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The Virginia State Police confirmed today that yesterday’s second victim was actually the shooter, and that yesterday’s crime is officially being classified as a murder-suicide.
At about 12:06 p.m. Thursday, a still-as-of-yet unidentified man approached the car of Virginia Tech Police Department officer Deriek Crouse in the parking lot adjacent to McComas Hall. The male shot and killed Crouse while he was sitting in his car.
There is video of the shooting on the dashboard camera of Crouse’s car, according to Virginia State Police spokesperson Corinne Geller. That video has not yet been released.
The man then ran toward the Hahn Horticulture gardens’ greenhouses, where he took off his clothes and put them in a backpack.
The man set off on foot away from the shooting location. About a half hour later, Geller said, a Montgomery County Sheriff’s Deputy, who was assisting Tech in the search for the shooter, saw the man walking around the parking lot known as the Cage (also known as the I-Lot).
Geller said the deputy thought the man was acting strangely. “He was a lone man, walking through the lot, with furtive movements. It was a little suspicious,” she said. “His actions walking through caught the deputy’s interest.”
The deputy started to drive through the rows of cars toward the man, to question him. At this time, many people on campus were being stopped and questioned.
But by the time the deputy got to the man, he had killed himself. The deputy found the man laying on the ground. The weapon, which police said today was the same weapon used to kill Crouse according to ballistics testing, was found on the ground near the man.
“Nobody actually witnessed him taking his own life,” Geller said in a press conference this morning.
The man was wearing different clothes when he was found dead in the Cage, because he had changed them in the greenhouses. But the fact that police couldn’t be 100 percent positive it was the shooter immediately was what prompted multiple investigations and lockdowns for hours after the shooting across campus, Geller said.
This morning’s press conference mainly confirmed those facts. Geller, along with VTPD chief Wendell Flinchum, Blacksburg Police Department chief Kim Crannis, and Tech spokesman Larry Hincker, fielded questions from media.
“Things are happening very quickly,” Hincker said. “We are doing our best to keep you posted.”
But as much as Geller and the others were able to tell media, there are still many questions left unanswered.
They were able to say that the man was not a student. He was not connected with the Tech community at all, Geller said.
But who is he? Is he connected to Radford? Was he involved in a carjacking near Radford on Wednesday? Is he even from the area? Does he have a history of mental health issues? Did he have a concealed carry permit for his gun, and where did his gun come from? Did he know Crouse? Did he leave any notes around the location he dropped his backpack? Did he have any other intended targets that he was not able to get to? Those are details still waiting to be filled in that frustrated media outlets in this morning’s conference.
Geller only said there was a “likelihood” that the shooter is connected to Wednesday’s carjacking in Radford, but refused to comment further.
Flinchum also took time during the conference to speak about Crouse, who was a father of five and an Army veteran. Flinchum described this as a “difficult time for this department.”
A version of this article appeared in the Dec 10 issue of the Collegiate Times.
Leave a comment 19 Comments Write a letter to the editor
All letters to the editor must include a name, e-mail, daytime phone number and affiliation to Virginia Tech. Affiliation includes: year and major for students; position and department for faculty and staff; current city for alumni and parents.
I know this is a very sad day for the Hokie nation, but as a recent graduate of Tech, I couldn't be more proud of Virginia Tech's response during this emergency. I hope universities across the country were as impressed with Virginia Tech's immediate and thurough response yesterday as I was. We are a stronger campus, school, and Hokie nation four and a half years after April 16, 2007. Sadly, yesterday we were forced to show the rest of America this... but I am proud we could lead by example.
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This random crime could have happened on any college campus given the shooter was not connected to the university. VT is not notoriously more violent now because of this either. It's just a shame this had to happen at the same place a massacre happened 5 years earlier.
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Yes, and it could've happened on any CITY STREET even. It just so happened to be on campus. So sad for his family...
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You HAVE to spell names right.
There is no "c" in Deriek's first name and yet I count it spelled wrong 6(!) times.
Please make the correction for the sake of the officer.
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The public knows so little, but what we do know is tragic. I hope the authorities can tell us the shooter's identity and (more importantly) the motives so this can make some sense.
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How can you give to the scholarship fund?
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https://sites.google.com/site/hokiesforcrouse/
you can donate there :)
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https://sites.google.com/site/hokiesforcrouse/ here it is
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Hopefully he really did kill himself, versus being shot by the female deputy. I look forward to seeing the coroner's report, so we can see if he was shot in the back, or shot in the head at close range.
The sooner they release his name, the sooner we can look this guy up online. Hopefully law enforcement does not get Facebook/Myspace to pull the dude's page, as is known to happen. Release his name so we can dig up information on this guy.
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They will pull the FB and MySpace accounts IF this person has one. Its part of the Protocol apparently.
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The sooner they release his name, the sooner we can start digging up dirt about him online. That is, of course, unless law enforcement persuades Facebook/Myspace to yank his page (which has happened, so that we only get law enforcement's description of character).
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What is "digging up dirt" on Myspace or Facebook going to do? What are you going to find that a detective can't?
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Creepy, much? It's none of your business what kind of profile he has. What do you think it's going to say, "Personal Beliefs- kill a cop?"
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Blacksburg is an amazing place and I'm proud to have VT as an anchor for business, tourism, the arts and education. It's odd, in NYC last week and a man opened fired on the subway during a fight with his girlfriend, shooting her and two passengers. That item did not make anything more than the local news. What is unusual is we don't expect this to happen in places like VT. But unfortunately, our society is not one of safety. Look at the shooting murder of 70 in Norway. Look at jason Cho. Look at the murder rates of DC, Philly, Richmond, New ORleans, Detroit...on and on and on. We owe it to ourselves to reaffirm our pride in our hometown, our adopted hometown, and treat each other with respect and conduct ourselves with integrity. I'm proud to be here and this is not going to sway me or my family for one second. My heart goes out to the officer killed and I only hope we can find the truth behind what went down yesterday.
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I would like to thank the CT for keeping us all up to date via Twitter - they had more information than any news outlet. A job VERY well done!
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My heart goes out to the family of the officer. May God give them strengh and carry them through this horrible tragedy. God Bless You All!
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