2010-01-01 00:03:00
JANET KELLEY
One man was gunned down as he walked to catch a bus to work on a summer morning.Another was gunned down in front of his rural Earl Township home after a night out with friends.The deaths of two other men in the city, one shot and one stabbed to death, also remain unsolved.The......
2009-12-31 00:02:00
TOM MURSE
The aughties started with all the promise of the a millennium. We had survived the Y2K scare, the economy was rolling right along and everyone thought things could only get better.We were wrong.This decade in Lancaster County has been marked by perhaps the worst tragedy in its histo......
2009-12-03 20:21:00
LARRY ALEXANDER
An Amish school was evacuated Nov. 27 after two men were seen peeking in its windows, police said.According to East Lampeter Township police, a white minivan with a New Jersey license plate pulled into the driveway of the school on Clearview Road, between Leaman Avenue and Rockvale Road, a......
2009-09-20 00:20:00
HELEN COLWELL ADAMS
Strange as it might seem, Charles Carl Roberts IV and Jonas Beiler had one thing in common. Both Roberts, the man who shot five Amish girls to death and wounded five others in their Nickel Mines school in 2006, and Beiler, the family counselor and chairman of the Angela Foundation, lost youn......
2009-07-14 00:01:00
DIANA MARTIN
People walking down South Queen Street have the opportunity to examine history in a unique way — through more than 200 years of newspaper pages.Headlines such as "Men walk on moon" and "More than 1,300 lives lost as the liner Titanic sank" join images of President......
2009-06-06 00:56:00
CINDY HUMMEL
One could say the Lampeter-Strasburg Class of 2009 went out with a bang Friday night in the school's performing arts center.Principal Carroll Staub noted the class had the honor of being the largest L-S class ever, with 277 graduates, along with having the highest PSSA scores. The clas......
2009-05-31 16:01:00
CLAUDIA W. ESBENSHADE
Forgiveness comes in many forms.Fifteen years ago, Holly Payne was hit by a drunk driver, and it changed the course of her life forever. Then 22 years old, Payne had just graduated from the University of Richmond and planned to travel the world and teach in Hungary. She dreamed of becoming......
2008-10-21 00:26:00
BRIAN WALLACE
When a Manheim Central High School senior died of a suspected drug overdose Sept. 21, Greg Kiehl knew the girl's classmates would be devastated.So Kiehl, coordinator of student services for the school district, called Mary Bowers, safety and security officer for Lancaster-Lebanon Inter......
2008-10-09 02:06:00
PATRICK BURNS
A quick response by police and Terre Hill Borough residents helped land an Ephrata man in jail Tuesday a little more than an hour after police say he pulled a lunchtime bank robbery.Investigators allege a masked Samuel Lee Martin, 36, walked into Susquehanna Bank, 100 W. Main St., Terre Hi......
2008-10-04 00:43:00
BRIAN WALLACE
A federal judge ruled this week that Penn Manor School District acted properly when it prohibited a student from wearing a T-shirt with images of guns on it.But the judge ordered the district to strike from its policies restrictions on student expression and dress he deemed "unconstit......
2008-09-28 00:15:00
JEANNETTE SCOTT
The deputy coroner hurried to the scene, only to wait. And wait. Hours passed as police with paper shoe covers stepped in and out of the schoolhouse in Bart Township. Deputy coroner Janice Ballenger could not enter until they were done. But she could wait no more. In a moment, sh......
2008-07-14 18:42:00
LINDA ESPENSHADE
Mary Steffy has taught thousands of people with anger issues that uncontrolled anger is often rooted in childhood trauma.The Rev. Grover DeVault helps state police process trauma they experience as they respond to violent situations. As a retired Army chaplain, he also has helped thousands......
2008-07-12 01:22:00
MICHAEL YODER
Police work is in the DNA of Lt. Col. Frank Pawlowski.His father was a former Pennsylvania state police trooper, and 30 years ago that heritage prompted Pawlowski to pursue the same career path.Now the former commander of Troop J in Lancaster has risen to the lead role of the state&......
