SANDY HOOK, Conn.—President Barack Obama was to join a grieving community here Sunday as authorities continued to piece together how a gunman stormed an elementary school and killed 20 children and six adults, in one of the worst mass shootings in U.S. history.
The White House said Mr. Obama would meet with the families of children and adults slain at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., and would speak at a vigil set for 7 p.m. Eastern time.
European Pressphoto Agency A man carries flowers Saturday down the street from the Sandy Hook Elementary School, in Newtown, Conn. where 20 children were among those killed in Friday's shooting.
The 26 victims who were shot inside the school on Friday were each hit by more than one bullet, most of them from the high-powered semiautomatic rifle wielded by the 20-year-old suspect, the state's chief medical examiner said on Saturday.
Authorities worked into Saturday morning at a temporary morgue on the school grounds to identify the bodies, H. Wayne Carver II said, as state authorities released the names of those killed at the school.
- Charlotte Bacon, 6
- Daniel Barden, 7
- Rachel Davino, 29
- Olivia Engel, 6
- Josephine Gay, 7
- Ana Marquez-Greene, 6
- Dylan Hockley, 6
- Dawn Hochsprung, 47
- Madeleine F. Hsu, 6
- Catherine V. Hubbard, 6
- Chase Kowalski, 7
- Jesse Lewis, 6
- James Mattioli, 6
- Grace McDonnell, 7
- Anne Marie Murphy, 52
- Emilie Parker, 6
- Jack Pinto, 6
- Noah Pozner, 6
- Caroline Previdi, 6
- Jessica Rekos, 6
- Avielle Richman, 6
- Lauren Rousseau, 30
- Mary Joy Sherlach, 56
- Vicki Soto, 27
- Benjamin Wheeler, 6
- Allison N. Wyatt, 6
On Saturday afternoon, authorities revealed the truth behind the grim numerical toll: a list of names, overwhelmingly female, heart-rendingly young. Twenty of the 26 victims in the school were just 6 or 7 years old.
"I believe they were all first-graders," Mr. Carver said.
Six adults also were killed in the school, including school psychologist Mary Jo Sherlach, the oldest victim, at age 56.
Shock, Tragedy at Connecticut School
Getty Images A flag flies half mass outside of a residence near the Sandy Hook School on Saturday.
Mr. Carver said his staff was to do an autopsy Sunday on the two remaining dead in the spree: the suspect, 20-year-old Adam Lanza, who took his own life at the school, and his mother, Nancy Lanza, 52, whom Mr. Lanza shot and killed in the house the two shared in town.
Mr. Lanza's body was found close to the rifle and two handguns he carried, police said, and he is believed to have taken his own life.
Police said they believe Mr. Lanza forced his way into the school Friday morning through a plate-glass partition next to a locked front door, possibly by shooting his way through. But why he had done so remained a mystery, despite waves of speculation among survivors, news reporters and law enforcement.
The quaint New England town on Saturday shared stories of heroics, including those of teachers who died trying to save their young charges, while at the same time it convulsed in grief. Some victims' families retreated in silence to mourn, in houses guarded by state police or private security. But some spoke out.
Police say that alleged gunman Adam Lanza, 20, appears to have broken into Sandy Hook elementary School to gain access to the building. Photo: Associated Press.
Standing before TV cameras Friday night, Robbie Parker, 30 years old, held back tears as he spoke of his murdered daughter, 6-year-old Emilie, and offered condolences to the other victims of the massacre.
"This includes the family of the shooter," Mr. Parker said. "I can't imagine how hard this experience must be for you, and I want you to know that our family and our love and our support goes out to you as well."
Dr. H. Wayne Carver, Conn. Chief Medical Examiner delivered a press conference late Saturday after completing examinations of all the children killed in the school shooting in Newtown, Conn Friday. Photo: AP
Miles away, a local official in Kingston, N.H., read a statement from James Champion, Nancy Lanza's brother, who offered condolences but was too overcome to speak.
"The whole family is traumatized by this event," Kingston Police Chief Donald Briggs Jr. said.
The suspect's father, Peter Lanza, issued a statement of condolence Saturday, according to the Associated Press.
"We too are asking why," it read in part. Peter and Nancy Lanza divorced in 2009, according to court records.
The forcible entry helped solve one of the many unanswered questions about the massacre Friday: how a heavily armed young man was able to pass through the locked security doors of an elementary school.
School staff members saw evidence of forced entry as they were ushered out of the school, said Mary Ann Jacob, a clerk at the school library who hid with others in a storage room during the shooting spree. As they left the building, Ms. Jacob said she saw that the plate-glass window next to the building's front door was broken.
But much remained unanswered, and much of what had been assumed in the rush of the crisis turned out to be wrong. It was incorrect, Lt. J. Paul Vance of the Connecticut State Police said, that Mr. Lanza's mother had had any connection to Sandy Hook Elementary, where early reports suggested she had been a teacher.
