Stranger Comforts Sandy Hook Students Who Ended Up on His Lawn After Shooting

By NAYELI CHAVEZ-GELLER

Dec. 19, 2012

Gene Rosen becomes emotional as he describes how he took in six students who were sitting at the end of his driveway who had just run from the school to escape the deadly massacre.

Gene Rosen becomes emotional as he describes, in an interview with The Associated Press, Monday, Dec. 17, 2012, that after Friday's shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, he took in six students who were sitting at the end of his driveway who had just run from the school to escape the deadly massacre. (Mary Altaffer/AP Photo)

Gene Rosen was feeding his cats in his yard last Friday when he noticed six children sitting on his lawn and a man saying "It's going to be alright! It's going to be alright!"

Mary Altaffer/AP Photo

Gene Rosen becomes emotional as he describes,... View Full Size

Mary Altaffer/AP Photo

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"They [the children] were crying and they were out of breath," Rosen, 69, recalls. He could have never imagined what had just happened. The children Rosen found on his lawn were students from Victoria Soto's classroom, one of the Newtown teachers who was killed that day.

Rosen, a retired psychologist and grandfather, kept the children distracted until their parents came for them. He recalls one woman who came in search of her son but Rosen hadn't seen him.