2008-07-10 00:48:00
CARLA DI FONZO
Like many, Jessica Dickey said watching the coverage of the 2006 Nickel Mines shootings caused her to feel many things at once."I was riveted, devastated and brokenhearted," said the Waynesboro native who now lives in New York City, where she works as an actor, writer and acting ......
2008-07-10 00:30:00
CARLA DI FONZO
These days, Col. Jeffrey Miller's friends and colleagues keep dropping hints about complimentary football tickets."Everyone keeps mentioning how much they like the Steelers or Eagles, and how free tickets to the games would be nice," said Pennsylvania's state police chief......
2008-07-09 01:56:00
STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS
The NFL has recruited Col. Jeffrey Miller, Pennsylvania's state police chief, for a new position that will cover all aspects of stadium security from fan behavior to signal stealing.But Miller, who begins work as director of strategic security Aug. 18, said Tuesday there was far more t......
2008-06-24 00:43:00
MADELYN PENNINO
State police Commissioner Jeffrey Miller told a group of about 50 educators Monday that preventing school violence starts with being prepared.Miller spoke at Millersville University as part of the school's two-day conference on school violence.Miller began his presentation with ......
2008-06-21 01:04:00
JOHN WALK
More than a year and a half has passed since five young lives were lost in the Nickel Mines tragedy in Bart Township.During that time, Millersville University Dean of Education Jane Bray has been busy preparing a conference to focus on how schools can be better prepared if such a tragedy s......
2008-05-02 00:58:00
STAFF REPORT
Ten editors, reporters and photographers whose work appeared in the Intelligencer Journal in 2007 have captured prizes in statewide journalism contests.Awards in a contest sponsored by Pennsylvania Associated Press Managing Editors will be presented tonight. Keystone Press Awards from Penn......
2008-03-14 01:43:00
BRETT HAMBRIGHT
A 17-year-old boy shot his teenage girlfriend in the head, then turned the .22-caliber rifle on himself after an argument late Wednesday night at a Little Britain Township mobile home, officials said.Michael Ryan Hollow was already dead from a single gunshot to the temple when police arriv......
2008-02-01 02:41:00
CARLA DI FONZO
Sarah Morton's original plan was to go to West Virginia and drum up some inspiration from the local coal miners.But the artist said she slowly changed her mind the longer she stayed at her secluded studio with only her paint supplies, books and her dog Fletcher to keep her company.......
2008-01-08 02:03:00
BRETT HAMBRIGHT
Tom Arnold walked away from his final assignment as Lancaster County senior deputy coroner on Sunday and asked himself a question he was often left with during his four-year term. "Why?" he said softly as he stepped out of a northern Lancaster County home that was the site o......
2007-12-30 00:20:00
HELEN COLWELL ADAMS
Another year. Another cable-news spotlight on Lancaster County. In 2005, it was David Ludwig killing his teenage girlfriend's parents in Lititz. In 2006, it was Jesse Dee Wise killing six family members in Leola — followed by Charlie Roberts killing five Amish schoolgirls in......
2007-12-29 12:33:00
TOM MURSE
Lancaster County residents looking back on 2007 will remember this year as being particularly violent, considering the notorious slayings of the Haines family and popular businessman Ray Diener. They will recall a community on edge as the killers remained on the loose. But they might also recal......
2007-12-04 01:44:00
P.J. REILLY
Every year from 1996 through 2006, the Lancaster County commissioners met at the Farm & Home Center to talk to the public about the proposed county budget.The center on Arcadia Road in Manheim Township is centrally located in the county and has a large meeting hall and a big parking lo......
2007-11-10 00:34:00
Elizabeth Eisenstadt-Evans
The Amish get something many American Christians seem to have a hard time grasping: We are citizens of God's kingdom first. As such, we have loyalties that may very well put us at odds with the state.Recently, the boundaries between the kingdom of this world and the kingdom of......
