LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Lake County officials on Friday directed flags on all county buildings to be lowered to half-staff through Tuesday, Dec. 18, in honor of the victims of Friday’s deadly school shooting in Connecticut.
The incident at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown has claimed the lives of 27 people, including 20 elementary school students, according to police.
The seven adults killed included the school’s principal Dawn Hocksprung and the shooter himself, identified as 20-year-old Adam Lanza, law enforcement reported. Lanza had fatally shot his mother before going to the school.
President Barack Obama addressed the nation on Friday.
“The majority of those who died today were children – beautiful little kids between the ages of 5 and 10 years old,” he said. “They had their entire lives ahead of them – birthdays, graduations, weddings, kids of their own. Among the fallen were also teachers – men and women who devoted their lives to helping our children fulfill their dreams.”
The president added, “So our hearts are broken today – for the parents and grandparents, sisters and brothers of these little children, and for the families of the adults who were lost. Our hearts are broken for the parents of the survivors as well, for as blessed as they are to have their children home tonight, they know that their children’s innocence has been torn away from them too early, and there are no words that will ease their pain.”
The Connecticut shooting has been reported as the second-worst in the nation’s history, surpassed only by the Virginia Tech shooting of April 2007, which claimed 32 lives. The 1999 Columbine shooting resulted in the deaths of 12 students, one teacher and the two suspects.
Newtown is located in southwestern Connecticut, about sixty miles from New York City, with a population of nearly 28,000 people.
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