Finalist: The Hartford Courant, by Staff
For its complete and sensitive coverage of the shooting massacre at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., that killed 20 children and 6 adults, using digital tools as well as traditional reporting to tell the story quickly while portraying the stunned community’s grief.
Nominated Work
December 14, 2012
The Courant’s coverage of the shootings at Sandy Hook started with a simple online post about an incident on Dickinson Drive. But within minutes, as Courant reporters and editors raced to the scene and began contacting sources, the scope of the event began to unfold. Over the next 10 hours, there were more than 180 revisions to the report online before the print version of the story went to press.
This chronology shows some of the major developments in that online process.
Click on each link to access a selection of the reports (recorded in 5-minute increments):
9:55 a.m.: State police respond to an incident on Dickinson Drive, where Sandy Hook School is located.
http://www.courant.com/news/breaking/hc-police-responding-to-incident-in-newtown-rev-1,0,2520513.story
10:05 a.m.: Sources confirm there has been a shooting at the school and that a number of people have been injured.
http://www.courant.com/news/breaking/hc-police-responding-to-incident-in-newtown-rev-8,0,2979272.story
11:10 a.m.: Report of multiple shooting victims, with the shooter dead; reporters at the scene describe crying students being led from the school.
http://www.courant.com/news/breaking/hc-police-responding-to-incident-in-newtown-rev-39,0,5576419.story
11:40 a.m.: Multiple fatalities reported; children are among those who have been shot.
http://www.courant.com/news/breaking/hc-police-responding-to-incident-in-newtown-rev-48,0,5641955.story
11:50 a.m.: Sources confirm children are among the dead. Reporting from the scene includes frustrated parents and frightened children.
http://www.courant.com/news/breaking/hc-police-responding-to-incident-in-newtown-rev-58,0,5773028.story
12:45 p.m.: At least 20 people have been shot. An entire classroom of children is unaccounted for.
http://www.courant.com/news/breaking/hc-police-responding-to-incident-in-newtown-rev-71,0,5576415.story
1:25 p.m.: Number of dead at 27. Gov. Dannel P. Malloy on scene.
http://www.courant.com/news/breaking/hc-police-responding-to-incident-in-newtown-rev-79,0,6100711.story
2:55 p.m.: Second scene discovered, another body found – later identified as the shooter’s mother.
http://www.courant.com/news/breaking/hc-police-responding-to-incident-in-newtown-rev-102,0,193191.story
3:20 p.m.: Other media outlets identifying shooter as Ryan Lanza, but local sources do not confirm.
http://www.courant.com/news/breaking/hc-police-responding-to-incident-in-newtown-rev-112,0,324264.story
3:30 p.m.: The President addresses the nation.
http://www.courant.com/news/breaking/hc-police-responding-to-incident-in-newtown-rev-116,0,586412.story
4:30 p.m.: Conflicting reports about the identity of the shooter.
http://www.courant.com/news/breaking/hc-police-responding-to-incident-in-newtown-rev-134,0,717484.story
7:10 p.m.: Local officials correctly identify shooter as Adam Lanza; more details emerge about shooter’s weapons and clothing.
http://www.courant.com/news/breaking/hc-police-responding-to-incident-in-newtown-rev-162,0,979629.story
December 14, 2012
December 14, 2012
This component will be re-posted as the new pulitzer.org continues to evolve.
December 15, 2012
Killed Mother Before Shooting, And Killed Himself As Police Moved In
By Matthew Kaufman
A gunman with a mind for destruction turned the idyllic Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown into a scene of horrific chaos and carnage Friday morning, killing 20 children and six adults, including the school's principal, in the worst shooting at a primary school in U.S. history.
The shooter also killed himself inside the school, authorities said, and his mother was later found dead at her home 2 miles away.
The shootings took place in two first-grade classrooms around 9:30 a.m., sources said, and one witness said she believed as many as 100 rounds had been fired. All of the adults and 18 of the children were pronounced dead at the school. Two more students died at a hospital. A single victim was injured but not killed.
State police sources identified the shooter as Adam Lanza, 20. When Lanza was found — dead in a hallway of a self-inflicted gunshot wound — he was carrying his brother Ryan Lanza's identification, which initially led to confusion about his identity, police said.
Adam Lanza was dressed in black fatigues and brought two weapons into the school, police sources said: a Glock and a Sig Sauer, both pistols. A .223-caliber rifle was found in his car in the school parking lot, sources said.
Principal Dawn Hochsprung, 47, was among those killed.
"She died protecting the children that she adored so much. It's just incredibly shocking,'' said Gerald Stomski, first selectman in Woodbury, where Hochsprung lived. Hochsprung had been the principal in the Bethlehem and Woodbury school district before taking the job in Newtown two years ago.
Police have not confirmed the identities of the other victims, but they are believed to include a school psychologist and at least one teacher. Sandy Hook has more than 600 students from kindergarten through fourth grade.
As news of the massacre spread through the typically quiet Fairfield County town, panicked parents clogged roads as they streamed to the school in search of their young sons and daughters. Police evacuated the children to a nearby firehouse, and tearful parents were led into the building. Most came out relieved, clutching and caressing their children. A few came out empty-handed and grief-stricken.
Later in the day, authorities set up a makeshift morgue in the school and took photographs of the young victims to show to parents to make a positive identification.
The horror of the shooting reverberated far beyond the school. Impromptu vigils were held across the state. In Washington, D.C., House Speaker John Boehner ordered flags at the Capitol to be flown at half-staff. And at the White House, a visibly emotional President Barack Obama offered the nation's condolences. "Our hearts are broken today," he said.
"This evening, Michelle and I will ... hug our children a little tighter and tell them that we love them," Obama said. "But there are families in Connecticut who cannot do that tonight."
Vanessa Bajraliu, a 9-year-old fourth grader, heard the shots.
"I saw policemen — lots of policemen in the hallway with guns," she said. "The police took us out of the school. We were told to hold each others' hands and to close our eyes. We opened our eyes when we were outside."
Her brother, Mergim Bajraliu, 17, a senior at Newtown High School, was at his nearby home when he heard shots, he said. He went to a neighbor's house.
"Then we heard sirens," he said.
He rushed to the school on foot and saw a girl being carried out, he said. She looked badly injured. Another girl had blood on her face, he said.
Bajraliu soon found his sister and took her away from the scene.
Parent Richard Wilford said his Sandy Hook second-grader, Richie, heard what he described as "pans falling" when gunshots rang out. He said that his son told him that his teacher went to check on the noise, then returned to the classroom, locked the door and told the students to stand in the corner.
"What does a parent think about coming to a school where there's a shooting … It's the most terrifying moment of a parent's life … you have no idea," said Wilford.
Alexis Wasik, 8, a third-grader at the school, said police checked everybody inside the school before they were escorted to the firehouse.
"We had to walk with a partner," she said.
One child leaving the school said there was shattered glass everywhere. A police officer ran into the classroom and told them to run outside and keep going until they reached the firehouse.
Audra Barth, who was walking away from the school with her first-grade son and third-grade daughter, said a teacher took first-graders into the restroom after bullets came through the window.
Brendan Murray, a 9-year-old fourth grader, said he was in the gym with his class when he heard "lots of banging." He said the teachers put the students in a nearby closet where they stayed for about 15 minutes before police officers told them to leave the building.
The boy said the students ran down a hallway where there were police at every door. "Lots of people were crying," he said.
But as reporters converged on the school, the children generally seemed more composed than their parents.
The first police on the scene instantly recognized the gravity of the crime and "asked for every resource we could get," Newtown Police Lt. George Sinko said. On- and off-duty state troopers raced to Newtown, including tactical units, K9 units and the bomb squad. The state police helicopter was put in the air, and before long agents with the FBI and ATF were headed to Newtown as well. No officer fired a weapon at the school, police said.
State police Lt. Paul Vance said the first goal was evacuating the school and bringing the children to a staging area to reunite them with their families. Students described being ushered from their classrooms hand-in-hand, with their eyes closed. Room-by-room, police extracted the students, scurrying them through hallways and outside toward the firehouse.
As the school was cleared, heavily armed police swept the building at least four times looking for victims, evidence and the possibility of additional shooters. Lanza is believed to have acted alone, and the killings were limited to two rooms in one section of the school.
With a tentative identification, police also descended on the nearby home of Nancy J. Lanza, Adam's mother. Inside, sources said, they found Nancy Lanza's body. Police in New Jersey also went to the home of Ryan Lanza — Adam's brother and the man authorities originally thought was the shooter. Ryan Lanza was questioned, but there are no indications he is suspected in the case.
All Newtown schools — and schools in several surrounding towns— were locked down Friday morning. Many local businesses closed. Outside one store was a handwritten sign: "Say A Prayer."
"This is most definitely the worst thing experienced here in town," Sinko said. "But for now, we're concerned about the families of the victims."
But there are concerns for the police as well. Vance said state police are providing crisis counseling for the first responders at the school — those who rushed into the classrooms to an incomprehensible sight.
"This was a very tragic, horrific scene that they encountered," he said.
Adam Lanza was a 2010 graduate of Newtown High School. Andrew Lapple, who sat next to Lanza in homeroom, described him as a skinny, reserved kid "who never really talked at all."
Lapple said he played Little League baseball with Lanza and remembers he wasn't very good. Instead, Lanza was more of a "tech-geek," he said.
"He was always carrying around his laptop holding onto it real tight,'' Lapple said. "He walked down the halls against the wall almost like he was afraid of people. He was definitely kind of strange but you'd never think he'd do something like this."
One former classmate of Adam Lanza remembered him as quiet.
Kateleen Soy, now an undergraduate at Hofstra University in New York, said she was in Lanza's seventh-grade class at St. Rose of Lima School in Newtown.
She recalled that he joined the class after the school year began and left before school got out for the summer.
"He was really shy, really painfully shy," Soy said."He was a little hard to talk to."
After he left St. Rose, she didn't recall seeing him again until she spotted him in a hall while they were students at Newtown High School.
"I wanted people to know he wasn't always a monster," Soy said. "He became one, but he wasn't always that way."
Police have given no indication of what Lanza's motive may have been and it is not clear what his connection was to the elementary school. There have been reports that Nancy Lanza worked at the school, but that has not been confirmed.
Marsha Moskowitz, a former bus driver in town, remembered the Lanza boys.
"You know the trouble kids, and you figure, 'Pfft, that one's going to be trouble.' But I never would have thought that about them," she said.
Moskowitz ran into the boys' mother a couple of weeks ago and exchanged pleasantries, she said.
Adam Lanza's grandmother, Dorothy Hanson, 78, told The Associated Press she was too distraught to speak when reached by phone at her home in Brooksville, Fla.
"I just don't know, and I can't make a comment right now," Hanson said in a shaky voice as she started to cry. She declined to comment further and hung up.
Friends and neighbors said Nancy Lanza, 52, was a kind woman with a sense of humor. Slender, with short hair, Lanza was a fixture at neighborhood events such as the Labor Day parade, and had a special interest in Christmas lights.
Lanza lived on Yogananda Street, in a hilly, affluent neighborhood in the east end of town. Neighbors call it a children- and family-friendly place, a description backed up by the kids riding their bikes and the folks walking their dogs despite the crush of television trucks and reporters waiting near the Lanza home.
Lanza's friend and neighbor Rhonda Cullens fought back tears Friday afternoon in the doorway of her home on Founders Lane, just around the corner from the Lanza residence.
She said she met Nancy Lanza playing bunco, a popular dice game, with a group of women in the neighborhood, but she hadn't seen her for years since she stopped playing with the group. "She was just a sweet, caring person," Cullens said.
Friends and relatives of school personnel spent anxious hours waiting to hear the fate of their loved ones.
When Janet Vollmer, a Sandy Hook kindergarten teacher, returned to her Liberty Street home about 4 p.m. Friday, her grown son and a nearby neighbor were there to greet her. The neighbor ran over and hugged Vollmer.
"I kept hearing it might have been a kindergarten teacher," the neighbor said. "I was hoping it wasn't her. I was shaking at work."
Students at nearby Newtown High School on Berkshire Road were stunned when they learned of the shootings.
Senior Alex Buttery went to Sandy Hook Elementary. "I know the teachers. I'm just wondering who it is," she said.
Newtown United Methodist Church opened its doors about noon after ministers heard of the tragedy. Brad Tefft, a bereavement minister at the church, said Newtown is a close-knit community.