2007-10-17 19:28:00
MARCELLA PEYRE-FERRY
Christiana Borough police Officers Richard Frinfrock and Heather Archer were honored Oct. 2 for their efforts last year at the West Nickel Mines School shootings.Borough council presented the officers with commemorative lapel pins from Bart Fire Company. The pins are being given only to th......
2007-10-04 02:29:00
PATRICK BURNS
Jane Johnson of Strasburg arrived at Bush's town hall-style meeting Wednesday in full Bush-Cheney regalia in a Honda Accord flying a trio of American flags.Johnson was one of the few people lucky enough to obtain a ticket to see the president at The Jay Group offices in West Hempfield ......
2007-10-02 11:35:00
JACK BRUBAKER
On a warm early-autumn morning, not quite so clear as the memorably bright morning of Oct. 2, 2006, Nickel Mines was quiet today. Horse-drawn buggies clip-clopped through town. Nearby farmers harvested field corn. Roadside stands sold plump pumpkins and gourds. On the outside, life in Nick......
2007-10-01 00:21:00
JENNIFER TODD
As the funeral procession turned into the tiny cemetery of Georgetown United Methodist Church, Dwight Lefever couldn't believe his eyes.Behind a shed, out of sight from prying media eyes, about 50 members of the Amish community had gathered.When the hearse came to a stop, the Am......
2007-09-30 00:18:00
MARIA COOLE
Sitting with her ambulance crew Thursday night watching Voganville and Fivepointville fire companies compete in a tug of war at the Ephrata Fair, Janice Ballenger looks comfortable and happy. She is among friends, smiling and cheering. This is home for Ballenger, and she has no desire to live anywhe...
2007-09-28 11:16:00
JANET KELLEY
Trooper Samuel Laureto stood poised, gun drawn, outside the West Nickel Mines School that morning last October. When the first gunshots sounded, Laureto thought, "He's shooting into the air. Ain't no way he's shooting those kids." Laureto and the other troopers starte......
2007-09-28 11:05:00
JACK BRUBAKER
The parents, children and teacher at the new Amish school at Nickel Mines released a statement this morning thanking all who have supported them since the schoolhouse shootings nearly a year ago. They particularly thanked police, firefighters and others who responded to the crisis on Oct. 2, 20......
2007-09-28 11:04:00
JANET KELLEY
It's been nearly a year since the shootings in Bart Township, and Dr. Michael Reihart is still caring for the people involved. Last year, Reihart and his fellow emergency room workers at Lancaster General Hospital treated several of the Amish children wounded by a suicidal gunman. This......
2007-09-26 11:26:00
JACK BRUBAKER
I do know I was frightened and bewildered. Feelings I had never known to exist and didn't have names for went coursing through me. When my mind drifted to what evil things Mr. Roberts might do, I forced myself to think about other things.
— from "The Happening."...
2007-09-25 11:20:00
JACK BRUBAKER
A helicopter hovered over Nickel Mines one morning last week. Hearing the insistent, chopping propellers, residents looked up with apprehension. They flashed back to last Oct. 2, when news gatherers from all over the world flew close to photograph a disaster scene and medical personnel dro......
2007-09-25 00:46:00
MADELYN PENNINO
When three scholars sat down to write a book together about the Nickel Mines Amish school massacre, there wasn't exactly a meeting of the minds at first.But it didn't take long for Donald B. Kraybill, Steven M. Nolt and David L. Weaver-Zercher to gel their ideas and writing styles ......
2007-09-24 00:39:00
JENNIFER TODD
Hours after Charles Carl Roberts IV shot 10 female students inside West Nickel Mines Amish School on Oct. 2, members of the Amish community visited the gunman's family.In the days following the massacre, which left five girls dead and five seriously wounded, the Amish buried their own ......
