Sandy Hook Final Report

[TechMan]

http://www.scribd.com/doc/187053363/Sandy-Hook-Final-Report

It was fewer than four minutes from the time the first 911 call was received until the first police officer arrived at the school. It was fewer than five minutes from the first 911 call, and one minute after the arrival of the first officer, that the shooter killed himself. It was fewer than six minutes from the time the first police officer arrived on SHES property to the time the first police officer entered the school  building. In fewer than 11 minutes twenty first-grade pupils and six adults had lost their lives.

[Ned Hamford]

When seconds count the police are minutes away.

[Hawkmoon]

When seconds count the police are minutes away.

Yeah.

Read the timeline in that report, and then consider that the Newtown chief of police has recently gone on record to defend his officers' response.

Don't ... think ... so.

[Boomhauer]

Yeah.

Read the timeline in that report, and then consider that the Newtown chief of police has recently gone on record to defend his officers' response.

Don't ... think ... so.

Less than 4 minutes is a damn good response time from 911 call to emergency services arrival.

While of course I agree that one needs an immediate ability to respond to an attacker the speed of police response is not at fault here...the fact that there wasnt an immediate defense mechanism available (i.e., CCW) is the problem.

[Hawkmoon]

Less than 4 minutes is a damn good response time from 911 call to emergency services arrival.

Especially considering that Newtown, CT, is a rather spread-out suburb, on that point I would agree. However --

I just looked at Google maps. The first officer arrived behind the school, on Crestwood Drive. Yes, it's directly behind the school -- but there's no entrance to the school property from Crestwood, the property line has a high fence along it.

More importantly:

The call came in at 9:35:39 and the alert was broadcast at 9:36:06. So far, so good.

First officer arrives (at a place that offers him no access to the school) at 9:39:00 -- three minutes into the incident.

Two more officers arrive, and park near the ball field at 9:39:13. At least they're on the driveway and don't have to scale a fence to even get onto the property, but they're 100 yards from the entrance to the building and I can't help thinking that a patrol car can roll faster than they could run.

LAST gunshot is reported at 9:40:03. Four minutes into the incident (since the alert broadcast), and a minute after three officers arrived at the site.

First officer enters the school at 9:44:47. Irrespective of transit time, over which they had no control, the first officer didn't enter the school until FOUR MINUTES AND 47 SECONDS  AFTER the first officer arrived at the site. Supposedly, the training protocol for active shooters in schools ever since Columbine has been for the first officer(s) on the scene to enter immediately and attempt to engage or neutralize the shooter(s). They are NOT supposed to wait for backup. These guys waited almost FIVE MINUTES before they entered the building, AFTER they were at the scene.

That's inexcusable.

Time line:

9:35:39 - First 911 call to Newtown Police Department is received.

9:36:06 - Newtown Police Department dispatcher broadcasts that there is a shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

9:37:38 - Connecticut State Police are dispatched to SHES for active shooter.

9:38:50 - CSP are informed that SHES is in lockdown.

9:39:00 - First Newtown police officer arrives behind SHES on Crestwood Rd.

9:39:13 - Two more Newtown officers arrive at SHES and park on the driveway near the ball field. Gunshots are heard in the background.

9:39:34 - Newtown officer encounters unknown male running along the east side of SHES with something in his hand.

9:40:03 - Last gunshot is heard. This is believed to be the final suicide shot from the shooter in classroom 10.

9:41:07 - Information is relayed as to the location of the last known gunshots heard within SHES, the front of the building.

9:41:24 - Newtown officer has unknown male prone on ground, starting information relay regarding possibly more than one shooter.

9:42:39 - Newtown officer calls out the license plate of the shooter’s car.

9:44:47 - Newtown officers enter SHES.

9:46:23 - CSP arrive at SHES.

9:46:48 - CSP enter SHES.

[Ned Hamford]

I didn't intend to denigrate. The response time was amazing. No fault falls on law enforcement in my mind. Any prevention that should have been falls to some different fields.

[RoadKingLarry]

The response time was amazing.