"The closeness became more apparent when you see a tragedy like this," he said. "We all feel for the families, and the kids and the teachers. It's part of who we are. It's part of the fabric of what this community is like. When something like this happens it tears at all our heartstrings."
The toll of Friday's shooting brought memories and comparisons to other tragedies, including the shootings in Columbine and Aurora in Colorado, the Petit family killings in Cheshire, and the 9/11 attacks.
Friday's massacre may be the largest school shooting of young children in the world, said Larry Barton, a professor at The American College in Pennsylvania whose three decades of research includes studying violence in workplaces, public spaces and schools.
Mass school shootings have often targeted high school or college students, he said.
"This is among the most diabolical crimes, to kill kindergarten-age children," Barton said. "It's very rare."
Gov. Dannel P. Malloy put it another way.
"Evil visited this community today," he said.
Associated Press reports are included. Staff writers David Owens, Dave Altimari, Josh Kovner, Marc O'Connell, Chris Keating, Samaia Hernandez, Denise Buffa, Steve Goode, Brian Dowling, Hilda Munoz, Jenny Wilson, Vanessa de la Torre, Jenna Carlesso, Ken Gosselin, Bernie Davidow, Naedine Hazell, Sandy Csizmar and Stephen Busemeyer contributed to this story.
December 15, 2012
By Kenneth R. Gosselin
The principal of Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown — described in one tribute as "a principal that you'd want your children to have" — was among the more than two dozen adults and children killed Friday at the school in a shooting that sent shock waves around the world.
Word of the death of Dawn L. Hochsprung, 47, spread quickly Friday through the town of Woodbury, where she lived with her family, said First Selectman Gerald Stomski.
Hochsprung had been a principal in the Bethlehem and Woodbury school district before taking the job in Newtown two years ago.
"We were saddened to see her leave, but I know she was excited for that job," Stomski said. "She was very charismatic and had an incredible way with students and parents."
Police have not confirmed the identities of any of the shooting victims, but Hochsprung is among at least two other adults who also are believed to have died: Mary J. Sherlach, 56, the school psychologist, of Trumbull, and Nancy Lanza, 52, the mother of the shooter Adam Lanza, who was found dead at her Newtown home. In all, 28 people — 20 of them schoolchildren — died, including the suspect, police said.
Stomski said that Hochsprung lived in Woodbury even after she took the job in Newtown.
"She died protecting the children that she adored so much. It's just incredibly shocking,'' Stomski said.
Numerous people turned to social media to offer words of praise for Hochsprung's leadership.
"She was deeply, deeply loved," one tribute said. Another wrote: "As Dawn Hochsprung said every day in morning announcements, 'Be nice to each other.' It's really all that matters."
Hochsprung, who became principal of the school in 2010, was principal at Mitchell Elementary School in Woodbury for three years and principal at Bethlehem Elementary School from 2004 to 2007. Earlier, she worked as an assistant principal in the Danbury schools — one year at Danbury High School and five years at Rogers Park Middle School — and as a special education teacher in Bridgeport and New Milford.
Hochsprung started her doctorate this year at Sage College in Troy, N.Y., which issued a statement describing her as a model principal.
At the start of this school year at Sandy Hook, which has students from kindergarten through fourth grade, she told the Newtown Bee that she was "really excited about bringing a readers workshop into the mainstream of the program. ... We capitalize on [students'] love of reading and use that passion to advance their achievement."
Hochsprung recently wrote to parents about the new security system that had been installed at the school, and reportedly alerted teachers Friday about the shooter by tripping the public address system.
On Oct. 17, she posted a tweet that read: "Safety first at Sandy Hook... it's a beautiful day for our first evacuation drill!"
Her tweets were often exuberant and frequently included photographs. "Sandy Hook gardeners celebrate their learning after the fall harvest!" "Vote today... and talk to your kids about it!!" "In a fourth grade classroom right now... Completely blown away by the caliber of instruction and by students' deep thinking!" "Chicken dancing at Sandy Hook with the Carnivale Trio!" "Busy afternoon at the Sandy Hook Book Fair... Great time to support your school & stock up for winter reading!"
Her last tweet, written Thursday, read: "Setting up for the Sandy Hook nonfiction book preview for staff... Common Core, here we come!" The tweet included her photograph of a display of books, among them "Alligator or Crocodile: How Do You Know?" and "Insect or Spider: How Do You Know?"
Hochsprung, who was married and raising two daughters and three stepdaughters, received her bachelor's degree in special education from Central Connecticut State University in 1993, a master's in special education from Southern Connecticut State University in 1997 and a sixth-year degree in educational leadership from Southern.
Sherlach, according to numerous news outlets and CNN, also died in the shooting and had worked at Sandy Hook Elementary since 1994 and had served on numerous districtwide committees, including the conflict resolution committee, according to a biography on the Newtown Public Schools website.
Sherlach lived in Trumbull and was married with two adult daughters — one a high school chorus teacher in New Jersey and the other a graduate student at Georgetown University. Sherlach wrote in the biography that she and her husband, Bill, enjoyed traveling and spending time at their lake house in the Finger Lakes in upstate New York. Her hobbies were gardening, reading and the theater.
"I truly enjoy working with the SHS staff, parents and children and am always ready to assist in problem solving, intervention and prevention," she wrote.
The gunman's mother, Nancy Lanza, who some said worked, or volunteered, at the Sandy Hook School, was found dead in her Newtown home, according to many reports.
According to friends and neighbors, Lanza was a kind woman with a sense of humor. Slender, with short hair, Lanza was a fixture at neighborhood events such as the Labor Day parade, and had a special interest in Christmas lights.
Lanza lived on Yogananda Street, in a hilly, affluent neighborhood in the east end of town. Neighbors call it a children- and family-friendly place, a description backed up by the kids riding their bikes and the folks walking their dogs despite the crush of television trucks and reporters waiting near the Lanza home.
Although many interviewed in the neighborhood said they didn't know Nancy Lanza, or merely knew that a family by that name lived nearby, those that did know her said the day's events were too much.
Lanza's friend and neighbor Rhonda Cullens fought back tears Friday afternoon in the doorway of her home on Founders Lane, just around the corner from the Lanza residence.
She said she met Nancy Lanza playing bunco, a popular dice game, with a group of women in the neighborhood, but she hadn't seen her for years since she stopped playing with the group. "She was just a sweet, caring person."
Marsha Moskowitz, 56, who lives near the Lanzas, used to drive a school bus for the school district and would pick up both Adam, 20, and Ryan Lanza, 24. They were "very quiet, shy," she said, "You know the trouble kids, and you figure, 'Pff, that one's going to be trouble.' But I never would have thought that about them."
In dropping off and picking up the boys each day for years, she would often run into Nancy Lanza, she said.
"We would chit-chat," Moskowitz said, who remembered Lanza as "a very kind woman."
Courant staff writers Dave Altimari, Brian Dowling, Jenny Wilson, Naedine Hazell and Nancy Schoeffler contributed to this story. An Associated Press report also is included.
December 16, 2012
By Josh Kovner and Edmund H. Mahony
He was a loner, a 20-year-old whom Newtown High School classmates remembered as a skinny, shaggy-haired boy "who never really talked at all" and who stayed tight to the corridor walls when he walked, often clutching his laptop.
There was a common refrain among acquaintances of Adam Lanza: I knew of him but I didn't know him.
Lanza kept to himself. Over several bloody minutes Friday morning, armed with a rifle, Lanza emerged from his shell long enough to destroy the lives of 20 first-graders and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School. He'd gone to the school as a youth, a former classmate said.
On Friday morning, he drove to the school after killing his mother, Nancy Lanza, 52, in herhome2 miles away on Yogananda Street, law enforcement sources said. She was still in bed when he shot her, the sources said.
Adam Lanza had lived with his mother in the 4,000-square-foot, $700,000 house. His parents were divorced in 2009.
He had two bedrooms that were clean and orderly when law officers swept into the house after the shootings Friday morning. Lanza apparently lived in one of the rooms and kept his computer gear and other items in the other one, the sources said. Law officers found evidence that Adam Lanza played graphically violent video games, the sources said.
Lanza was estranged from his brother, Ryan Lanza, 24, and hadn't talked to his father since 2010, according to people who have known the family. Ryan, a graduate of Quinnipiac University in Hamden, works for the financial firm Ernst &Young and lives in an apartment in Hoboken, N.J.
Marsha Lanza, Adam Lanza's aunt, said it was her understanding that Nancy Lanza kept three guns in the home.
"Nancy was meticulous," Marsha Lanza told reporters outside her home in Crystal Lake, northwest of Chicago. "She would never leave the guns out."
Marsha Lanza called Nancy Lanza "self-reliant."
"The only reason she would have guns," Marsha Lanza said, "was for self-defense."
Two law enforcement sources said the murder weapon was one of those guns, a semiautomatic rifle. The others were a pair of semiautomatic pistols.
But why Adam Lanza embarked on the deadliest rampage at an elementary school in U.S. history is an open question. Law officers have a sense of his home life, but they have yet to nail down a motive.
The sources said investigators believe Adam Lanza's isolation and social awkwardness were consistent with Asperger's syndrome. Asperger's is a disorder that is part of the autism spectrum. It is marked by difficulty with social interaction. Many with Asperger's are otherwise high-functioning people. There is no pre-disposition toward violence, experts said.
"It's very important for people to know that there is absolutely no correlation between the diagnosis of Asperger's syndrome and a predilection toward violent behavior,'' said Dr. Harold Schwartz, chief psychiatrist at the Institute of Living in Hartford.
The reasons someone may suddenly commit unfathomable violence are, at best, elusive.
"Frankly, it is the kind of question no one can answer, but there are patterns,'' said Schwartz. "There are 'grievance collectors,' people who walk around feeling deeply aggrieved and harboring enormous resentments. But they don't have the skill to address what they are feeling in any productive way.
"They can act out, and through some fantastic thinking, believe that somehow the world will understand the depth of their pain when others see what they have done,'' said Schwartz.
Adam Lanza's relatives were at a loss to explain his actions.
"Like you, we want to know why," said Marsha Lanza. "My heart goes out to all the families."
Andrew Lapple sat next to Lanza in homeroom in their senior year at Newtown High.
Lapple described him as a skinny, reserved kid "who never really talked at all."
Lanza tried his hand at Little League baseball but wasn't very good. He was more of a "tech-geek," Lapple said.
"He was always carrying around his laptop holding onto it real tight,'' Lapple said. "He walked down the halls against the wall almost like he was afraid of people. He was definitely kind of strange but you'd never think he'd do something like this."
Rebecca Jaroszewski said she was in the same first- and third-grade classes with Lanza at Sandy Hook Elementary. She said the memory that stands out most is Lanza standing alone while other children played at recess, straining himself to make his face turn red and making animal-like noises.
He did this often, Jaroszewski said. "He would seem really angry, but he wouldn't tell people why," she said.
When she heard the news about the shootings, "It clicked for me when I realized who it was," Jaroszewski said.
Another former classmate of Lanza's remembered him as quiet and shy and socially awkward.
Kateleen Foy, now an undergraduate at Hofstra University in New York, said she was in Lanza's seventh-grade class at St. Rose of Lima School in Newtown.
She recalled that he joined the class after the school year began and left before school got out for the summer.
"He was really shy, really painfully shy," Foy said. "He was a little hard to talk to."
Foy said she didn't recall seeing Lanza again after he left St. Rose until she spotted him in a hall while they were students at Newtown High School.
"I want people to know he wasn't always a monster," Foy said. "He became one, but he wasn't always that way."
Foy said she and other students accepted his shyness because, she said, he had been home-schooled and "hadn't really been socialized."
In high school, "There were never any concrete signs of anything like [violence]. He went with the flow. … He flew under the radar,'' Foy said.
Another high school classmate, Ryan Schmidt, said Lanza "kept to himself. … He was just a bit off. He seemed like he was always awkward and looking around expecting something or someone to be coming at him. Twitchy, almost."
Cindy Kromberg, mother of one of Lanza's Newtown High classmates, Kyle Kromberg, recalled Lanza as "such a quiet, odd child." She said he was "a kid that didn't make eye contact, very introverted, very shy, very odd, very not mainstream."
Nicholas Martinez, who rode the school bus with Lanza when they were both seventh-graders at St. Rose of Lima, recalled talking with Lanza about classic rock, which they both enjoyed. Martinez said he remembered that Lanza had been home-schooled for a time.