2007-09-23 00:21:00
JON RUTTER
"Shoot me first," 13-year-old Marian Fisher told Charles Carl Roberts IV as he stood over 10 Amish girls last Oct. 2 in the little wooden schoolhouse in Bart Township. Roberts straight away shot Marian and four other students to death at the West Nickel Mines School on White Oak Road.......
2007-09-22 23:56:00
DONALD B. KRAYBILL, STEVEN M. NOLT and DAVID L. WEAVER-ZERCHER
The following is excerpted from Amish Grace by Donald B. Kraybill, Steven M. Nolt, and David L. Weaver-Zercher (September 2007, $24.95, cloth) by permission of Jossey-Bass, a Wiley Imprint
CHAPTER NINE
The Practice of Forgiveness
We are not always a......
2007-09-21 00:55:00
MARK SCOLFORO
(AP)The first state trooper to breach the Amish school where 10 girls were shot last year got inside by ripping out part of a window frame with his bare hands, helping save the lives of five girls, the state police chief said Thursday.The trooper used a ballistic shield to batter a window ......
2007-09-18 01:11:00
JENNIFER TODD
As the one-year anniversary of the West Nickel Mines school shootings approaches, members of gunman Charles Carl Roberts IV's family say they are "doing well" and are grateful for the support they've received from the community.In a brief statement released Monday through state police, Rob......
2007-09-17 11:42:00
JANET KELLEY
The family of gunman Charles Roberts IV, who shot 10 Amish girls last October, killing five and wounding five others, released a statement today, thanking the community for its support. It was almost one year ago that Roberts, a 32-year-old milk tanker truck driver, entered the West Nickel Mine......
2007-09-16 10:22:00
CINDY STAUFFER and AD CRABLE
The English language does not have words equal to the task of describing the intense grief a parent feels when a child dies. To capture that emotion, some of the Amish families who lost five children almost a year ago in the West Nickel Mines School shootings turn to a Pennsylvania Dutch w......
2007-09-13 11:15:00
STAFF REPORT
Bart Township Fire Chief Curt Woerth issued a statement this afternoon, thanking those near and far who offered support and assistance to the Nickel Mines community in the aftermine of the school shooting there nearly a year ago.Here is the full text of his statement:"Almost a ......
2007-09-13 01:25:00
JENNIFER TODD
Although Oct. 2 is certain to be a day of heavy hearts, prayer and family, Bart Township Fire Company officials and the Nickel Mines Accountability Committee said there will be no public observance of the shootings one year ago at West Nickel Mines Amish School in Bart Township.A statement......
2007-09-12 11:58:00
JACK BRUBAKER
About a third of $4.3 million raised for the relief of victims of the Amish schoolhouse shooting at Nickel Mines has been spent, the Nickel Mines Accountability Committee said in a statement this morning. The remainder will be placed in a trust fund to cover long-term care, the committee sai......
2007-09-11 01:34:00
JENNIFER TODD and CARLA DI FONZO
Six years after the Sept. 11 attacks, local emergency-response workers say expecting the unexpected is a priority that hasn't faded with time."We learned a lot of lessons after 9/11," said Craig Elmer, director of the Lancaster County Public Safety Training Center. "And ......
2007-09-06 11:26:00
AD CRABLE and CINDY STAUFFER
It was time, Amish members of the Nickel Mines community agreed. Time — sadly, already — to pass on the "comfort quilt" that had been delivered into their midst only eight months earlier to bring them solace from the Oct. 2 massacre that claimed the lives of five of the......
2007-08-31 09:35:00
JOAN KERN
Memories of the West Nickel Mines Amish School shootings are engraved on the heart of the Rev. Grover DeVault. "My life will never be the same," said DeVault, Lt. Col. U.S. Army Chaplain (retired) and Pennsylvania State Police Chaplain, Troop J, Lancaster. DeVault — who was......
2007-08-23 01:38:00
MARK SCOLFORO
(AP)From the moment a gunman began shooting 10 girls in an Amish schoolhouse last year, 2½ agonizing minutes ticked by before state police were able to force their way into the barricaded building, according to newly revealed details about the siege.The Pennsylvania state trooper in......
