Police Cite Person of Interest in Va. Tech Dorm Killing; Dead Gunman Yet to Be ID'd

April 16, 2007 — -- At least 33 people are dead in the worst mass shooting in modern American history.

In a Tuesday morning interview with "Good Morning America's" Diane Sawyer, Virginia Tech president Charles Steger said the shooter who killed himself was a student of Asian descent who resided in a Virginia Tech dormitory. He referred to the man as "the second shooter" and said they are still investigating the possibility of two shooters.

"Well there's one bit of information, that it appears that the second shooter was a resident in a dormitory," he said.

"There may be others, we just don't know."

In a press conference on Monday night, Steger gave a detailed timeline of the morning's tragic events.

He said a 911 call reporting a shooting at a dormitory was made at approximately 7:15 a.m. While police were trying to assess what they first believed was a domestic dispute, they received a second 911 call, nearly two and a half hours later, that reported shootings on the opposite side of campus. According to the Virginia Police Chief Wendell Flinchum, officials have not definitively linked the two shootings.

Campus police have identified a person of interest who is not currently in police custody. Police say the person of interest is a male who knew the female killed in the double homicide at the West Ambler Johnston Hall dormitory.

Two guns were recovered, a 9 mm pistol and a .22-caliber pistol.

Flinchum said they have ruled out the possibility of a murder-suicide in the first shooting, and that investigators have a preliminary identification of the shooter involved in the Norris Hall shooting. The police will not release the identity at this time.

When asked to describe the scene at Norris Hall, where the second shooting took place, Flinchum called it, "one of the worst things I've seen in my life."

While Flinchum would not name any of the victims, he did say university staff members were among the dead.

The student newspaper's Web site, collegiatetimes.com, printed a list of 14 faculty and staff that were confirmed dead, including four faculty members and 10 students.

Some students question why administrators did not cancel classes after the first shooting, and why it took more than two hours to inform the university community via e-mail about the shootings.