"Looking back now," Martinez said, "it just seems like there was a lot beneath the surface that was never attended to."
Marsha Lanza said she considered her nephew "very bright, very brilliant. I guess he was what you might call a computer geek."
Those who know Adam Lanza's parents were grieving for the mother and expressing sympathy for the father.
His father, Peter Lanza, an accountant, lives in Stamford with his second wife.
On Saturday afternoon, Stamford police stood guard outside his home, and residents from the affluent north Stamford neighborhood slowed down while driving past the line of press cars and SUVs parked along the street.
A neighbor, Tony Battinelli, said Lanza has lived in the modest, older, one-story gray house for a year or two.
"As a parent, I feel for him. I can't imagine what he's going through right now," Battinelli said.
Peter Lanza released the following statement through an intermediary:
"Our hearts go out to the families and friends who lost loved ones and to all those who were injured. Our family is grieving along with all those who have been affected by this enormous tragedy. No words can truly express how heartbroken we are.
"We are in a state of disbelief and trying to find whatever answers we can. We too are asking why. We have cooperated fully with law enforcement and will continue to do so. Like so many of you, we are saddened, but struggling to make sense of what has transpired."
Friends and neighbors on Yogananda Street in Newtown said Nancy Lanza was a kind woman with a sense of humor. Slender, with short hair, she was a fixture at neighborhood events such as the Labor Day parade, and had a flair for setting up Christmas lights.
Neighbors said the hilly, affluent neighborhood in the east end of town is a children- and family-friendly place. The description was affirmed by the children riding their bikes and the folks walking their dogs despite the crush of TV trucks and reporters waiting near the Lanza home.
Rhonda Cullens, Nancy Lanza's friend and neighbor, fought back tears Friday afternoon in the doorway of her home on Founders Lane, around the corner from the Lanza residence.
She said she met Nancy Lanza playing bunco, a popular dice game, with a group of women in the neighborhood, but she hadn't seen her for years since she stopped playing with the group. "She was just a sweet, caring person," Cullens said.
Courant staff reporters Dave Altimari, Brian Dowling, Susan Dunne, Kenneth Gosselin, Jesse Leavenworth and Don Stacom contributed to this story. Information from Chicago Tribune correspondent Mark Shuman is also included.
December 17, 2012
Killed in Friday's horrific shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School were 20 children, ages 6 and 7, and six adults. The shooter's mother was also killed Friday. Stories of the adult heroes of this tragedy and tributes to the children who lost their lives are being shared on Facebook and Twitter, by the families and in obituaries. Following are reports about the victims, gathered from news sources and Courant reporters.
Charlotte Bacon, who would have turned 7 in February, was anything but shy.
"The family will forever remember her beautiful smile, her energy for life, and the unique way she expressed her individuality usually with the color pink," a statement released by her family said. "Charlotte never met and animal she didn't love, and since the age of two wanted to be a veterinarian."
She was smart, outgoing, precocious and persistent, said her uncle, John Hagen, of Minneapolis.
"She had a big personality. She could carry on a conversation with any adult. She challenged my sister every day. She knew how to get what she wanted."
Case in point: Charlotte's mother, Joann, bought her a pink dress and white boots for the holidays. Charlotte had been begging to wear her new outfit early. On the last day of Charlotte's life, her mom finally gave in.
Charlotte had curly, dark red hair. She loved going to school. She was so smart, Hagen said, that her parents were thinking about putting her in a special private school because they worried she wasn't being challenged enough. "This girl was definitely going places," her uncle said.
Charlotte liked a physical challenge, too, and enjoyed practicing Tae Kwon Do with her father and brother, especially "kicking and throwing punches," according to her family.
Another story that stands out in Hagen's mind: the time the Bacons were vacationing with extended family at a lake. Charlotte was 4 or 5. "I watched her jump off a pontoon into the water without any hesitation," Hagen said. "She just did it."
Charlotte was born in the Chicago area, a couple of years before Joann and husband Joel relocated to Sandy Hook. Joann is a stay-at-home mom. Joel, who holds a doctorate, works as a scientist in New York, according to a Wall Street Journalreport. Their 9-year-old son, Guy, also was at Sandy Hook on Friday but wasn't harmed.
Despite having only one sibling, Charlotte had a big family. Joel is one of three brothers. His parents are retiredmissionaries who now live close to him. Joann, who grew up in Minnesota, is the youngest of six children.
Charlotte also loved being a girl scout, and her mom was her troop leader.
"There were 10 girls in the group," Hagen said. "Only five are left."
-- Washington Post; Courant Staff Report
Statement released by Charlotte Bacon's family:
Charlotte Helen Bacon is the beloved daughter of Joel and JoAnn Bacon, and the sister of Guy Bacon. Charlotte was an extraordinarily gifted six year old who filled her family each day with joy and love. The family will forever remember her beautiful smile, her energy for life, and the unique way she expressed her individuality usually with the color pink. Charolette never met and animal she didn't love, and since the age of two wanted to be a Veterinarian. She also enjoyed practicing Tae Kwon Do weekly with her Dad and brother where she relished kicking and throwing punches!
Charlotte has left a place in her entire extended family's hearts that will never be replaced. The family is profoundly grateful for the thoughts and prayers of the many friends around the world who expressed their sympathies. They trust in the depths of God's grace, and with confidence, know that Charolette rests in God's arms.
***
Daniel Barden was fulll of kindness, an "old soul," according to his family.
Daniel's parents, Mark and Jackie, along with his brother James, 12, talked with Katie Couric about his remarkable empathy, his mother telling the TV host, "how unusual he was."
"Daniel was fearless in his pursuit of happiness and life," his family wrote in a statement released to the media. "He earned his ripped jeans and missing two front teeth."
"He embodied everything that is wholesome and innocent in the world," the statement said. "Our hearts break over losing him and for the many other families suffering loss."
The Bardens are often shuttling their children – including Daniel, James and their 10-year-old sister, Natalie -- from one activity to the next, said friends, colleagues and neighbors who admired their ability to keep up with their children's active schedule. This summer, Daniel scored the final goal in the last game of the soccer season. He loved to swim, and his mother's Facebook page featured a photo of her three children smiling at the beach. On Sunday morning, she posted a public note on Facebook saying, "Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers."
Jackie Barden is a second-grade teacher at Pawling Elementary School in Pawling, N.Y. She is one of the school district's reading specialists.
"She is a wonderful mom," said Lynn Maloney, who teaches second grade in the classroom next to Barden's. "She was extremely close to her children. She's a teacher and I'm a teacher, and children are really the centers of our world. She adored her family, and I am sure she must be devastated, like any mom."
***
It was around 9:30 a.m. when Barden learned there was a tragedy at her son's elementary school, colleagues said. A guidance counselor drove a shaken Barden back to Connecticut, where she learned about the loss of her 7-year-old son.
Jackie's husband, Mark Barden, is a rock guitarist who plays at places such as Proud Mary's, a local bar, according to Javier Mendizabal, who works there. A forum was set up on a message board called thegearpage.net to offer condolences. One man referred to Mark Barden as a "kind, gentle and humble man, as well as one of the most talented guitarists I know."
On Saturday, friends and family members gathered in the Sandy Hook section of Newtown to visit the Bardens. A local pastor prayed with them.
A bio on Jackie Barden's school Web page says the family has a pet ball python named Todd and a tortoise named Queenie.
Even for neighbors who did not know them intimately, such as Peter Bernson, there is an image they would see each morning they are sure they will miss — a smiling, laughing boy with a reddish-brown mop top and missing two front teeth, hoisted on his father's shoulders, headed to the school bus stop.
-- Washington Post; Courant Staff Report
***
Rachel D'Avino was pursuing a dream of helping and serving others when she lost her life during the Newtown shootings.
At Sandy Hook, D'Avino was an intern, offering one-on-one instruction to a child with special needs. She was also a student at University of Saint Joseph, where she was pursuing a graduate certificate in Applied Behavior Analysis.
In a statement from the family, Mary D'Avino, Rachel's mother, said she knew that one day Rachel would have the letters, Ph.D, following her name.
"Now instead of 'Dr.' in front of her name, she'll have 'St.' in front of it. She's up there with those kids," Mary said.
Those who knew her at the school remember her fondly, as both a professional and passionate young woman eager to work with children. One of her professor's, Deirdre Fitzgerald, described her as a dynamic individual, respected by her peers and full of potential.
"She was a leading force in the group," said Fitzgerald in a statement. "She just sparked with ideas and potential."
Christine Carmody, Rachel's aunt, recalled her laughter.
"She had the greatest sense of humor," Carmody said in a statement from the family. "She found humor in almost anything. She was almost like an actress and she loved dressing up when she was younger. She was a hoot."
Carmody also remembered Rachel's love for animals.
"She loved her dogs, but she also loved frogs, snakes and mice," Carmody said. "Not the animals most people like,"
She had been an intern at Sandy Hook for just over a week, according to an interview Fox 13 News in Tampa Bay had with Pastor Ken Whitten, the senior pastor at Carmody's church in Lutz, Fla.
Pastor Whitten says D'Avino's aunt is feeling pain over her loss. Carmody told him D'Avino's boyfriend had just asked her parents for her hand in marriage and was planning to propose on Christmas Eve.
"We will pray especially for Christine," Whitten added. "But we'll be praying for all of the victims of this senseless tragedy."
-- Jenny Wilson; Courant Staff Report
Statement from the family of Rachel Marie D'Avino:
"We are heartbroken over the loss of our beautiful daughter, sister, cousin and friend. Rachel was a true hero who died protecting the children she loved.
"We are thankful for the outpouring of love and support from our family, friends and neighbors."
Rachel's mother, Mary D'Avino, said she knew that one day Rachel would have the letters, Ph.D, following her name. Rachel was studying for her doctorate degree at University of St. Joseph's of Hartford.
"Now instead of 'Dr.' in front of her name, she'll have 'St.' in front of it. She's up there with those kids," Mary D'Avino said.
Mary D'Avino and Rachel's sisters, Hannah and Sarah, met with President Obama on Sunday in Newtown.
"It was just so beautiful," Mary D'Avino said of the ceremony. She said President met individually with each family and spent time talking to them.
Rachel's aunt, Christine Carmody, recalled her niece's love of laughter.
"She had the greatest sense of humor. She found humor in almost anything. She was almost like an actress and she loved dressing up when she was younger. She was a hoot."
Christine Carmody also recalled Rachel's love of animals.
"She loved her dogs, but she also loved frogs, snakes and mice – not the animals most people like," she said.
Christine Carmody said the family knew at a young age that Rachel would become an educator.
"She always wanted to work with kids."
***
On the "Friends of the Engel Family Fund" Facebook page, there were photos of Olivia Rose Engel, 6, sitting behind the steering wheel of a boat with sunglasses. Another showed her wearing a set of wings, holding a golden star over her head.
In nearly every Facebook photograph of Olivia, the girl is smiling.
"Beautiful little angel," commented a Facebook friend.
Family pictures were tradition for the Engel family, who at least twice this year met with photographer Tim Nosenzo for portraits. Over the summer they gathered at the Saugatuck Harbor Yacht Club in Westport, where the family posed for photos at the club, along the shore and on a boat.
"Always a nice way to spend a summer morning," Nosenzo wrote on his professional Web site, where he posted the images last month.
In November, Nosenzo photographed the family again -- this time for what Nosenzo described as "our annual Christmas card photo shoot" in Tarrywile Park in Danbury.
"This is a tragedy beyond understanding," Nosenzo wrote on his Web site Saturday.
Her parents and other family members declined requests for interviews over the weekend, but Brian Engel released a statement about his daughter.
Olivia's favorite colors were pink and purple, he said. Her favorite stuffed animal was a lamb. She loved school and did well in math and reading. She liked to draw and took art classes. She played tennis and soccer, and liked musical theater.
Olivia was a Daisy Girl Scout, enjoyed swimming, and took dance lessons in ballet and hip hop
She was an active member of her family's church, St. Rose of Lima Catholic Church in Newtown, where she was supposed to appear in a Nativity play as an angel over the weekend. Every night, she led grace at her family's dinner table.
"She was insightful for her age and had a great sense of humor," the family statement said. "She was a grateful child who was always appreciative and never greedy... She was a 6-year-old who had a lot to look forward to."