Almost too amazing

[Hawkmoon]

I'll parse the time line to show what was wrong:

9:39:13 - Two more Newtown officers arrive at SHES and park on the driveway near the ball field. Gunshots are heard in the background.

...

9:40:03 - Last gunshot is heard. This is believed to be the final suicide shot from the shooter in classroom 10. [Obviously, at the time they did not know that this would be the last gunshot heard.]

...

9:44:47 - Newtown officers enter SHES.

That's FIVE MINUTES AND 34 SECONDS between the arrival of the two cops who went to the front entrance, and when a cop actually made entry. FIVE AND A HALF MINUTES.

By contrast:

9:46:23 - CSP arrive at SHES.

9:46:48 - CSP enter SHES.

CSP is Connecticut State Police. The State Police entered within less than HALF a minute after arriving.

In retrospect, the killing was already done and the shooter offed himself when he heard the sirens approaching. But the responding officers did not know that. The first responders had no reason to believe that there wasn't still an active shooter (or shooters) inside the building. The protocol is supposed to be to immediately enter and engage the shooter(s). The Newtown Police did not do this.

[Boomhauer]

You and I do not have the details of what transpired in that time. We do not know if the officers were trying to gain entrance to the school, either by forcible entry or finding the main entrance point that had been (as we now know) opened by the killer. The information concerning that time period is not covered in the report.

The CSP time between arrival and entry is great...but did they follow the Newtown officer's point of entry? It's a lot faster to find your way in when someone else has located it or made an entry point for you already.

[cordex]

Local doctrine is first three units on scene make entry as a team, not as individuals. It may be they were attempting to locate each other on foot (and probably moving cover to cover the whole way) and having trouble making radio contact because everyone was keying up at once.

I too wish that someone onsite had been able to stop the shooter in a hail of return fire, though.

[Hawkmoon]

Local doctrine is first three units on scene make entry as a team, not as individuals. 

"Local" meaning local to you, or to Newtown, Connecticut? I have never seen or heard any department, anywhere, espouse this "doctrine" at any time since Columbine.

[griz]

What stands out to me is the in the second room the shooter went to, the ones that survived, all kids, ran away.  I've always wondered about the idea of locking down a school in an active shooter situation.  I know there are disadvantages to having people, kids especially, running loose.  But at least this time those people in room 10 would probably have lived if they had left with the others.

[vaskidmark]

Without getting into the specifics of Room 10, moving targets are almost always harder to hit.

Along with some very shaky speculatin that spree killers may not focus on moving targets when "offered" stationary ones.  The profilers who put that out a few years ago were never, in my book, very accurate in their guesses but seemed to have a following amongst the professional psychopathic sociologists - and you can pArse that either way.

stay safe.

[cordex]

"Local" meaning local to you, or to Newtown, Connecticut? I have never seen or heard any department, anywhere, espouse this "doctrine" at any time since Columbine.

Local to me.  That doctrine is current as of about a month ago when they last did active shooter training.  Well after Columbine, or Sandy Hook even.

"Make entry immediately" is a relative thing.  The old standard was to secure the perimeter and wait for SWAT or its local equivalent to arrive to handle the entry and clearing.  That could take hours from initial call to the first badge through the door.  The new standard is to make entry when the first viable team can be assembled.  Our local doctrine is any 3 officers, but that probably varies from department to department and may well be a single officer in some jurisdictions.  Even at three units the response time is much, much faster than waiting for a SWAT/ERT callout, for everyone to gear up, get caught up and deploy - minutes instead of hours.  Still slower than a teacher dropping the shooter in their tracks, but much faster than waiting for the ninjas to get ready.

Whether three should be the magic number or not is up for debate.  Sending in multiple officers as a team certainly decreases the chances the shooter will kill off responders piecemeal and keep up with their spree, but the flip side is that most of the time when confronted with armed opposition these scumbags end up doing the world a favor anyway - which would seem to imply that going in individually would be better.  Then again, when you get something like the Norway massacre where the bad actor is dressed up like a cop, individual officers running around would make the killer's job easier as he could blend in more easily.

[Blakenzy]

Yes, you can't look for a magic formula to defeat what will be a wild, random event. In a killing spree, it will always end up being every man for himself.