2007-06-20 12:33:00
JANET KELLEY
Every year the Pennsylvania State Police recognizes the efforts and accomplishments of its own. Today, it was the efforts of Lancaster troopers — primarily those involved with the shootings at the West Nickel Mines Amish School — who dominated the awards ceremony at the State Police......
2007-06-16 01:16:00
MADELYN PENNINO
Twenty-year-old Dutch journalism student Ruben Koops flew thousands of miles from to Nickel Mines to satisfy a longtime curiosity.During the last week, Koops, a student at Ede Christian University in Ede, the Netherlands, and four other journalism students have investigated how the Amish c......
2007-06-05 01:40:00
PATRICK BURNS
In theory, all religions guide their followers to forgive those who injure them."But no one does it like the Amish," said Donald B. Kraybill, Elizabethtown College sociology professor.Kraybill, speaking at a Lancaster Mennonite Historical Society meeting Monday night, exam......
2007-06-02 00:09:00
JAMES BUESCHER
Nine days before the Amish schoolhouse shootings took place in Nickel Mines last October, the small Bart Township town was host to another tragedy: a hit-and-run accident in which a 12-year-old Amish boy was struck and killed by a pickup truck."Even though the woman who hit the boy in......
2007-05-31 14:59:00
JACK BRUBAKER
The intense media interest in the Amish schoolhouse murders last October disturbed Lancaster County's publicity-shy Old Order community. But the Amish worried even more about the inevitable books to come. If the first book to go to press is any indication, however, they need not have been ......
2007-05-24 03:27:00
BRETT LOVELACE
Saint Rita of Cascia Catholic Church in Philadelphia chose the victims' families because they showed forgiveness to the gunman and his family. The national award is based on St. Rita's example of peace and forgiveness.•••A Catholic church in Philadelphi......
2007-05-18 14:15:00
Staff Report
For the third straight year the Lancaster New Era has been recognized as the most award-winning newspaper of its size by the state's premier journalism organization. The New Era received the Sweepstakes Award for mid-sized daily newspapers after its staff won 16 awards, including nine first......
2007-05-02 13:57:00
Staff Report
A peace award has been created by a Philadelphia Catholic church, recognizing the families of the Amish shooting victims at the West Nickel Mines School last October. The award will be bestowed at the National Shrine of Saint Rita of Cascia on May 19. Five girls were killed and five were w......
2007-05-02 01:31:00
Brett Lovelace
A Catholic church in Philadelphia has created an award to recognize the Amish families of students killed or wounded during the Oct. 2 shootings at West Nickel Mines School.Family members, however, do not plan to attend a May 19 event at the National Shrine of Saint Rita of Cascia, when th......
2007-04-06 14:33:00
Staff and wire reports
Marie Roberts, widow of the Georgetown man who killed five young Amish girls in a Nickel Mines schoolhouse last October, plans to remarry. Roberts, 29, has three young children. Her fiance, an insurance salesman, is divorced and has two children. They plan to marry in the fall, the New York Pos......
2007-04-04 13:52:00
Staff Report
Nickel Mine Auction, which became a staging point for media and emergency workers following the Oct. 2 shootings at the former West Nickel Mines School, is going up for sale. The property will be sold at auction on April 20, longtime manager Samuel Fisher said Tuesday. DLS Investments, which ow......
2007-04-03 01:18:00
Brett Lovelace
The children of Nickel Mines Monday got back something gunman Charles Roberts IV tried to take away from them six months ago.As about a dozen boys and five girls walked through the door of New Hope Amish School, just a few hundred yards from where 10 of their classmates were shot in Octobe......
2007-04-02 14:02:00
JACK BRUBAKER
Three soft rings of a bell called the Amish children of Nickel Mines to their first classes at the one-room New Hope School this morning. Carrying brightly colored plastic lunch containers, the children walked across farm fields. Their parents, wearing black coats and shawls against an early ch......