A family member serving as spokesman for Olivia's parents, Brian and Shannon Engel, said he had been communicating with the family by text messages since yesterday, asking what he and other could do to help.
"It's the same message," John Engel said. "Just pray for us."
-- Kenneth R. Gosselin; Dan Haar; Washington Post
***
Called "Joey" by her family, Josephine Gay celebrated her seventh birthday the Tuesday before she was killed at Sandy Hook Elementary school.
In a photo circulating on the internet, Josephine peeked out from under a green, toy traffic cone, smiling with her glasses perched on the tip of her nose.
Josephine was autistic, severely apraxic and did not speak, but "she touched the lives of so many around her: teachers, therapists, friends, neighbors, all loved and cherished her," according to a statement from her parents, Michele and Bob Gay.
Josephine was born in Maryland, according to her family, and grew up in a house full of Ravens fans, falling in love with color purple, which has become a theme for friends and family in remembering her.
"After her passing, many friends who visited wore purple clothing to honor her," the family statement said. "On Saturday a family friend tied purple balloons on the mailboxes on our street, and on Sunday the neighborhood children and her sisters and cousins released purple balloons with written messages of love to her in heaven."
Joey was social and affectionate; she smiled, she loved hugs, and she even had a wonderful sense of humor. Her spirit was indomitable. She participated in rigorous therapy and treatment on a daily basis without complaint. She loved to play with her Barbie dolls, iPad, and computer, swim, swing, and be anywhere her sisters were.
Josephine is survived by her parents as well as two sisters, Sophia and Marie, according to her obituary.
The family established Joey's Fund through the Doug Flutie, Jr. Foundation for Autism, with proceeds of the fund directed toward helping families raising autistic children.
-- Brian Dowling; Courant Staff Report
A family statement from Bob and Michele Gay, Josephine's parents:
On Friday, December 14, 2012, our beautiful daughter, Josephine Grace Gay, was killed in an unimaginable tragedy at her elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut. Joey, many of her friends, teachers, and school staff members were taken from our loving community. Joey turned 7 three days prior to this tragedy and was looking forward to celebrating at her birthday party with many of these friends the next day.
Although our family is devastated, we are deeply comforted in the knowledge that she is no longer scared or hurting and rests in the arms of our Savior, Jesus Christ. It is through His sufficient grace that we are able to get through this. Our innocent, trusting little girl stared into the face of unimaginable evil and overcame it in Christ. She was not alone in her courage.
Our small, close-knit community acted instantly. First responders from our town and those surrounding quickly removed surviving children and staff members from the scene. Connecticut state troopers have tended to our families around the clock, surrounding us with protection and compassion. Neighbors, religious communities, townspeople, and professionals are providing the care and love that we are so in need of now. We see this movement grow daily with acts of love and kindness pouring in from around the country and the world. We see how evil is defeated.
Since Joey's passing, we have received many media requests for our story and for pictures of our daughter. Although we are protecting our family's privacy during this time of healing, we believe it is important to share some of Joey's story. It will help us if others know what a special person she was and how she inspired everyone she met.
Joey was autistic and severely apraxic. She could not speak, yet she touched the lives of so many around her: teachers, therapists, friends, neighbors, all loved and cherished her. Joey was social and affectionate; she smiled, she loved hugs, and she even had a wonderful sense of humor. Her spirit was indomitable. She participated in rigorous therapy and treatment on a daily basis without complaint. She loved to play with her Barbie dolls, iPad, and computer, swim, swing, and be anywhere her sisters were.
Josephine loved the color purple. Born in Maryland, she grew up in a family of Ravens fans and developed an affinity for all things purple. She rarely left the house without wearing something purple. After her passing, many friends who visited wore purple clothing to honor her. On Saturday a family friend tied purple balloons on the mailboxes on our street, and on Sunday the neighborhood children and her sisters and cousins released purple balloons with written messages of love to her in heaven.
We will not let this tragedy define her life. Instead, we will honor her inspiring and generous spirit. We have established Joey's Fund in her name through the Doug Flutie, Jr. Foundation for Autism. The proceeds of this fund will help families raising autistic children. It's our way of dealing.
***
Praised as a model educator with a playful passion and infectious laugh, Dawn Hochsprung was hired to lead Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2010.
Mary Ann Jacob, a clerk in the library, said Hochsprung was a friend and "a really amazing woman and a great leader.'
"This is a huge loss," Jacob told reporters Saturday in Newtown. "We had a book fair a few weeks ago and she dressed up as the reading fairy and had a dress on with lights on it, and went around the classroom putting reading fairy dust on all the kids. She was just an amazing woman."
She added: "She was strong and fun, and the kids loved her. She was a wonderful woman. When you think about how our school is going to recover, you think about it needing leadership, and she was the person who most could have done that."
At the start of this school year at Sandy Hook, which has students from kindergarten through fourth grade, she told the Newtown Bee that she was "really excited about bringing a readers workshop into the mainstream of the program. ... We capitalize on [students'] love of reading and use that passion to advance their achievement."
Diane Day, a therapist at the school, told the Wall Street Journal that she was in a meeting with Hochsprung about 9:30 a.m. when they heard shots. Hochsprung and a school psychologist ran toward the sound of the gunfire, Day said.
Hochsprung was the assistant principal at the middle school where George Hochsprung was working as a 7th grade math teacher when the two met and fell in love more than a decade ago. In an interview with CNN Sunday night, George Hochsprung said he had to propose marriage six times before Dawn, more than 20 years his junior, said yes.
Surrounded by four of their grown daughters, George Hochsprung described for a CNN reporter the retirement home in the Adirondacks that the couple had bought and outfitted with extra bedrooms for visiting children and grandchildren.
"It was going to be Dawn's house, ultimately ... with all the children," he said, voice breaking. "And now it's me. I don't think I can do that."
Erica Lafferty, Dawn Hochsprung's daughter, told CNN her mother was a constant presence in her daughters' lives — "my rock."
"Every practice she was there," Erica said. "All of my sister's cheerleadering stuff, she was there. Every dance competition. She was doing homework on the bleachers, but she was there."
Lynn Wasik, whose daughter attends Sandy Hook, said Dawn Hochsprung could often be seen crouching down to speak to her students at eye level.
"She connected with the children," Wasik said.
Hochsprung maintained a Twitter account, from which she regularly kept her followers informed about what was happening at the school. Her last tweets were about setting up for a nonfiction book preview and her enjoyment of the 4th grade winter concert rehearsal – "a telnted group" she said.
— Kenneth R. Gosselin; Washington Post
***
Dylan Hockley smiles online in a series of family photos. He's Shrek, his mom writes. Or he's "Super Dylan" — posed in a Superman outfit. In other images, he poses with his brother, Jake.
According to news outlets in Great Britain, Dylan Hockley was born in Winchester, England, and his family moved from that country to Newtown in 2011. According to those reports his father is a native of Great Britain while his mother is American. Dylan's older brother was also a student at the school.
Dylan had lived across Yogananda Street from where the violence began. His neighbor, Nancy Lanza, was the mother of the suspected shooter — and apparently the first person killed Friday.
-- Ken Byron; Washington Post
Statement from the family of Dylan Hockley:
We want to give sincere thanks and appreciation to the emergency services and first responders who helped everyone on Friday, Dec. 14. It was an impossible day for us, but even in our grief we cannot comprehend what other people may have experienced.
The support of our beautiful community and from family, friends and people around the world has been overwhelming and we are humbled. We feel the love and comfort that people are sending and this gives our family strength. We thank everyone for their support, which we will continue to need as we begin this long journey of healing.
Our thoughts and prayers are with the other families who have also been affected by this tragedy. We are forever bound together and hope we can support and find solace with each other.Sandy Hook and Newtown have warmly welcomed us since we moved here two years ago from England. We specifically chose Sandy Hook for the community and the elementary school. We do not and shall never regret this choice. Our boys have flourished here and our family's happiness has been limitless.
We cannot speak highly enough of Dawn Hochsprung and Mary Sherlach, exceptional women who knew both our children and who specifically helped us navigate Dylan's special education needs. Dylan's teacher, Vicki Soto, was warm and funny and Dylan loved her dearly. We take great comfort in knowing that Dylan was not alone when he died, but was wrapped in the arms of his amazing aide, Anne Marie Murphy. Dylan loved Mrs. Murphy so much and pointed at her picture on our refrigerator every day. Though our hearts break for Dylan, they are also filled with love for these and the other beautiful women who all selflessly died trying to save our children.
Everyone who met Dylan fell in love with him. His beaming smile would light up any room and his laugh was the sweetest music. He loved to cuddle, play tag every morning at the bus stop with our neighbors, bounce on the trampoline, play computer games, watch movies, the color purple, seeing the moon and eating his favorite foods, especially chocolate. He was learning to read and was so proud when he read us a new book every day. He adored his big brother Jake, his best friend and role model.
There are no words that can express our feeling of loss. We will always be a family of four, as though Dylan is no longer physically with us, he is forever in our hearts and minds. We love you Mister D, our special gorgeous angel.
***
Madeleine Hsu was a shy and quiet 6-year-old — but she would light up around dogs.
Karen Dryer, who lived on the same street as the Hsu family, would see Madeleine's mom waiting for her at the bus stop at 3:15 every afternoon. Dryer would wait too, for her son Logan, who is in kindergarten. Dryer usually brought the family's golden retriever with her.
"She would come off the bus and her face would light up when she saw the dog," Dryer said.
Madeleine was among the youngest victims in Newtown. She had just turned six in July, meaning just five victims were born after her.
Her mom would give her a big squeeze, and Madeleine would hug her little sister. "She was just an absolute doll," Dryer said. "She seemed very shy, but she was just so sweet."
Dryer described Hsu as a "very upbeat and kind" girl who favored bright dresses.
There wasn't much information readily available about Hsu. Attempts to reach her family and neighbors in Sandy Hook were unsuccessful. Dr. Matthew Belsmid, who was at the Hsu house on Saturday, told the Associated Press that Hsu's family did not want to comment.
Memorial Web pages appeared on Facebook and Legacy.com, but they didn't appear to be connected to Hsu's family. Instead, they showed the way that these tragedies can impact people a world away. Condolences were offered from across the country, with words of comfort sent to Sandy Hook from as far away as South Africa, the Phillippines and Israel.
The only publicly visible online comment that seemed to come from Hsu's family came in the form of a hauntingly simple photograph.
A Facebook account belonging to Arline Arnold, believed to be related to Hsu, had its profile picture changed on Friday night to show a young girl smiling brightly. In the picture, a pink bow in the young girl's hair matched the pink sweater she wore.
Several people offered their condolences to Hsu's family. A commenter named Christen posted to the account on Saturday night, calling Hsu "a beautiful little soul who was very loved, full of life and I know will be missed dearly by all who knew her."
-- Washington Post; Associated Press
***
Besides her red hair, Catherine Violet Hubbard's most striking characteristic was her love of animals. She wanted to protect and care for them — an ambition the first-grader is fulfilling even in death.
In lieu of flowers, Catherine's parents, Jennifer and Matthew Hubbard, have asked people to donate money to the Animal Center, the Newtown animal shelter. The center is pooling the donations submitted in Catherine's name and will plan a project to honor her, according to Harmony Verna, the director of the center's board.
Verna said members of Catherine's family had adopted animals from the shelter in the past.
"We are so touched and warmed that this family could reach through their grief to do something for us," Verna said. "This little girl wanted to grow up to be a veterinarian, and these donors are helping make that dream come true in some way."
Family members declined to talk about Catherine, who was 6, but her parents released a statement saying they were "greatly saddened by the loss of our beautiful daughter."
Besides her love for animals, a death notice said Catherine's family will remember her for her constant smile.
Catherine was born June 8, 2006 and is survived by her older brother, Frederick William; her parents Matthew and Jennifer; her grandparents Susan and Leo Sullivan and her great-grandmother Geraldine Russell Holden, all of West Chester, Penn.; Nancy and Earl Hubbard of Chatham, Mass., along with four uncles, four aunts, and nine cousins survive Catherine.
"Her family prays that she, all the students of Sandy Hook Elementary, and all those affected by this brutal event find peace in their hearts," the family said in the obituary.
-- Ken Byron; Washington Post
***
Chase Kowalski loved to be outside riding his bicycle, running or playing baseball, according to his family and neighbors.
