Editor's note: The files linked in the archive are of two points of origin. The files labeled "This material was gathered in August of 2008" have been available for some time to those who visited University Relations and is also accessible through the Prevail Archive. The other documents were released for the first time on Dec. 16 as part of the settlement. These files include all of the Cho-related correspondence, have never before made public and are largely independent of Prevail and University Relations content.
Documents released to the families of April 16 victims by the university yesterday unveil a portrait of Seung-Hui Cho previously unrevealed.
Related: Archive
In e-mails between roughly half a dozen members of the English department, Cho's eerie mannerisms and the professors' repeated attempts to reach him come to light in a way that is both intimate and unsettling.
English instructor Cheryl Ruggiero's chronicle of an Oct. 19, 2005 meeting between Cho and then-department head Lucinda Roy begins, "I am struck immediately by Seung Cho's physical aspect -- he has a choice of seating, the chair opposite mine close to Lucinda's desk or the sofa, and he chooses the sofa, as far as possible from either of us -- understandable. When I'm introduced and shake his hand, his hand is very sweaty and does not clasp my hand."
The Collegiate Times obtained a number of the documents released to families yesterday, a selection of which appear online at this time. The Collegiate Times will be adding to this archive during the winter break.
The meeting, one of several according to the e-mails, was called to address a violent poem Cho wrote and presented in Nikki Giovanni's poetry course on Oct. 10 in the fall of 2006. That poem -- which Cho later called satire in a lengthy e-mail to Roy on Oct. 21 -- described a previous class discussion on food and eating habits in foreign countries. Cho wrote of one of the conversations' participants, "I don't know which uncouth, low-life planet you come from but you disgust me. In fact, you all disgust me!"
While nearly all of Cho's e-mail correspondence consists of one-line responses to professors entreaties -- "I don't know. I'm not all that good at talking. I don't know," he wrote on Feb. 9, 2006 to English professor Bob Hicok in response to Hicok's e-mail about Cho's classroom reticence -- his response to the meeting with Roy and Ruggiero runs nearly three 8.5" x 11" pages in length.
In conversational -- if somewhat awkward -- prose, Cho writes that issues with Giovanni's teaching style and the lackluster approach he believes Giovanni brought to the classroom led him to write the offending poem.
"I was simply making a point that we seem to spend more time talking about random things than on anybody's poems in a poetry class, and it was certainly not an attempt in any way to offend anyone," Cho wrote.
He contrasts his shyness with what he perceives as a lack of effort on behalf of his classmates. "I might not say much after I read, but neither do many people ... it feels like hell when I [read], but I do it," Cho wrote. Cho concludes with, "I know all this mess that I've made with the class is all my fault. I don't know what to say ... sorry, sorry. I'm not sure if I fully or appropriately responded to your concern with me ... sorry if I said something wrong."
Tech released 13,700 pages of information yesterday to those who lost family members or who survived the April 16 shootings. The information was released only to the families, "because there are records unique to each victim and available only to them or the families of victims, the university is making it available only to settlement participants until February 1, 2009. This will allow them time to use and inspect the materials and to ensure that they are satisfied that no otherwise protected information (unique to them or their loved one) is exposed," according to a release from university relations.
The Collegiate Times has not released any documents with family-specific information, instead focusing on documents relating to Seung-Hui Cho and the work of the university Policy Group, a cadre of the universities top administrators, during and after the shooting.
After Feb. 1, public users in Newman Library and the Library of Virginia in Richmond will be able to access the archive through terminals at both locations. The information will "eventually" be able for access to anyone on-line, according to the release.
The archive, which uses propriety search software created by Servient, a Web hosting service and software vendor, cost $440,000, according to the release.
Any record pertaining to Cho, except his medical records, will be released, according to the release.
Tech spokesman Larry Hincker said he was "disappointed" in the Collegiate Times' on-line publication of the documents because it was the university's intent to allow families to "digest" the information contained within the archive before it became publicly available.