The gunman who killed 20 children and six adults at a Connecticut elementary school fired 154 rounds in less than 5 minutes, selecting high capacity magazines from a home arsenal stocked with swords, knives and a cache of guns, officials said.
Investigators also found a newspaper clipping about a mass shooting in the home that Adam Lanza shared with his mother, along with a gun safe in his bedroom, receipts from shooting ranges and National Rifle Association (NRA) certificates for both of them, according to court papers released on Thursday.
To carry out the second-deadliest school shooting in US history, Lanza used 30-round magazines at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy said after the previously sealed searches of Lanza’s car and home were made public.
As more details about the shooting came to light, US President Barack Obama urged lawmakers not to forget those shot to death in Newtown three months ago.
The Dec. 14 rampage started at the Lanza family home, where authorities say the 20-year-old shot dead his mother, Nancy Lanza, and then drove to the school he once attended.
Armed with an AR-15-type assault rifle and two handguns, he killed the 20 children, six staff members and himself.
Searches of the house by police turned up a cache of guns, three samurai-style swords and boxes of bullets, along with items that could offer some clues on Adam Lanza’s thinking.
Among them were a 2008 New York Times clipping on an Illinois school shooting and books on Asperger’s syndrome and autism. Friends of the Lanza family had described Adam Lanza as having Asperger’s syndrome, which is a form of autism.
The attack, which Obama called the worst day of his presidency, reignited a fierce debate on gun violence and gun regulation in the US.
The Second Amendment of the US Constitution protects the right to gun ownership.
The NRA called after the shooting for armed guards to patrol public schools, while gun-control advocates called for tighter restrictions on both the process to buy guns and the types of guns and ammunition clips that may be sold.
The court papers said police searching the Lanza home found an Enfield bolt-action rifle, a Savage Mark II rifle, a revolver, three samurai-style swords with blades measuring up to 71cm and a 208cm wood-handled pole with a blade on one side and a spear on the other.
FLYBY: The object, appears to be traveling more than 60 kilometers per second, meaning it is not bound by the sun’s orbit, astronomers studying 3I/Atlas said Astronomers on Wednesday confirmed the discovery of an interstellar object racing through the solar system — only the third-ever spotted, although scientists suspect many more might slip past unnoticed. The visitor from the stars, designated 3I/Atlas, is likely the largest yet detected, and has been classified as a comet, or cosmic snowball. “It looks kind of fuzzy,” said Peter Veres, an astronomer with the International Astronomical Union’s Minor Planet Center, which was responsible for the official confirmation. “It seems that there is some gas around it, and I think one or two telescopes reported a very short tail.” Originally known as A11pl3Z before
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