He competed in his first triathlon at age 6, according to his obituary. He was a Cub Scout, and was a "fun loving energetic boy that had a true love of life."
Kowalski's family "sends their prayers and thoughts to all of the families involved with this horrific event," the obituary said.
Just last week, he was visiting neighbor Kevin Grimes, telling him about completing — and winning — his first mini-triathlon.
"You couldn't think of a better child," Grimes said.
Grimes' own five children all attended Sandy Hook, too. Cars lined up outside the Kowalski's ranch home Saturday, and a state trooper's car idled in the driveway. Grimes spoke of the boy only in the present tense.
-- Shawn Beals
***
Nancy Lanza, the mother of shooter Adam Lanza, was killed Friday morning before her son shot his way into the Sandy Hook School
According to published reports, Lanza had grown up in New Hampshire, where her brother was a long-time police officer. Officials in Kingston, N.H., described her as a kind, considerate and loving person.
Lanza and her former husband, Peter Lanza, were divorced in 2009, according to court records.
It was not clear what Lanza did for a living and according to reports she was not working at the time of the shooting.
Friends and neighbors in Newtown said Lanza was a kind woman with a good sense of humor who participated in events like Labor Day parades. According to reports, Lanza was interested in gardening and took a special interest in in Christmas lights. She was also a member a group of women who met regularly to play bunco, a dice game.
The Lanzas lived on Yogananda Street, a hilly, affluent neighborhood to the east of town.
—Ken Byron; Brian Dowling
***
Kevin Samoskevich works in construction in Shelton and he often ran into Neil Heslin, a fellow building contractor, at the Dew Drop Donut shop in town. They'd exchange pleasantries over coffee and talk about available construction work. Heslin's son, Jesse Lewis, a happy 6 year old, was always beside him.
"He's a very nice guy, a very friendly man and always helpful," Samoskevich said. "We're all so shocked. I have his Facebook page up in front of me and I don't know what to write."
Jesse Lewis died in the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary. Heslin always brought his son with him to job sites during his construction work, Samoskevich said.
"He was a happy child," Samoskevich said. "A typical boy who was always in and out of things," on the job sites.
Samoskevich said the tragedy has had a deep impact in the Newtown area and surrounding communities.
"People are very upset here.They're numb. There's no happy smiles on anybody's faces," Samoskevich said. "People are crying."
"Jesse was such an incredible light," his mother, Scarlett Lewis, told the Wall Street Journal in an email Sunday. "So bright and full of love. He lived life with vigor and passion...brave and true."
"They told me he ran into the hall to help," Jesse's mother said in the e-mail. "I can only hope this meant he had less fear and went quickly in his bravery."
-- Washington Post; Courant Staff Report
***
Ana Grace Marquez-Greene died in the shootings while her older brother Isaiah, also at the school, escaped harm. She is the daughter of jazz musician and teacher Jimmy Greene, 37, and his wife Nelba Marquez Greene.
"She never walked anywhere," the family said in a statement Sunday evening. "Her mode of transportation was dance."
The couple, high school sweethearts, told the Courant in May that they chose Newtown because it was close to Greene's job and to the music scene in New York City, where Greene is in demand as a saxophone and flute player, and as a composer and arranger. Their remembrance of Ana Grace recalled the girl's musical gifts of melody and rhythm. "Ana's love for singing was evident before she was even able to talk."
Jimmy and Nelba Greene said that their daughter strengthened them through her love and generosity – noting that Ana would often leave love notes under their pillows "not on special occasions, but, rather, on ordinary days."
When Ana's parents would bend down to kiss her, she would step back and pucker her lips, making it clear that she wanted to do the kissing, her parents said.
In 2009, Jimmy Greene included a song, "Ana Grace," about his daughter on the album, "Mission Statement."
— Donna Larcen; Owen McNally; Brian Dowling
Statement from the family of Ana Grace Marquez-Greene:
It is with immeasurable grief and heavy-heartedness that we mourn the loss of our precious angel, Ana Grace Marquez-Greene. She was taken from us far too soon in the horrific massacre enacted upon Sandy Hook Elementary School on Friday morning December 14, 2012. She was 6 ½ years old.
In her short life, Ana strengthened us with her loving, generous joyful spirit. She routinely committed selfless acts of kindness: every drawing or craft project she began was envisioned not for her own enjoyment, but as a gift for another. She often left sweet notes that read, "I love you Mom and Dad," under our bedroom pillow – not on special occasions, but, rather, on ordinary days. She would not allow me to kiss her goodbye. Instead, when I bent down to kiss her, she would take a step backwards, poke out her lips and wait for me to lower my cheek -she made it clear that she wanted to do the kissing.
Ana's love for singing was evident before she was even able to talk. In a musical family, her gift for melody, pitch and rhythm stood out remarkably. And she never walked anywhere – her mode of transportation was dance. She danced from room to room and place to place. She danced to all the music she heard, whether in air or in her head. Ana loved her God, loved to read the Bible and loved to sing and dance as acts of worship.
We ask that you pray for the legions of people who are left behind to cherish memories of her. We also ask that you, like Ana, commit selfless acts of kindness to all those around you. Maybe, in some way, through love, similar senseless acts of violence could be prevented. Funeral arrangements will be announced soon. In lieu of gifts and flowers, the family is working to establish scholarships in Ana's name at Western Connecticut State University's Department of Music in Danbury, Conn. and the Artist's Collective in Hartford, Conn.
***
James Mattioli, known to many simply as "J," loved life until it was tragically ended on Friday, was a smart, active boy who looked up to – and like – his father, played sports and loved food, an obituary posted online through a Monroe funeral home said.
"I need to go outside, Mom. I need fresh air," the family recalled James saying often. He loved baseball, basketball swimming and arm wrestling. He and his cousin George played hockey together.
The 6-year-old "proudly" rode his bike without training wheels, his family said.
He was the first one up in the morning, and would draw and do crafts with his older sister, Anna.
Math and numbers came quickly to James. A friend, Christopher, introduced him to the concept of a googolplex, a number so large it's physically impossible to write.
-- Brian Dowling
***
Chris, Lynn and Jack McDonnell, the parents and older brother of Grace McDonnell, sent in a short statement to The Washington Post: "We are overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and support from so many people. Our daughter Grace was the love and light of our family. Words cannot adequately express our sense of loss."
The Werdens, who live across the street from the McDonnell's, shared a school bus stop. And so, on many mornings, the Werdens saw Grace's father, Christopher McDonnell, a competitive runner, out for jog.
"It's heartbreaking, just heartbreaking," Todd Werden said. "It's just unfathomable."
Werden described Grace as "a real cute little blonde girl with blue eyes — a real little doll."
The McDonnell family residence was still brightly decorated for the holidays.
"Last night it was all ablaze with Christmas lights," Werden said.
The Werdens also live close to the home of the shooter, also believed to have shot his mother several times in the head before he went to the Sandy Hook school Friday morning.
"If he was pissed at his family, why did he feel like he needed to go to the school and kill all those kids?" Werden said. "I can't understand it. Nobody will be able to understand it."
-- Washington Post
***
Special-education assistant Anne Marie Murphy — mother of four, protector of so many more — died trying to save her students, according to her father. Hugh McGowan said Murphy was found in a classroom, shielding a group of her beloved children.
"A first responder said she was a hero," McGowan told Newsday.
Of course she was, said her friend Amy Potucek. "She was so selfless," said Potucek, who worked at Sandy Hook until moving recently to another school. "I know that Anne Marie was doing everything she could to keep those kids safe, to protect them, because she loved them."
"We take great comfort in knowing that Dylan was not alone when he died, but was wrapped in the arms of his amazing aide, Anne Marie Murphy," a statement from the family of shooting victim Dylan Hockley said. "Dylan loved Mrs. Murphy so much and pointed at her picture on our refrigerator every day."
At her funeral Thursday, New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan compared Murphy to Jesus for giving up her life to protect others.
"Like Jesus, Annie laid down her life for her friends," Dolan said. "Like Jesus, Annie's life and death brings light, truth, goodness and love to a world often shrouded in darkness, evil, selfishness and death."
About 15 people arrived at St. Mary of the Assumption Church in Katonah, N.Y., in a yellow school bus with "Newtown" written on its side. The church quickly filled and about 100 mourners waited outside.
Murphy, 52, was raised in Katonah, about half an hour away from Newtown, where her parents still live. She had six siblings and a serious joie de vivre. Her mother, Alice McGowan, told Newsday that her daughter was "a happy soul" who was devoted to her work and family.
The youngest of Murphy's four children is a senior in high school; the others have gone on to college and into adulthood. But always, they reconvened at the family home on Great Ring Road. Reached there Sunday, her husband, Mike Murphy, an engineer, said his emotions were too raw for him to talk. "It's too early, too soon," he said.
The Murphys' home is about five miles from the school, near the end of a rural road, by a pond where the kids ice-skate every winter. Anne Marie Murphy tended to brighten the bucolic place, a neighbor said. "She's a lovely lady, always very pleasant and very upbeat," said Gerald George, who has lived next door for about 15 years. They would always exchange pleasantries and chat about town news.
"It's just horrific, what's happened," George said. "I can't fathom the idea that she's gone and won't be pulling into the driveway next door, waving and smiling."
Murphy was a certified teacher who began volunteering at Sandy Hook when her children attended the school, friends said. She settled on working as an educational assistant at Sandy Hook "to be close to and available to her husband and to her children," Potucek said. "She was the absolute rock in that family."
She loved walking outdoors, and she loved going to the movies — though she usually avoided the violent ones. And she never saw anything when it was new, always waiting until it landed at the Edmond Town Hall theater, a second-run cinema on Main Street. "It's only $2 to get in," Potucek said. "And she had four kids."
She laughed. It felt right.
"Anne Marie was always so positive," Potucek said. "She would take any situation and make it happy. She would turn it around and look for the good."
On Saturday, Murphy had planned to get together with some of her friends for a holiday cookie exchange. They would have eaten too much and laughed even more, and they would have had a great time, friends said. They always did.
-- Washington Post; Courant Staff Report; Associated Press
***
Emilie Parker was a "bright," avid artist who acted as a mentor to her 3- and 4-year-old sisters, her father, Robbie Parker, recalled Saturday.
"Emily's laughter was infectious and all those who met her would agree this world is a better place because she has been in it," Parker, 30, told reporters in Newtown. "She was beautiful; she was blond, always smiling. She was the type of person that could just light up a room."
Emilie taught her younger sisters to read, dance and "find the simple joys of life," Parker said. Her siblings looked up to her and leaned on her for comfort.
Emilie was compassionate, Parker said, and loved to create cards for others. One "special card" she made was even placed in her grandfather's casket.
"She always had something kind to say about anybody, and her love and the strength she gave us and the example she showed us is remarkable," he said.
The last conversation Parker said he had with Emilie was Friday morning, in Portuguese. He had been teaching her the language.
"I was leaving for work," he said. "She told me good morning. She asked how I was doing. … She told me she loved me. I gave her a kiss and I was out the door."
Parker expressed sympathy for the other families and said he's sought strength through his family and his faith.
"She is an incredible person," he said of Emilie, "and I'm so blessed to be her dad."
— Jenna Carlesso
***
He was a Giants fan and a wrestler. Jack Pinto, who was killed Friday at the Sandy Hook Elementary School, became the hero of his sports idol, Giant's receiver Victor Cruz.
"Jack Pinto 'My Hero'," Cruz wrote in Sharpie across his cleats Sunday. "This one is 4 U!"
Cruz, who heard that Jack was a big fan of his, tweeted on Sunday that that his condolences and prayers are with the Pinto family.
A family friend of the Pinto's contacted FOX-CT's Rich Coppola to see if he could get a photograph of Jack displayed during Sunday's Giants game. The friend told Coppola that she heard that Cruz was hoping to attend Jack's funeral.
"Jack was an incredibly loving and vivacious young boy, appreciated by all who knew him for his lively and giving spirit and steely determination," read an obituary for Jack on The Newtown Bee's website. "In life and in death, Jack will forever be remembered for the immeasurable joy he brought to all who had the pleasure of knowing him, a joy whose wide reach belied his six short years"
Also Sunday morning, Jack's wrestling team paused for a moment of silence before their meet.
-- Brian Dowling
***
First-grader Noah Samuel Pozner, born in Danbury, was a kind, caring and smart boy, with an occasional "mischievous" streak, his uncle, Alexis Haller, said during a funeral for Noah Monday.
