Va. Tech police chief to testify in shooting trial

Palm Beach Post ^ | 7 Mar 2012 | STEVE SZKOTAK

[smokingfrog]

CHRISTIANSBURG, Va. — Attorneys at a trial seeking an accounting of the deadly 2007 rampage on the Virginia Tech campus are expected to question the chief of the university's police force Wednesday to explain his actions during the first two killings on campus.

Police Chief Wendell Flinchum is among the witnesses scheduled to testify in a wrongful death lawsuit brought by the parents of two students who were among the 33 killed during the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.

Flinchum's officers were the first to investigate the slayings at Ryan Clark and Emily Hilscher in a dormitory on the morning of April 16, 2007, and they concluded the students were likely the victims of a domestic dispute — a jealous boyfriend or girlfriend. That conclusion led officials to believe the slayings were targeted and that the killer was not a threat to the campus.

As a result, a campus-wide alert about the killings was not released by university administrators for more than 2 1/2 hours, after student gunman Seung-Hui Cho had chained the doors of Norris Hall and killed 30 people in the classroom building, then himself.

Attorneys for the parents of Julia K. Pryde and Erin N. Peterson have said if the university had warned the campus earlier of a gunman on campus, others including their daughters might have survived Cho's killing spree. They are seeking $100,000 each and a full official accounting of the morning of April 16, 2007.

[VA_Gentleman]

Wow, they’re addressing this five years later. Good thing they hopped right on this one.

[frithguild]

You would move slowly too if you were blind.

[smokingfrog]

I’m still waiting for the day when one of these school shooting victims will sue the school for not allowing them to defend themselves by being armed.