Law-enforcement officials initially said an assault rifle had been discovered in a car in the school's parking lot. In fact, said Mr. Carver, the medical examiner, it had been the primary weapon used in the killings.
And a television report that Mr. Lanza had been in some form of altercation at the school earlier this week also appeared false, Lt. Vance said.
Investigators were still trying to glean Mr. Lanza's motives, and why he had chosen to attack the school in Sandy Hook. Lt. Vance said investigators at the scene "did produce some very good evidence" that could be used in "hopefully, painting the complete picture as to how—and more importantly why—this occurred."
The investigation unfolded in the middle of a reeling community—decked out with Christmas decorations but packed with strange out-of-town vehicles, police cruisers and news trucks. The school was expected to remain an active crime scene at least through Sunday, said Lt. George Sinko of the Newtown police. Sandy Hook is a village within Newtown.
In addition to the buildings, investigators were searching a large number of vehicles in the parking lot. The suspect's car remained outside the school on Saturday morning.
One of the victims, first-grade teacher Vicki Leigh Soto, 27, died trying to protect the children she loved, her cousin Jim Wiltsie said. When the gunfire started on Friday morning, she gathered her students and tried to hide them in a classroom closet, officials told her family.
"In doing so, she put herself between the kids and the gunman's bullets," said Mr. Wiltsie, who is a police officer. "That's how she was found. Huddled with her children." He said he didn't know if her students were among the dead.
Diane Day, a therapist at the school, was sitting with the principal, a parent and other staff members for a meeting when she heard gunshots.
"At first we heard a bunch of kids scream, and then it was just quiet and all you could hear was the shooting," Ms. Day said Friday.
Principal Dawn Hochsprung and the school psychologist, Ms. Sherlach, both of whom where killed, leapt from their seats and ran out to help, Ms. Day said. "They didn't think twice about confronting or seeing what was going on," she said.
Without a lock to secure the door, a teacher at the meeting pressed her body against the door to hold it shut, Ms. Day said. That teacher was shot through the door in the leg and arm. "She was our hero," Ms. Day said.
Carrie Usher, a fourth-grade teacher, said she believed the principal turned on the campus loudspeaker system, which broadcast sounds of "screaming and crying" through the school to warn others.
Ms. Usher's class, meanwhile, was in the library, and they hid in the closet.
"The gunfire was just unbelievable. It felt like it lasted for five minutes," the teacher said Friday. "It wouldn't stop." No one in her class was hurt.
In the minutes after the shooting stopped, students were taken to a nearby firehouse that became the staging area for anxious parents who quickly streamed to the campus when the news broke. Many remained there until late Friday night, still awaiting word of their missing children, officials said.
There, some were informed of their children's deaths by Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy, whom an aide described as "stricken" in delivering the news.
Rabbi Shaul Praver of Congregation Adath Israel in Newtown said that when the governor came in to announce all the children had been killed, not everyone immediately understood, leaving one parent to shout out, "Does that mean my kid is dead or alive?"
Once the governor was clear that all children were killed, Rabbi Praver said some parents were in shock and others erupted into wailing. One man was hitting himself in the head, said Rabbi Praver. "He wanted to roll himself into a ball," he said. "It was just a horrible thing to see a person in that state of mind."
Across the country, some officials turned to issues of policy, including some calling for additional gun-control measures and to focus on treating the mentally ill.
That included some from Connecticut, like Democratic Rep. John Larson, who called for votes on background checks, bans on high-capacity clips and other measures.
"Politics be damned," Mr. Larson said in a statement. "Of the 12 deadliest shootings in our nation's history, half of them have happened in the last five years. And there is not a single person in America who doesn't fear it will happen again."
But it seemed too soon for policy for officials on the ground, said Democratic Rep. Christopher Murphy, who was recently elected to the U.S. Senate but has represented Newtown in the U.S. House for three terms.
"For those of us who are on the ground here, there's no way for us to think about the policy implications right now," Mr. Murphy said. "But I don't begrudge anyone else who's beginning to raise these issues."
"Obviously, this is going to be an awful week," he said, "because we'll begin to have the funerals, and the real grieving will start."
People in the region are "concerned and scared," said Mark Boughton, the mayor of nearby Danbury, where extra police will be on hand Monday morning outside the city's schools to provide reassurance to parents and students.
Mr. Boughton said a bipartisan commitment to funding better treatment for the mentally ill was long overdue, and while he said his city and Newtown had developed effective emergency-management procedures, there was little to stop an unpredictable threat like the one visited on Sandy Hook.
"If somebody shoots the window in, it doesn't matter that you've got a doorbell in front of the door," he said.
—Josh Dawsey, Will James, Lisa Fleisher, Alison Fox and Aaron Zitner contributed to this article. Write to Ted Mann at ted.mann@wsj.com
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