[Ned Hamford]

Yes, you can't look for a magic formula to defeat what will be a wild, random event. In a killing spree, it will always end up being every man for himself.

Or kintergardeners...

[Perd Hapley]

How is this report going to affect the conspiracy/false flag ideas about the case? Weren't some people basing those ideas (partially) on the fact that the final report had not yet been released?

[Boomhauer]

How is this report going to affect the conspiracy/false flag ideas about the case? Weren't some people basing those ideas (partially) on the fact that the final report had not yet been released?

They will claim it's falsified or a coverup...These kinds of people never let go of their conspiracy. They will believe what they claim is true to the end...9/11 Troofers, JFK, chemtrails, FEMA cattle cars/death camps, etc.

[Perd Hapley]

I was hoping for a more specific answer, but thanks.

[Hawkmoon]

How is this report going to affect the conspiracy/false flag ideas about the case? Weren't some people basing those ideas (partially) on the fact that the final report had not yet been released?

This isn't the final report. This is an interim, summary report. The state police are still working on the final report.

http://www.nhregister.com/opinion/20131125/editorial-sandy-hook-report-both-late-and-incomplete

[MechAg94]

So was an AR15 used as the primary weapon as reported?  I assume yes, but I didn't seeif that was confirmed.

[Perd Hapley]

This isn't the final report. This is an interim, summary report. The state police are still working on the final report.

http://www.nhregister.com/opinion/20131125/editorial-sandy-hook-report-both-late-and-incomplete

OK, thanks.

Sedensky has been given an extraordinarily difficult task: To weigh the public’s right to know details of the slayings against concerns from the victims’ families that they would have to effectively re-live the horror of losing their loved ones upon seeing details of their deaths in the report, and widely publicized in the media.

What the...? Is this the first high-profile violent crime in our nation's history? How do they not know how to deal with this? 

[Hawkmoon]

So was an AR15 used as the primary weapon as reported?  I assume yes, but I didn't seeif that was confirmed.

The report does not actually come out and say that. In fact, the report may be a masterpiece of disinformation -- presenting a false conclusion without actually making any completely untrue statements. Since someone (ahem) has mentioned conspiracy theorists, I suppose I could take that as a cue to mention that I know three different firearms trainers who each have contacts within the Connecticut State Police. As far as I know none of the three know one another, but they have all stated that their CSP sources say the AR-15 jammed and that most of the victims were killed with the Glock. That might explain why the AR-15 was found with the sling ripped off at one end -- possibly broken in a fit of anger.

The same three trainers also agree that their sources have said Lanza was buzzed into the school and didn't shoot his way in. Their version is that the responding officers had to shoot their way in because there was nobody in the office at that point to push one of the three buttons to open the front door.

[Nick1911]

So was an AR15 used as the primary weapon as reported?  I assume yes, but I didn't seeif that was confirmed.

The introduction starts with:

On the morning of December 14, 2012, Adam Lanza, the shooter, age 20, went to Sandy Hook Elementary School (also SHES) in Newtown, Connecticut, where he shot his way into the  building and killed twenty children and six adults and wounded two other adults, all with a Bushmaster Model XM15-E2S rifle. The shooter then took his own life with a single shot from a Glock 20, 10 mm handgun. From the time the doors of the school were locked at 9:30 a.m. until the time it is believed the shooter killed himself at 9:40:03, fewer than 11 minutes had elapsed.

It seems clear that the AR was the primary weapon.

[Perd Hapley]

Since someone (ahem) has mentioned conspiracy theorists, I suppose I could take that as a cue to mention that I know three different firearms trainers who each have contacts within the Connecticut State Police. As far as I know none of the three know one another, but they have all stated that their CSP sources say the AR-15 jammed and that most of the victims were killed with the Glock. That might explain why the AR-15 was found with the sling ripped off at one end -- possibly broken in a fit of anger.

If the truth about the weapon used was covered up, I wonder how we will ever know. A lot of people with contradictory evidence are going to have to come forward and confirm that the Glock was used on the children, before it's anything but a rumor.