Hope in the Mourning

By Robert C. Johnston

At about the same time, Patrick Purdy, 26, was walking through a back gate at the school. He had an AK-47 assault rifle, two pistols, and a nightmarish plan that, to this day, nobody fully understands.

Within moments, Purdy, a former student at Cleveland Elementary, opened fire on the youngsters in the playground. When his shooting spree ended nearly two minutes later, five children were dead and 29 others were wounded. Purdy also lay dead, having turned a gun on himself. Geng's sons were uninjured, but a bullet had shattered the femur in her left leg.

Lam Nguyen, meanwhile, lay huddled for 30 minutes on the floor of his classroom, where he ran during the shooting. "I was running as fast as I could," he recalls, "and a bullet hit the wall a couple of inches in front of my face. If I ran...