2007-04-02 08:32:00
Jennifer Todd
In many ways, today will be like any other Monday.Shortly after sunrise, Amish children in the Nickel Mines area will set out for school, books and lunch pails in hand, sometimes laughing as they make their way along the berms of southern Lancaster County roads.But on this particula......
2007-03-31 12:04:00
Jack Brubaker
Donations to the Amish girls shot in October in the West Nickel Mines School have passed $4 million, and medical personnel are evaluating whether that amount is sufficient. "The money donated has been significant," said Herman Bontrager, a representative of the Nickel Mines Accountabi......
2007-03-30 13:59:00
Jack Brubaker
When the Jonathan Kings traveled from Shipshewana, Ind., to attend a wedding in Lancaster County a few weeks ago, a relative gave them a booklet of newspaper stories. The booklet — "Lost Angels: The Untold Stories of the Amish School Shootings" — reprinted the in-depth series on the......
2007-03-23 14:15:00
Staff Report
The New Era series examining the Amish schoolhouse shooting here and its aftermath has won another national journalism award. The three-day "Lost Angels" series, published in December, received a 2007 Wilbur Award from the Religion Communicators Council. "Lost Angels" w......
2007-03-19 08:52:00
Madelyn Pennino
How quickly the Amish forgave after the Nickel Mines shootings in October stunned the world.Filmmaker Martin Doblemeier will give insight into why the Amish forgave — and forgave so quickly — in his new documentary, "The Power of Forgiveness," Monday at Elizabethtown ......
2007-03-09 09:44:00
Staff and Wire reports
The New Era's series on the aftermath of an Amish schoolhouse shooting was named a finalist in a national journalism contest. The "Lost Angels" series, which ran in December, was named a finalist for the 2007 Dart Awards for Excellence in Reporting on Victims in Violence. The a......
2007-03-05 14:05:00
Staff and Wire reports
New Era staff writer Janet Kelley has won the 2007 Eugene S. Pulliam National Journalism Writing Award, given annually to one reporter in the country for excellence in writing. Kelley received the award for her in-depth story about the October shooting of 10 Amish girls in a schoolhouse i......
2007-03-05 13:30:00
staff reports
The New Era has raised about $13,000 for the victims of the Amish schoolhouse shootings. The money has come from sales of reprints of "Lost Angels," a three-part series about the shootings that ran in the New Era in December. The New Era has sold about 2,700 copies of the seri......
2007-02-15 11:28:00
Letters to the Editor
Following is a poem inspired by the Nickel Mines tragedy
GOD'S GREATEST GIFT
Well done, my good and faithful child, Your heart stayed pure, meek and mild. You never forgot that Our Father's love is true, You prayed to me and I am here f......
2007-02-09 00:40:00
Carla Di Fonzo
Sarah McRae Morton isn't the typical 22-year-old artist.As a painter, she's developed a meticulous style that's beyond her years."If you looked at her paintings and didn't know who she is, you could easily assume the work was made by a 60-year-old," said Le......
2007-01-24 11:05:00
LancasterOnline.com
In response to requests from our readers, the New Era has reprinted its special series, "Lost Angels: The Untold Stories of the Amish School Shootings," in a 28-page full-color booklet. All proceeds from the sale of the books will go to the Nickel Mines Acc......
2007-01-19 01:03:00
Brett Hambright
Visitors bearing a special gift recently stopped by the Pennsylvania state police barracks in Lancaster.
Inside, a dozen troopers — first responders to the West Nickel Mines School shootings in October — were expecting them.
The visitors, Emma Zook, a teacher in the...
2007-01-17 10:59:00
JACK BRUBAKER
To everything, the Bible says, there is a season. A time to rend... Following the horrifying shootings of young girls in the one-room schoolhouse at Nickel Mines last October, Amish workmen quickly tore down the old school, removed the debris and returned the lot to pasture. ... an......