"He liked to tell his sisters that he worked in a taco factory; when they asked him how he got to work, he would give them a funny look as if to say he knew something that they didn't," Haller, of Woodinville, Wash., recalled. "He loved animals, video games and Mario Brothers. He was already a very good reader, and had just bought a Ninjago book at a book fair that he was really excited about reading."
If Noah had had the chance to grow up, Haller said: "He would have become a great man. He would [have] been a wonderful husband and a loving father. He would have been a backbone of our family for years to come."
Noah attended Sandy Hook Elementary with his twin sister, Arielle, and an older sister, Sophia, 8. Like many twins, the Pozners had been assigned to different classes.
Arielle survived Friday's rampage. Noah did not.
Noah was a "rambunctious little maverick" who was "smart as a whip," said his mother, Veronique, speaking through a relative. He loved his family, his parents, his siblings and especially his twin, she said.
"He called her his best friend," she said.
Noah was an "impish, larger than life little boy," according to his obituary.
"How do you capture the essence of a six year old in just a few words?," his obituary said. "Everything he did conveyed action and energy through love. He was the light of our family, a little soul devoid of spite and meanness."
An inquisitive and "very warm" child, Noah liked to ask about how the world worked, recalled his uncle, Arthur Pozner, who saw Noah for Hanukkah in Brooklyn the Saturday before the shooting.
Noah asked him question after question, he recalled, at one point wondering about the digital display on the toaster oven.
"Is the toaster going to reach 10,000 degrees?" Noah asked his uncle.
"Ten thousand degrees would melt diamonds," his uncle recalls telling him.
Arthur Pozner said Noah often seemed beyond his years. "For a 6-year-old, he was a very smart kid," he said.
Noah's mother is a nurse, and his father, Leonard, works with computers. The family appreciated their charming old New England town and its strong schools, Arthur Pozner said.
"One of the reasons they moved there was the schools," he said. "They were very good. And it was very safe."
At the funeral Monday, Haller said people could honor Noah "by loving each other and taking care of each other."
"That's what Noah would have wanted," he said.
Noah is survived by his mother, father, sister and twin, as well as his siblings Danielle and Michael, his grandparents Marie, Dirk, Ivan, Deanna and Lena, uncles and aunts, Arthur, Stephan, Alexi, Patricia and Victoria.
-- Washington Post
At Noah's funeral Monday, his mother, Veroniquie Pozner, and his uncle, Alexis Haller, of Woodinville, Wash., gave the following eulogies.
From mother, Veronique Pozner:
The sky is crying, and the flags are at half-mast. It is a sad, sad day. But it is also your day, Noah, my little man. I will miss your forceful and purposeful little steps stomping through our house. I will miss your perpetual smile, the twinkle in your dark blue eyes, framed by eyelashes that would be the envy of any lady in this room.
Most of all, I will miss your visions of your future. You wanted to be a doctor, a soldier, a taco factory manager. It was your favorite food, and no doubt you wanted to ensure that the world kept producing tacos.
You were a little boy whose life force had all the gravitational pull of a celestial body. You were light and love, mischief and pranks. You adored your family with every fiber of your 6-year-old being. We are all of us elevated in our humanity by having known you. A little maverick, who didn't always want to do his schoolwork or clean up his toys, when practicing his ninja moves or Super Mario on the Wii seemed far more important.
Noah, you will not pass through this way again. I can only believe that you were planted on Earth to bloom in heaven. Take flight, my boy. Soar. You now have the wings you always wanted. Go to that peaceful valley that we will all one day come to know. I will join you someday. Not today. I still have lots of mommy love to give to Danielle, Michael, Sophia and Arielle.
Until then, your melody will linger in our hearts forever. Momma loves you, little man.
From uncle, Alexis Haller:
On Friday, Dec. 14, we tragically lost a most beloved member of our family. Noah was a 6-year-old little boy, and he was so dear to all of our hearts.
Words cannot express the unfathomable loss we feel.
Noah was a wonderful son and a loving brother. He was kind, caring, smart, funny, and sometimes even a little mischievous. He liked to tell his sisters that he worked in a taco factory; when they asked him how he got to work, he would give them a funny look as if to say he knew something that they didn't.
Noah was a little kid. He loved animals, video games and Mario Brothers. He was already a very good reader, and had just bought a Ninjago book at a book fair that he was really excited about reading. He was also very excited about going to a birthday party he had been invited to. It was to take place on Saturday, Dec. 15.
Noah loved his family dearly, especially his mom, his dad, his big sisters Danielle and Sophia, his big brother Michael, and his dear twin Arielle. He called Arielle his best friend, and she was — and always had been.
If Noah had not been taken from us, he would have become a great man. He would been a wonderful husband and a loving father. He would have been a backbone of our family for years to come. His loss, and our loss, are deep indeed.
It is unspeakably tragic that none of us can bring Noah back. We would go to the ends of the Earth to do so, but none of us can.
What we can do is carry Noah within us, always. We can remember the joy he brought to us. We can hold his memory close to our hearts. We can treasure him forever. And all of us, including the family, the community, the country and the world, can honor Noah by loving each other and taking care of each other. That's what Noah would have wanted.
Noah, we love you so much, we miss you dearly, and we will never, ever forget you.
***
"Silly Caroline" Previdi had an infectious grin and a giving heart.
Karen Dryer, a neighbor, remembered how six-year-old Caroline would ride the bus with her son, Logan, when he got scared. She'd sit with him, make sure he felt safe, and play peek-a-boo over the seat to distract him.
"My son refers to her as 'Silly Caroline,'" said Dryer, who is still wrestling with how to talk to her son about the shootings. "She's just a girl that was always smiling, always wanting others to smile."
"Caroline Phoebe Previdi was a blessing from God and brought joy to everyone she touched," her parents, Jeff and Sandy Previdi, said in a statement. "We know that she is looking down on us from Heaven."
Previdi once went by the nickname "Boo" because she looked so much like the little girl from the movie "Monsters, Inc.," said one family friend, who declined to be named.
"She was a total sweetheart. She was adorable," the family friend said.
Another friend who lives in the Newtown area said Caroline loved gymnastics. "She was a spunky little girl. She had fire to her," the woman said.
"It's a warm, loving family," said Catherina Mola, who lives across the street from the Previdis. "It's senseless."
"We're a pretty close neighborhood," Mola added.
On Saturday morning, before all the victims' names became public, some who knew Caroline remembered her on Twitter. "R.I.P Caroline Previdi. You were a very sweet little girl and we will all miss you dearly. #PrayersForNewtown," tweeted Paige Tremblay.
-- Brian Dowling; Washington Post; Associated Press
***
In a pale pink polo dress, 6-year-old Jessica Rekos's grayish-blue eyes beam into the camera lens. Her arm is wrapped around her younger brother, who has the same eyes.
"They are absolute clones of you guys" says a Facebook friend, commenting on the photo Jessica's mother, Krista Lehman Rekos, posted Nov. 9.
In another family photo taken from Cape Cod, she stands in the back with her hand on her mother's shoulder as her family sits in the sand.
Condolences poured in for the Rekos family, who posted photos of Jessica in her honor, including one where she is in the arms of a relative, wearing a princess's tiara.
In a statement to the Washington Post on Sunday, Jessica's parents Krista and Rich said their daughter "loved everything about horses."
"She devoted her free time to watching horse movies, reading horse books, drawing horses and writing stories about horses. We had promised her she could have her very own horse when she turned 10. She asked Santa for new cowgirl boots and a cowgirl hat," her parents said in the statement.
Jessica was the Rekos's first born and they said she enjoyed being the big sister to her two little brothers, Travis and Shane. Jessica loved doing research on Orca whales, one of her passions after seeing the movie "Free Willy" last year. In October, she got a chance to visit Sea World and see a live Orca. She spent time, her family said, writing in her journals and making up stories.
Jessica, her family said, "started our family, and she was our rock."
"She had an answer for everything, she didn't miss a trick, and she outsmarted us every time," the statement said. "We called her our little CEO for the way she carefully thought out and planned everything. We cannot imagine our life without her. We are mourning her loss, sharing our beautiful memories we have of her, and trying to help her brother Travis understand why he can't play with his best friend. We are devastated, and our hearts are with the other families who are grieving as we are."
-- Washington Post
***
They called her "Avie."
She was a curly-haired kid who shared the passion of her parents, Jennifer Hensel and Jeremy Richman, for keeping active outdoors, according to her father's online postings and family acquaintances.
Avielle Richman took riding lessons on a pony named Betty at Zoar Ridge Stables and had none of the timidity around the big animals one might expect of a 6-year-old. Inspired by Merida, a character in the animated movie "Brave," she took up archery last summer, firing arrows at a backyard target during breaks from watching the Olympics on television inside.
She did a lot of summer reading that required trips to the library, and her parents rewarded her with an outing for lunch at a restaurant called My Place. She liked too many books to have just one favorite, and got out her crayons for Harry Potter coloring books.
She had a black cat named Molokai who somehow defied gravity to reach the fireplace mantel; Molokai was caught just as a paw dipped into the fish bowl.
Avielle's family roots were in Connecticut, and they moved back there in 2011 after living in San Diego. She received a kindergarten diploma from Sandy Hook Elementary School in June, and the family took a road trip across eight states to visit Iowa.
She turned 6 nine days before Halloween and blew out the candles on a cake with white frosting and pink trim. The family went to the Castle Hill Farms fall festival and roamed through the pumpkin patch to find the perfect Halloween jack-o'-lantern.
By then, first grade was well underway.
Just before school started, her father, Jeremy, marveled online: "Our little hummingbird is starting first grade tomorrow."
-- Washington Post
***
When Lauren Rousseau was in fifth grade, she had a teacher she loved. Always bubbly and outgoing, the young Lauren would come home and tell her parents or her two younger brothers about Mr. Hochsprung and what they did in class that day: tap a maple tree to learn about botany and how syrup was made, or learn how to make apple cider with a press.
She had talked about becoming a teacher since she was a small child, her mother, Teresa Rousseau, said in a statement. Her father, Gilles Rousseau, said it was in fifth grade that she knew for sure: She wanted to be a teacher like "Mr. H."
In November, after several years of substitute teaching, catering and working at Starbucks, she was hired to be a full-time substitute teacher at Sandy Hook Elementary School. In one of the inevitable links of small-town life, her principal, Dawn Hochsprung, was the wife of George Hochsprung — Mr. H.
On Friday, Rousseau and Dawn Hoschsprung were both killed at Sandy Hook.
"We will miss her terribly and will take comfort knowing that she had achieved that dream," Teresa Rousseau, her mother, said.
"She was always on social media talking," said Bill Leukhardt, Teresa Rousseau's longtime. "She really liked going to Broadway shows."
A graduate of the University of Connecticut, Rousseau was also an avid fan of the women's basketball team, sometimes going to games. She received her master's in elementary education from the University of Bridgeport.
But it was school that Rousseau most loved to talk about. She would tell her dad about the things the children did that day, how one of them had learned something in a new way, and about Sandy Hook's principal. He wasn't surprised that she loved Dawn Hochsprung.
"She's the kind of person you meet and five minutes after being around her, you want to hug her and give her a kiss — a very likable, warm person, a wonderful person."
As Rousseau's father tried to understand how something so cruel could happen at a place his daughter loved so well, he also mourned for the loss suffered by someone else: George Hochsprung.
— Kenneth R. Gosselin; Washington Post
Statement from Terri Rousseau, mother of Lauren:
The Connecticut State Police confirmed at 1 a.m. today that our beloved Lauren was among the victims of the Newtown shooting. Lauren wanted to be a teacher from before she even went to kindergarten. We will miss her terribly and will take comfort knowing that she had achieved that dream.
Lauren Gabrielle Rousseau was born June 8, 1982 in Danbury, where she lived for most of her life. She was a graduate of Danbury High Schood. She had a bachelor's degree from the University of Connecticut and a master's degree in elementary education from the University of Bridgeport. She had worked as a substitute teacher in Danbury, New Milford and Newtown before she was hired in November as a permanent substitute teacher at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown.
***
For 18 years, Mary Sherlach went to work as the school psychologist at Sandy Hook Elementary. She was the person children could see if they had difficulty keeping up in class, if they had emotional problems, or if they simply wanted to talk.
