Illinois university shooter identified
Steve Kazmierczak
By John Worthen
For Between Editions
The Chicago Tribune is reporting the identity of the man who sprayed bullets inside a lecture hall at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, Ill., Thursday.
Six were killed.
According to the DeKalb Police Department, it’s former student Steve Kazmierczak. DeKalb police asked Florida authorities Friday morning to assist in speaking to his father, Robert Kazmierczak.
The latest round of gun-related violence is sickening, to say the least. We’ve heard, over the past year or so, of school shootings, mall shootings, department store shootings and other senseless violence.
This time it happened at Northern Illinois University, but it could have just as easily been at South Arkansas Community College right here in El Dorado.
When is our nation going to face the fact that we’re in a violence-related crisis? The sad truth: There probably isn’t anything we can do about it.
THE LATEST:
The Associate Press is reporting: Kazmierczak became erratic after halting his medication and carried a shotgun to campus inside a guitar case, police said Friday. The man, 27-year-old former student was also wielding three handguns during Thursday’s ambush inside a lecture hall.
Two of the weapons — the pump-action Remington shotgun and a Glock 9mm handgun — were purchased legally less than a week ago, on Feb. 9, authorities said. They were purchased in Champaign, where Kazmierczak was enrolled at the University of Illinois.