2007-01-02 14:09:58
Jack Brubaker
For years I have wondered about the name “Nickel Mines.’’ When was Nickel Mines there? When did it stop? Is Nickel Mines still there? The only other nickel mine I have ever seen was in Canada, where a nickel about 10 feet tall was placed in front of the mine. Don Ober Manheim
Dear......
2007-01-02 17:57:00
Brett Lovelace
Murder again created national interest in Lancaster County in 2006.
The deaths of five Amish girls after being shot in a Bart Township school and slaughter of six relatives at a Leola home brought throngs of media into both small towns.
The television, Internet and print media ...
2006-12-15 01:25:24
Jennifer Todd
One student, Nanako Nomura, sat each evening in the Lancaster Township home of her host parents and gingerly folded tissue-like paper into the shape of a crane.
A month later, Nomura and seven other Japanese students had created 1,000 of the origami birds, which represent a prayer for health ...
2006-12-06 22:01:12
Brett Hambright
Cramer, a 62-year-old Willow Street resident, was among the crowd that departed Smaltz Harley-Davidson in Eagle Oct. 15 and arrived an hour later at Lancaster’s Dutch Wonderland Amusement Park.
“I couldn’t even see the front of the pack,” Cramer said. “It was awesome. I didn’t think we’d get ...
2006-12-05 00:39:03
P. J. Reilly
When a tragedy occurs, like the Oct. 2 shootings at West Nickel Mines School, Christians often struggle to figure out how God could let such a horrible event happen.
Charles Roberts IV on Oct. 2 entered the West Nickel Mines School in Bart Township and shot 10 Amish girls before killing himse...
2006-11-23 00:55:47
Jennifer Todd
Just how difficult remains to be seen.
The deputy county coroner will celebrate the holiday, as she has for as long as she can remember, with about a dozen relatives at her family’s cabin in Lebanon.
But this year will be different.
Ballenger was called to the scene after a gunm...
2006-11-21 14:09:51
Staff And News Service Reports
Another girl is at home and the fifth child is expected to be released from the hospital by Christmas. The Nickel Mines Accountability Committee, in addition to releasing a public statement on the girls’ condition Monday, also noted that more than $3.2 million has been donated to help the familie......
2006-11-21 00:18:17
The committee's statement also gave updates on the medical condition of the shooting victims. 32-year-old gunman Charles Carl Roberts IV, killed five girls and injured five others Oct. 2, committing suicide as police surrounded the one-room Amish schoolhouse in West Nickel Mines where he had barr......
2006-11-21 00:33:01
Brett Hambright
Two other girls who survived the shootings suffered severe head wounds and are likely to have long-term disabilities. One is home while the other remains hospitalized, a spokesman for the Nickel Mines Accountability Committee said Monday.
The families “are dealing with pain and loss, but I’ve...
2006-11-21 00:17:51
Four of the five injured girls have returned to their homes. Two of the girls suffered serious head wounds. One of them remains hospitalized, receiving rehabilitation, and hopes to be released by Christmas. A church representative reported that she has shown remarkable improvement. The other, semi-c...
2006-11-16 00:53:28
Mark Scolforo
(AP)Two were severely wounded in the head, said Dr. D. Holmes Morton, a pediatrician and director of the Clinic for Special Children in Strasburg.
A neurosurgeon told Morton about a week ago that one of the two was expected to remain in the rehabilitation facility at Children’s Hospital of Ph...
2006-11-15 13:52:47
Anya Litvak
Their faces betrayed nothing. The honorees sat silently, their shoulders back, their faces solemn, as the commissioners readied to extend the county’s gratitude to the men and women who handled the tragedy on that October day. “It’s just something that we do,” said Hen Woerth, chief of the Bar......
2006-11-07 14:27:43
Janet Kelley
Five girls were killed and five seriously injured when the gunman entered the Bart Township school on Oct. 2, shooting them all before killing himself. The Amish community formed the Nickel Mines Accountability Committee, comprised of seven Amish leaders and two non-Amish members, to manage all t......