"She considered what she was doing as God's work — that's all you need to know about her," her husband, William Sherlach, a Morgan Stanley financial consultant, told the Washington Post by telephone from the family's home.
Sherlach, 56, was in a meeting at Sandy Hook with Principal Dawn Hochsprung when they heard gunfire Friday morning, according to news accounts. Sherlach and the principal bolted from the meeting to run toward the sound of the gunfire.
To her colleagues, Sherlach was known for her steady commitment to her work, which required that she navigate complex issues such as dyslexia, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, chronic misbehavior and whatever emotional issues children might bring to school from home. She served on numerous districtwide committees, including the conflict resolutioncommittee, according to a biography on the Newtown Public Schools website.
"She was an extremely dedicated professional," said Sandra Zuccarello, a Sandy Hook reading teacher who, overcome with emotion, abruptly ended a phone call with the Washington Post.
Sherlach lived in Trumbull and was married with two adult daughters — one a high school chorus teacher in New Jersey and the other a graduate student at Georgetown University. Sherlach wrote in the biography that she and her husband, Bill, enjoyed traveling and spending time at their lake house in the Finger Lakes in upstate New York. Her hobbies were gardening, reading and the theater.
Sherlach is survived by two sisters and two brothers, one of whom is her twin, according to Jeanne Stocker, a childhood friend.
"I truly enjoy working with the SHS staff, parents and children and am always ready to assist in problem solving, intervention and prevention," she wrote.
— Kenneth R. Gosselin; Washington Post
***
Vicki Soto greeted the new school year as she always had: with unbridled enthusiasm.
"I absolutely love teaching first grade," she wrote in her biography on the school's Web site. "I look forward to an amazing year . . . with my amazing students!"
Soto was the fun one, the kind of teacher who sent a September newsletter to parents with funny self-portraits of all her students in the margins. When she started out as a substitute teacher at Sandy Hook Elementary, she was an instant hit with students, who loved hearing her stories about growing up in Stratford.
"The kids would say, 'Oh, Ms. Soto is subbing in your class today? You're so lucky,' " said Tess Mubarak, a former student.
Soto, 27, later became a first-grade teacher, a job she had coveted since she was a first-grader herself. She had earned all the necessary credentials. But it was a certain girlishness — ("I also love flamingos and the New York Yankees," she enthused in her bio) — that children responded to.
She, in turn, was devoted to them.
Soto was a first-grade teacher in Room 10 next to where the shooting began. She hid her students and by thinking quickly, she is credited with saving many of the children in her class.
Adam Lanza, according to sources familiar with the investigation, walked in, shot her and went back into the hallway looking for another class. The source said there's no doubt the suspect would have fired at more students if he had seen them.
She died, authorities told the family, trying to protect her students.
The last time her cousin Jim Wiltsie saw her was Thursday night, at the wake of a child who had died suddenly of spinal meningitis. One of Soto's younger sisters used to babysit the child. The cousins chatted briefly. With the holidays approaching, they expected to see each other soon.
"She put herself between the gunman and the children," said Wiltsie, a police officer. "Her instincts as a teacher kicked in."
Victoria Soto grew up in Stratford, the oldest of four children in a public-service-oriented family. Her father works for the state transportation department. Her mother is a nurse. Her aunt is a teacher.
Bright and studious, Soto graduated from Eastern Connecticut State University, where she double-majored in educationand history. But there was never any doubt about her priority.
Soto's lifelong ambition was to be a teacher -- a goal she pursued with single-minded purpose. "She focused her mind on that from a very early age," Wiltsie recalled.
Once Soto started working at Sandy Hook five years ago, the school quickly became "the center of her universe," her cousin said. She started out as an intern and a long-term substitute teacher for second- and third-grade classes. Three years ago, she became a first-grade teacher.
She juggled teaching and attending graduate school. She was working toward a master's degree in special education at Southern Connecticut State University.
"Her students weren't her students. They were her kids," Wiltsie said. "That's what she called them."
Tim Snellman, father of a 12-year-old son and 10-year-old daughter who attended Sandy Hook, expected he'd know some of the teachers, but he didn't realize how close the tragedy would come to his family.
"Victoria Soto was a tutor for my son for a couple of years. She was really good," Snellman said. "Really pleasant girl, really smart, Matthew liked going to her. she knew how to connect with my son. She absolutely did a great a job with him. His grades improved immediately after working with her."
"We just live right down the street, and I spoke to her after every session," two days a week for two years, he said.
"I'm so proud of her. Because of what she did, there are parents who can have Christmas with their children," childhood friend Jessica Zrallack said at a vigil outside Stratford town hall on Saturday, shivering in the middle of the somber crowd. "She's a real hero. I wouldn't have expected anything less of her. I don't think there's one person who could say anything bad about her."
"We lost a very special person. She was living her dream – she wanted to be a teacher, but look at the price she paid for it," Zrallack said.
"She was always a good person. I remember her back to first grade. We were in the same class in fourth grade — the Soto family was like a second family to me, and she was very family involved," said Aquiles Rodriguez of New York City.
"When I heard about the shooting, I thought that was really bad. But when I heard the story that it was her," Rodriguez said, pausing and looking to the ground. "When I heard it was her, I just got on the train to come up and be with the fam."
"Hug your loved ones," Carlee Soto, one of her sisters, wrote on Twitter the morning after the shooting. "Tell them how much you love them because you never know when you'll see them again. Do this in honor of Vicki."
— Mara Lee; Kenneth R. Gosselin; Don Stacom; Washington Post
***
Even as a toddler, Benjamin Andrew Wheeler had the bright eyes and comedic timing of a performer. His father, David, was a longtime actor. His mother, Francine, recorded bouncy children's music. And Ben loved cracking them both up.
In a "happy birthday" video for Ben's grandfather — which was posted online in 2008 and featured big brother Nate drawing a green, yellow and purple birthday robot — Ben went off-script with his own improvisations. Instead of birthday wishes, he kept giving hearty shout-outs to Grandpa's wife, Kay-Kay, to his parents' clear delight.
"He was a feisty little 6-year-old," said family friend Sophfronia Scott. "He and my son loved to run and jump and throw leaves and everything you thought a young boy would love to do."
Ben was creative like his parents. He painted kid pictures and studied piano with his mother, who gives lessons. The Sunday before he died, he had a recital with fellow students.
"Spirited" is how Rabbi Shaul Praver of the Adath Israel congregation in Newtown put it. Though Ben and his family were members of Trinity Episcopal Church, they once attended a Hanukkah celebration at the synagogue.
"There's always some brave individual who goes up to the dance floor to get everybody involved," Praver said. "That was Ben Wheeler."
Ben's comedy was a hit among the under-10 set. Scott's son, Tain, 8, recalled that when they would watch TV together, Ben would offer his own voice-overs for TV characters. Ben would replace a bit of dialogue, such as "follow the flashing light," with the much more popular "follow the flashing butt."
"That's what kids do," Scott said.
The adults were some of his biggest fans.
When the grown-ups and kids gathered at David Wheeler's birthday party last year, Darryl Gregory, Scott's husband, performed a playful song titled "Too Many Kids in This House."
As Ben and the children were laughing, getting swept up in the rollicking tune, Ben cut in with a pretty important question: What does he mean there are too many kids in this house?
The house went wild.
"There were times we would say, 'Ben is smarter than all of us,' " Scott said.
On Monday, the Wheeler family released the following statement:
Ben Wheeler was an irrepressibly bright and spirited boy whose love of fun and excitement at the wonders of life and the world could rarely be contained. His rush to experience life was headlong, creative and immediate.
He was a devoted fan of his older brother, Nate, and the two of them together filled the house with the noise of four children. He loved the local soccer program, often running across the field long after it was actually necessary, but always smiling and laughing as he moved the ball nearly always at full tilt.
He was becoming a strong swimmer and loved his lessons. Eager to learn, he couldn't wait to get to school to see his teacher and his growing group of new first grade friends. Ben was also a member of Tiger Scout Den 6 which met at the Sandy Hook Volunteer Firehouse. Earlier in December, Ben performed at his piano recital and sitting still long enough to play one piece was an accomplishment he reveled in.
He loved The Beatles, lighthouses, and the number 7 train to Sunnyside, Queens. In a conversation with Francine before school on Friday, he said, "I still want to be an architect, but I also want to be a paleontologist, because that's what Nate is going to be and I want to do everything Nate does."
The family's statement said Ben was born in Manhattan and moved to Newtown in 2007 with his parents, Francine and David Wheeler, and Nate, who is now 9.
-- Washington Post
A statement from the family of Benjamin Wheeler:
Ben Wheeler was an irrepressibly bright and spirited boy whose love of fun and excitement at the wonders of life and the world could rarely be contained. His rush to experience life was headlong, creative and immediate. He was a devoted fan of his older brother, Nate, and the two of them together filled the house with the noise of four children. He loved the local soccer program, often running across the field long after it was actually necessary, but always smiling and laughing as he moved the ball nearly always at full tilt. He was becoming a strong swimmer and loved his lessons. Eager to learn, he couldn't wait to get to school to see his teacher and his growing group of new first grade friends. Ben was also a member of Tiger Scout Den 6 which met at the Sandy Hook Volunteer Firehouse. Earlier in December, Ben performed at his piano recital and sitting still long enough to play one piece was an accomplishment he reveled in. He loved The Beatles, lighthouses, and the number 7 train to Sunnyside, Queens. In a conversation with Francine [his mother] before school on Friday, he said, "I still want to be an architect, but I also want to be a paleontologist, because that's what Nate is going to be and I want to do everything Nate does."
***
Allison Wyatt was a six-year-old student of Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown.
Kate Capellaro of All for Kids in Ridgefield last say Allison over the summer and described her to the New Haven Register: "She was a very shy girl, she was quiet and kept to herself, but she would smile at things. If a kid did something funny, she'd be laughing."
Messages on a Facebook tribute for Allison read "Our prayers go out to you and your family," and "Rest in Peace and look over those who love you."
-- Courant Staff Report
A statement released by Cheyanne and Ben Wyatt, Allison's parents:
Allison was a kind-hearted little girl who had a lot of love to give, and she formed special bonds with most people who spent any amount of time with her. She loved her family and teachers especially, but would often surprise us with random acts of kindness - once even offering her snacks to a complete stranger on a plane. Allison loved drawing and wanted to be an artist, often turning parts of the house into an "art studio" with rows of pictures taped to the walls. She loved to laugh and was developing her own wonderful sense of humor that ranged from just being a silly six-year old to coming up with observations that more than once had us crying with laughter.
Allison made the world a better place for six, far too short years and we now have to figure out how to move on without her. She was a sweet, creative, funny, intelligent little girl who had an amazing life ahead of her. Our world is a lot darker now that she's gone. We love and miss her so much.
December 17, 2012
By Rick Green
Monday morning, parents must do what for many will still feel excruciating.
Send their children to school. And try not to worry.
What a regrettable milestone. The safest place isn't that safe at all.
Locked doors, intercom buzzer systems, a cop in every high school and millions of dollars in security improvements cannot stop the terrorists who live among us.
I watched Sunday as the ubiquitous Lt. J. Paul Vance promised us schools will open and they will be safe. I listened as a leading educator said we are all at risk. A school security expert told me it's the world we live in now.
One administrator who remembers the feeling after Columbine told me he, too, is anxious about Monday morning, the first school day after things changed.
This Monday morning, police officers will be among the first to welcome children back at schools throughout Connecticut. It is the horrible new normal.
"Our hearts are broken, but our hands are extended," state Education Commissioner Stefan Pryor said.
He spent Sunday meeting with educators from Sandy Hook Elementary, the first time teachers had come together since Friday's tragedy.
Pryor said the state has brought in a special consultant, David Schonfeld, director of the National Center for School Crisis and Bereavement, to work with Newtown. Schonfeld has prepared "prompts for classroom teachers across the state" to stimulate discussion, Pryor said.
What sticks with all of us are the Friday morning parting words of Robbie Parker, the father of 6-year-old Emilie, one of 20 children to die in the attack on Sandy Hook Elementary School.
"She said she loved me, and I gave her a kiss and I was out the door."
We've all done it hundreds of times, without a second thought. After Newtown, it feels different.
"We do everything we can to make sure my kids and your kids are safe. That's what I've been thinking about all weekend,'' said Tom Moore, assistant superintendent in West Hartford and a former high school principal. "We are all so nervous. This makes the unthinkable thinkable.
