CHRISTIANSBURG, Virginia – Virginia Tech's president on Friday defended his actions during the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history, saying in court: "I tried my best."
President Charles Steger testified at a wrongful death trial brought by the families of two students killed during the April 2007 campus attack. The civil suit claims university officials delayed warning the campus of the initial two shootings on campus and then attempted to cover up their missteps. In the end, 33 people, including the gunman, were dead.
Steger said officials delayed sending a warning to avoid panic on campus and allow the university to identify the first two victims and contact their families. Student Seung-Hui Cho shot and killed those students in a dormitory before continuing his attack hours later at a classroom building.
Asked by an attorney for the parents if he erred, Steger said, "That's not my conclusion. We did the best we could ... based upon the information we had at the time."
The parents have said they want an apology from Steger. Attorneys for the families of Julia K. Pryde and Erin N. Peterson claim their daughters and others might have survived if the university had warned the students earlier.
The state, the defendant in the case, has maintained that officials believed the first two killings were domestic violence and did not pose a wider threat to campus.
The dorm shootings occurred shortly after 7 a.m., but no campus-wide alert was issued until 9:26 a.m. An email only stated a "shooting incident" had occurred but did not mention the gunman remained at large. It urged students to "be cautious" but did not recommend any other action.
The warning that a "gunman is loose on campus" was released through "blast" emails to everyone on campus at 9:50 a.m., nearly 10 minutes after Cho had chained the doors of the classroom building.
The Prydes and the Petersons are seeking $100,000 each and a full official accounting of events that day. They were the only eligible families who didn't accept their share of an $11 million state settlement.
A state panel that investigated the shootings concluded that officials erred in not sending an alert earlier. The lag in issuing a campus warning also brought Virginia Tech a $55,000 fine from the U.S. Education Department. The school is appealing.
