A year later, no final report on NIU (Northern Illinois University) shooting

Chicago Tribune ^ | February 13, 2009 | Michael Tarm

[Zakeet]

If Donald Grady had his way, the Northern Illinois University police chief would never again hear the name of the gunman who opened fire from a lecture hall stage one year ago Saturday, fatally shooting five students in a geology class before killing himself.

"Why give the guy the notoriety he sought?" says Grady, the lead investigator charged with issuing a final police report on the Feb. 14, 2008 attack. "That might only encourage someone else with mental issues to try and do the same thing one day."

But with a full year passed and no sign of the investigative report, there's no chance of fulfilling Grady's wish to banish Steven Kazmierczak's name from public discourse.

Grady brushes aside critics who insist his findings are long overdue. Just days before the first anniversary of the shootings, the gruff, no-nonsense police chief said there's no dispute about what he deems the most important facts.

"You want to know who the suspect is? You know that. He's dead," said Grady, his booming voice rising. "You want to know how many guns he had? You know that. You want to know how many victims there were? You know that. What else do you need to know?"

Indeed, it took only hours for authorities to piece together the rampage that lasted mere minutes:

Kazmierczak, a 27-year-old former NIU student, stepped from behind a screen on the lecture hall stage, carrying at least four guns. He fired dozens of shots into a geology class, killing five and wounding 19 others before turning a gun on himself.

[Zakeet]

So, if the police really know all the key facts in the shooting, why isn't the investigation wrapped up?

[Esther Ruth]

http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/kazmierczak/index

[livius]

BECAUSE...

A former Northern Illinois University newspaper reporter says the killer who gunned down five innocent students in an apparently unprovoked attack liked to study Arabic and the terror group Hamas. "'Assalamo alikum,' he [Steve Kazmierczak] would say to me, which means 'peace be with you' in Arabic," wrote Rasmieyh Abdelnabi in an essay published in the Chicago Sun-Times.