"The culture of fear that we have to operate under takes away the innocence of kids and the happiness."
This new culture means schools where drilling for a gun attack becomes as important as the regular fire drill. What saved lives at Sandy Hook wasn't merely heroism. It was the essential fact that these brave Newtown teachers knew what to do. Within seconds of the first shots, they were doing what security experts have trained educators to do without thinking in the years since school attacks have become almost what we expect. Because of that, dozens of children from Sandy Hook Elementary are alive today.
What would save more lives? Armed guards and searches at the door are one solution that works, most of the time, in Israel and at many of our own government buildings. A careful evaluation of every person before they can regularly enter a school — is there a restraining order? a gun permit? a history of mental illness? — would give teachers and principals a lot less to worry about.
But do we really need to add this to the growing list of responsibilities for teachers and principals? Very likely.
Without a doubt, we will soon see new restrictions on who can even enter a school, let alone whether they can travel to a classroom. That is the grim new reality.
"You need to look at all people,'' said Michael W. Wanik, a security consultant who has spent a career making office and workplaces safer. "Who belongs and who doesn't?''
The best schools are welcoming, happy places. That's what we risk losing under this new normal. When a classroom of 6-year-olds is slain, we are at a tipping point.
Before Newtown. And after.
"There is not a parent in this country who is not going to worry about sending their child to school tomorrow morning,'' Joseph Cirasuolo, executive director of the Connecticut Association of Public School Superintendents, told my colleagues at FOX CT Sunday morning. "We are all at risk here unless we do something about taking guns away from people who do this kind of thing."
Anything that make assault weapons harder to acquire is an important, urgent beginning. Making sure mentally ill people have access to help, in a time of budget cuts and scaling back, will be even harder. We also must remember what Moore, the West Hartford administrator, reminded me: "Schools need to be happy."
"Children's resiliency always stuns us,'' he said. "We need to make sure that kids know they are safe."
It starts Monday morning, with that goodbye kiss.
December 17, 2012
NEWTOWN — At the Lathrop School of Dance on Main Street, a gaggle of pint-sized 4-year-olds hopped around and flapped their arms and wiggled their tail feathers Monday morning, practicing the Chicken Dance under the tutelage of Miss Diane.
It might have taken the would-be ballerinas a little longer to get to class this morning. The road outside Diane Wardenburg's studio was clogged with satellite trucks, lined up to capture the nearby funeral for Jack Pinto, shot dead in his elementary school Friday at the age of 6.
"My husband asked me Sunday morning before church: 'What are you going to do?'" Wardenburg said.
She answered: "We're teaching."
It was a defiant act of normalcy in a town struggling to make sense of the word. A day after a gunman shot his way into the Sandy Hook Elementary School and killed 20 children and six adults, one grieving father, Robbie Parker, told reporters, "My wife and I don't understand how to process all of this and how to get our lives going."
That same sense of loss and dread lingers throughout this small town, represented in endless makeshift memorials, in lawns studded with angels and crosses and flags, in handwritten signs over store windows, in still-shocked residents greeting each other with wordless embraces.
Wardenburg did not know any of the young students killed. But that doesn't spare her the heartache.
"It's our children," she said simply. "I turn on the TV from 5 to 7 and have my coffee and cry period — like everybody."
Two of the 20 children were buried Monday: Jack Pinto, a New York Giants fan, and 6-year-old Noah Pozner, who loved tacos and wanted to be a doctor.
Journalists from around the world watched as mourners lined up in the drizzling rain for Jack's service. Little boys congregated outside the white clapboard church, bracing against the cold in team jackets and oversized sport coats.
Fifteen miles south, in Fairfield, scores of local and state police stood guard at the Abraham L. Green & Son Funeral Home as family and friends arrived for Noah's funeral.
White balloons were tethered to street signs and to weighted, gold-colored bags. A neon green sign was fastened to a large oak tree, with the words, "Our hearts are with you Noah."
Noah's twin sister also attended Sandy Hook Elementary. She survived the massacre.
Fairfield police Lt. James Perez described the mood inside the funeralhomeas "a thick, deep sadness coupled with intense love."
Perez was not spared that sadness. "To see such a small casket left me literally speechless," he said.
Noah's funeral lasted more than an hour and, as mourners filed out, a few stopped to talk to the dozens of reporters assembled across the street.
Roxanne Dunn, 42, sobbed, her hands clutching her face as she shook.
"This is horrifying," she said. "He touched us all."
It was all she could muster.
Newtown's pain has rippled far beyond the community, and people streamed toward the town all day Monday, creating a bumper-to-bumper traffic jam that stretched back to the highway.
In the center of Sandy Hook, less than a quarter-mile from the elementary school, an improvised memorial grew larger and larger as visitors brought tokens of sympathy. The result was a massive pile of balloons, flickering votives, Beanie Babies and Build-A-Bears, bouquets, rosary beads, prayer cards, poetry verses, plastic angels and paper cranes. The lower branches of a towering pine were laden with cards and pictures, some delivered from Ohio, Michigan and elsewhere.
A truck driver from Canada on his way to a delivery in Middlebury parked his rig on I-84 and walked into town to deposit a stuffed white bear adorned with a green ribbon — the elementary school's colors. As the father of a 9-year-old daughter, he said, he figured it was the least he could do.
A trio of lacrosse players from the University of New Haven came to the memorial site after spending the morning running around in a gym with children from the town. The college students played kickball and other games with a group of primary school kids "to help them cope and take their minds off things,'' said Kyle Hurley, a 21-year-old from Rhode Island.
"We just wanted to help," said James Egan, 19, of New York. "And to see them running around with smiles on their faces."
That same impulse brought Tim Engel and Barnabas to Newtown. Engel, a Lutheran minister from the Chicago area, and Barnabas, a nearly 3-year-old golden retriever, are part of a "comfort dog" program run by Lutheran Church Charities.
"Last month, Barnabas and I were in New York and New Jersey after Sandy,'' said Engel, pastor of Holy Cross Lutheran Church in Portage, Indiana.
The group brought nine golden retrievers to Connecticut. Six went to a community center where children had gathered, and three, Barnabas among them, were mingling among the crowd at the memorial site.
"It's been tremendous," Engel said. "The people just come up and embrace the dogs and talk to the dogs."
The dogs "by their very nature impart hope and encouragement," said Engel. "And then they give us the opportunity to talk with people and to pray with people."
Eric J. Pongonis and his wife, April, came to pay their respects. "I've just been crying all weekend thinking about this," April Pongonis said. "I can't sleep at night."
The couple had decided earlier this year to keep their twin 5-year-old daughters in day care for another year instead of enrolling them at Sandy Hook Elementary.
"We witnessed parents running up the hill to the school and that's when it really hit me," Eric J. Pongonis said. "Our girls would have been there."
Near the memorial, four young men, including Fred Knapp, a cousin of slain teacher Victoria Soto, held a cardboard box of green-and-white ribbons with the message "faith, hope, love."
"It's a way to show support," said Thomas Mastrocinque. "We're a small town, we all know each other, we're all in each other's business. There's absolutely nobody from this town, not one person, who doesn't know somebody [who died] or who wasn't hurt by this."
Knapp wore a solid green ribbon in a different shade from the others, similar to ones handed out Saturday night in Stratford at a vigil for Victoria Soto.
"It was her favorite color," he said.
The memorial is not far from the international TV news army that has settled in.
Church Hill Road was clogged with news vans from Boston, New York and Philadelphia. Canadian TV satellite trucksoccupied a large stretch of the United Methodist Church parking lot. Sidewalks were a maze of tripods, cables, high-intensity lights, microphone-wielding broadcasters and burly cameramen.
"No media" signs hung from the doors of several stores, and many people scowled at the hordes of interviewers or pointedly walked away from them.
Tim Snellman sent his 12-year-old-son and 10-year-old daughter down to Norwalk to be with his parents because he wanted to shield them from the media circus. A TV crew from France tried to interview him Friday. When he went out to dinner with his wife, an ABC crew asked to share his table because the restaurant was so crowded.
"You almost feel like they're taking over your town," he said.
Snellman's son was tutored by Soto. His daughter graduated from Sandy Hook Elementary last year. Through his work with the Cub Scouts, he knows two of the families who lost children.
"People have a lot of sympathy for our town. There are a lot of people that have big hearts in this country and around the world," said Snellman. "It's uplifting in one way, but extremely depressing in another way to be known for this."
Back at Lathrop's School of Dance, Wardenburg finished up the day's lesson and found herself thinking about the days ahead. She's determined to have cheer return to her town.
On Monday morning, Wardenburg's son, who is 14, asked her: "Are we having a happy Christmas?"
She said she told him: "Yes, we are."
Courant staff writers Mara Lee, Don Stacom, Matthew Sturdevant and Daniela Altimari contributed to this story.
Honored Judges,
In the hours and days that followed the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School we found ourselves trying to unravel the truth of a story unprecedented in its horror – 20 first-graders systematically slaughtered, along with six women who’d tried to keep them safe. For our journalists, covering Sandy Hook became more than a story; it became a mission, to help our readers take in the incomprehensible and convey the depth of a community’s grief with honesty and respect.
A good deal of what you’ll see in our submission is our online coverage from the first day, as reporters working in the field and tapping sources worked quickly to get information. We aggressively updated our online story, sent out text messages and emails, posted powerful images and engaged our readers on Facebook and through Twitter. We broke several key developments the first day. We kept our readers up to the minute with the latest information while also conveying the terror and pain of the families as they awaited word of their children’s fate. Our work also involved trying to verify – and eventually refute – some of the erroneous information that became part of the story that day.
By the time the first day’s newspaper was published, we had compiled a complete and powerful narrative of the tragedy at Sandy Hook. The stories that appeared in the paper and online in the days that followed provided depth, context and are some of the finest examples of journalism in the Courant’s long and storied history. Working quickly, we were able to tell readers in exacting detail how the shooter had gone from room to room searching for victims; about a quiet loner who inexplicably turned into a mass murderer and about the beloved principal who gave her life trying to protect her students. Within 24 hours of the release of the victims’ names, we’d built a thorough collection of their pictures and stories. A column by staffer Rick Green reflected the extent to which the pain and fear of Sandy Hook was shared by so many.
I’m proud of how our people handled this challenging story. I appreciate you taking the time to read our work.
Respectfully,
Andrew Julien
Winners
Prize Winner in Breaking News Reporting in 2013:
Staff
For its comprehensive coverage of the mass shooting at a movie theater in Aurora, Colo., that killed 12 and injured 58, using journalistic tools, from Twitter and Facebook to video and written reports, both to capture a breaking story and provide context.
Breaking News Reporting
Finalists
Nominated as finalists in Breaking News Reporting in 2013:
Staff
For its vivid coverage of a wildfire that destroyed more than 300 homes, combining on-the-ground reporting with imaginative use of digital tools, including a before-and-after interactive feature that helped displaced fire victims determine the fate of their homes before there was official notification.
The Jury
The Jury
Mike Connelly(Chair )
editor
Traci Bauer
vice president/digital strategy and development
Paul Cheung
global interactive editor
Mark E. Russell
editor
Carol Stark
editor
Winners in Breaking News Reporting
Staff
For its enterprising coverage of a deadly tornado, using social media as well as traditional reporting to provide real-time updates, help locate missing people and produce in-depth print accounts even after power disruption forced the paper to publish at another plant 50 miles away.
No award
No award
Staff
For its comprehensive coverage, in print and online, of the shooting deaths of four police officers in a coffee house and the 40-hour manhunt for the suspect.
Staff
For its swift and sweeping coverage of a sex scandal that resulted in the resignation of Gov. Eliot Spitzer, breaking the story on its Web site and then developing it with authoritative, rapid-fire reports.
2013 Prize Winners
Adam Johnson
An exquisitely crafted novel that carries the reader on an adventuresome journey into the depths of totalitarian North Korea and into the most intimate spaces of the human heart.
Ayad Akhtar
A moving play that depicts a successful corporate lawyer painfully forced to consider why he has for so long camouflaged his Pakistani Muslim heritage.
Sharon Olds
A book of unflinching poems on the author's divorce that examine love, sorrow and the limits of self-knowledge.
Caroline Shaw
A highly polished and inventive a cappella work uniquely embracing speech, whispers, sighs, murmurs, wordless melodies and novel vocal effects (New Amsterdam Records).