This article will be updated as more information becomes available.
VIDEO UPDATE:
UPDATE: The New York Post is reporting that the shooter demanded that people state their religion and that he would then shoot anyone in the head who said they were Christians. According to that publication:
A woman who claimed to have a grandmother inside a writing class in Snyder Hall, where a portion the massacre unfolded, described the scene in a tweet.
“The shooter was lining people up and asking if they were Christian,” she wrote. “If they said yes, then they were shot in the head. If they said no, or didn’t answer, they were shot in the legs. My grandma just got to my house, and she was in the room. She wasn’t shot, but she is very upset.
UPDATE: CBS News reports that a blog purportedly written by the killer spoke longingly of the fame given to mass shooters:
Posts on an online blog that appears to belong to Mercer reference multiple shootings, including one in Virginia in August that left a television news reporter and cameraman dead. The last upload on the blog was Wednesday. when a documentary about the Newtown shooting was posted.
In one post on the blog about Vester Flanagan, the man who killed the reporter and cameraman in Virginia, Mercer apparently wrote, “I have noticed that so many people like [Flanagan] are alone and unknown, yet when they spill a little blood, the whole world knows who they are. A man who was known by no one, is now known by everyone. His face splashed across every screen, his name across the lips of every person on the planet, all in the course of one day. Seems like the more people you kill, the more you’re in the limelight.”
UPDATE: The shooter has been identified as 26-year-old Chris Harper Mercer. The New York Times reports that he lived in the local area, but did not attend the school.
ROSEBURG, Oregon — State emergency officials first reported that 7-10 people are dead–with some officials’ reports claiming as many as 13–and at least 20 injured in a school shooting situation at a community college. The school, Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon, is reported to have approximately 3,000 students enrolled. Officials were careful to clarify that these are initial reports and the figures are still being investigating.
Oregon Governor Kate Brown reported that the shooter was a 20-year-old male. A student who was in one of the targeted classrooms reportedly stated that the shooter was demanding that his intended victims “stand up and state their religion.” That local report stated:
Kortney Moore, 18, from Rogue River, was in her Writing 115 class in Snyder Hall when one shot came through a window. She saw her teacher get shot in the head. The shooter was inside at that point, and he told people to get on the ground. The shooter was asking people to stand up and state their religion and then started firing away, Moore said. Moore was lying there with people who had been shot.
An emergency official said that the local sheriff was currently leading the investigation, but that federal agents from the BATFE were on scene. The Douglas County Sheriff, John Hanlin, held a press conference providing the public with an update, but provided few details:
A student who was on campus during the shooting spoke with Breitbart News and described his experiences:
Breitbart News spoke with a Department of Homeland Security agent on the scene. The agent said that they are present to secure federal facilities in the area and that 117 such facilities in the DHS region, but only two exist in the Roseburg area.
Breitbart News’ veteran reporter Lee Stranahan is on scene near the community college in Roseburg, Oregon.
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