The U.S. town shattered by last week’s school shooting prepared on Monday for the first two funerals, including the one for the youngest victim, while officials weren’t sure whether the school itself would ever reopen.
The first funerals were planned for six-year-old Jack Pinto and Noah Pozner, who had his birthday two weeks ago. They would be buried a day after President Barack Obama said he will use “whatever power” he has to prevent similar massacres.
Investigators have offered no motive for the shooting, and the Connecticut community struggled to comprehend what drove 20-year-old Adam Lanza to shoot children, most of them six and seven years old.
All the victims at the school apparently were shot more than once, and some of them were shot at close range, Chief Medical Examiner Dr. H. Wayne Carver has said. Police said Lanza was carrying an arsenal of ammunition big enough to kill just about every student in the school if given enough time. He shot himself in the head just as he heard police drawing near, authorities said.
The shootings have restarted a debate in Washington about what politicians can to do help gun control or otherwise. Mr. Obama has called for “meaningful action” to prevent killings.
Versions of the AR-15, which Lanza used, were outlawed in the United States under the 1994 assault weapons ban. That law expired in 2004, and Congress, in a nod to the political power of the gun-rights lobby, did not renew it.