to reflect on it,” Steger said.

Va. Tech gunman writings raised concerns

By ADAM GELLER, AP National Writer

The gunman suspected of carrying out the Virginia Tech massacre that left 33 people dead was identified Tuesday as an English major whose creative writing was so disturbing that he was referred to the school's counseling service.

News reports also said that he may have been taking medication for depression, that he was becoming increasingly violent and erratic, and that he left a note in his dorm in which he railed against "rich kids," "debauchery" and "deceitful charlatans" on campus.

Cho Seung-Hui, a 23-year-old senior, arrived in the United States as boy from South Korea in 1992 and was raised in suburban Washington, D.C., officials said. He was living on campus in a different dorm from the one where Monday's bloodbath began.

Police and university officials offered no clues as to exactly what set him off on the deadliest shooting rampage in modern U.S. history.

"He was a loner, and we're having difficulty finding information about him," school spokesman Larry Hincker said.

Professor Carolyn Rude, chairwoman of the university's English department, said she did not personally know the gunman. But she said she spoke with Lucinda Roy, the department's director of creative writing, who had Cho in one of her classes and described him as "troubled."

"There was some concern about him," Rude said. "Sometimes, in creative writing, people reveal things and you never know if it's creative or if they're describing things, if they're imagining things or just how real it might be. But we're all alert to not ignore things like this."

She said Cho was referred to the counseling service, but she said she did not know when, or what the outcome was. Rude refused to release any of his writings or his grades, citing privacy laws.

The Chicago Tribune reported on its Web site that he left a note in his dorm room that included a rambling list of grievances. Citing unidentified sources, the Tribune said he had recently shown troubling signs, including setting a fire in a dorm room and stalking some women.

ABC, citing law enforcement sources, reported that the note, several pages long, explains Cho's actions and says, "You caused me to do this."

Investigators believe Cho at some point had been taking medication for depression, the Tribune reported.

The rampage consisted of two attacks, more than two hours apart — first at a dormitory, where two people were killed, then inside a classroom building, where 31 people, including Cho, died after being locked inside, Virginia State Police said. Cho committed suicide; two guns were found in the classroom building.

One law enforcement official said Cho's backpack contained a receipt for a March purchase of a Glock 9 mm pistol. Cho held a green card, meaning he was a legal, permanent resident, federal officials said. That meant he was eligible to buy a handgun unless he had been convicted of a felony.

Investigators stopped short of saying Cho carried out both attacks. But ballistics tests show one gun was used in both, Virginia State Police said.

And two law enforcement officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because the information had not been announced, said Cho's fingerprints were found on both guns. The serial numbers on the two weapons had been filed off, the officials said.

Col. Steve Flaherty, superintendent of the Virginia State Police, said it was reasonable to assume that Cho was the shooter in both attacks but that the link was not yet definitive. "There's no evidence of any accomplice at either event, but we're exploring the possibility," he said.

Officials said Cho graduated from a public high school in Chantilly, Va., in 2003. His family lived in an off-white, two-story townhouse in Centreville, Va.

"He was very quiet, always by himself," neighbor Abdul Shash said. Shash said Cho spent a lot of his free time playing basketball and would not respond if someone greeted him. He described the family as quiet.

Virginia Tech Police issued a speeding ticket to Cho on April 7 for going 44 mph in a 25 mph zone, and he had a court date set for May 23.

South Korea expressed its condolences, and said it hoped that the tragedy would not "stir up racial prejudice or confrontation."

"We are in shock beyond description," said Cho Byung-se, a Foreign Ministry official handling North American affairs.

A memorial service was planned for the victims Tuesday afternoon at the university, and President Bush planned to attend. Gov. Tim Kaine was flying back to Virginia from Tokyo for the gathering.

Classes were canceled for the rest of the week.

Many students were leaving town quickly, lugging pillows, sleeping bags and backpacks down the sidewalks.

Jessie Ferguson, 19, a freshman from Arlington, left Newman Hall and headed for her car with tears streaming down her red cheeks.

"I'm still kind of shaky," she said. "I had to pump myself up just to kind of come out of the building. I was going to come out, but it took a little bit of 'OK, it's going to be all right. There's lots of cops around.'"

Although she wanted to be with friends, she wanted her family more. "I just don't want to be on campus," she said.

The first deadly attack was at the dormitory around 7:15 a.m., but some students said they didn't get their first warning about a danger on campus until two hours later, in an e-mail at 9:26 a.m., around the time the second attack began.

Two students told NBC's "Today" show they were unaware of the dorm shooting when they walked into Norris Hall for a German class where the gunman later opened fire.

The victims in Norris Hall were found in four classrooms and a stairwell, Flaherty said. Cho was found dead in one of those classrooms, he said.

Derek O'Dell, his arm in a cast after being shot, described a shooter who fired away in "eerily silence" with "no specific target — just taking out anybody he could."

After the gunman left the room, students could hear him shooting other people down the hall. O'Dell said he and other students barricaded the door so the shooter couldn't get back in — though he later tried.

"After he couldn't get the door open he tried shooting it open ... but the gunshots were blunted by the door," O'Dell said.

Virginia Tech President Charles Steger emphasized that the university closed off the dorm after the first attack. He said that before the e-mail was sent, the university began telephoning resident advisers in the dorms and sent people to knock on doors to warn them.

"We can only make decisions based on the information you had at the time. You don't have hours to reflect on it," Steger said.

Until Monday, the deadliest shooting in modern U.S. history was in Killeen, Texas, in 1991, when George Hennard plowed his pickup truck into a Luby's Cafeteria and shot 23 people to death, then himself.

Previously, the deadliest campus shooting in U.S. history was a rampage that took place in 1966 at the University of Texas at Austin, where Charles Whitman climbed the clock tower and opened fire with a rifle from the 28th-floor observation deck. He killed 16 people before he was shot to death by police.

Virginia Tech reports shooting, 1 killed

Associated Press

A shooting at a Virginia Tech dorm Monday left one person dead and one wounded, a state government official with knowledge of the case told The Associated Press.

A gunman was "loose on the campus" the state university said on its Web site. The advisory said a shooting had occurred at a residence hall and that students should stay in their homes away from windows.

"There's just a lot of commotion. It's hard to tell exactly what's going on," said student Jason Anthony Smith, 19, who lives in the building where shooting took place.

The shooting was reported at West Ambler Johnston Hall.

Officials ordered the campus closed, the second time in less than a year the 26,000-student campus was shut because of a shooting.

In August 2006, the opening day of classes was canceled and the campus closed when an escaped jail inmate allegedly killed a hospital guard off campus and fled to the Tech area. A sheriff's deputy involved in the manhunt was killed on a trail just off campus.

The accused gunman, William Morva, faces capital murder charges.