2006-11-02 14:19:08
Ad Crable
And although security issues continue to be discussed by the Amish leaders and the parents of the shooting victims — and urged by police — it is likely the new school will be built simply, like all the ones before. “You have to put your trust in God sometimes,” said an Amish man whose daughter wa......
2006-11-02 00:24:30
Colby Itkowitz
On most days school is just as it always was\!q — seven hours filled with reading, writing and arithmetic taught by a young Amish girl, Emma Mae Zook.
But there are times when class discussion veers from academics to the students' memories of Oct. 2.
Emma Mae lets them share thei...
2006-10-30 14:31:29
Ad Crable
The wife and parents of the mass murderer tearfully expressed their gratitude to the families of the victims for not only not judging them, but for reaching out to lessen their grief, even amid their own anguish. In two remarkable, emotional private meetings born of forgiveness and healing, about......
2006-10-26 01:51:48
Colby Itkowitz
The fifth girl is still at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia but is “making progress,” the source, an Amishman, said.
One of the girls who returned home is 11-year-old Barbie Fisher, according to earlier reports. Her older sister, Marian, died after the shootings, and her younger sister, Em...
2006-10-25 14:04:27
Jack Brubaker
He was working on the painting when the story broke on that Monday morning. “I stopped working for a couple hours to watch the news. Then I went back to work,’’ he says. “I had to make some positive use of this for the public. It was too coincidental.’’ Becker’s work — a simple wrought iron an......
2006-10-25 01:04:00
Carla Di Fonzo
For starters, how could such violence take place on Amish soil?
“The Amish are such a plain, gentle people,” said the senior pastor of congregations in Portland, Ore., and St. Louis, Miss.
He was even more affected when he learned the Amish community in Bart Township had forgiven the s...
2006-10-23 08:52:02
Staff And Wire Reports
The 22-year-old woman, Lydia Mae Zook, gave birth Oct. 10, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The child is named Naomi Rose, after 7-year-old Naomi Rose Ebersol, one of five girls fatally shot by Charles Carl Roberts IV.
The gunman took over the West Nickel Mines Amish School on Oct. 2 b...
2006-10-19 01:47:35
Colby Itkowitz
Within hours, hundreds responded to Schenck, president of Faith and Action of Washington, D.C., and asked him to take their prayers directly to the families of the young victims and gunman Charles Carl Roberts IV.
On Monday, Schenck will do just that.
Schenck will hand-deliver two blue...
2006-10-18 00:57:39
Brett Hambright
“We are slowly getting back to our feet,” Amos K. Ebersol, Naomi’s father, said during a telephone interview Tuesday. “We are getting by.”
Amos, his wife, Katie, and the couple’s five sons are now able to reminisce about their daughter and sister, who was a second-grader at the Amish school....
2006-10-18 00:53:44
We will never forget the feelings of protection and comfort it gave us to have the state police protecting us from the hungry media on our way to the burial services of our daughter. Neither will we forget the long hours our neighbors, “Buzz” and “Bucky,” provided security at the entrance of our dri...
2006-10-17 14:14:58
Cindy Stauffer
The emergency workers have undergone counseling and debriefings. They have leaned on each other. But they will never forget the scene that greeted them in Bart Township. Ian Solodky was one of the first to arrive at West Nickel Mines School. As he surveyed the scene, the paramedic said he saw ......
2006-10-17 01:21:07
Jennifer Todd
As he surveyed the scene, the paramedic said he saw one young victim. And then another. And another.
As the reality of what occurred inside the tiny one-room schoolhouse began to hit home, Solodky said he shifted into “autopilot.”
“Nothing went through my mind,” the paramedic from Lanc...
2006-10-17 01:20:20
Tom Knapp
A selection of Amish goods, from buggies to quilts and furniture to shoofly pies, will be auctioned off this weekend to raise funds for the victims of the West Nickel Mines School shootings.
The owner of Martin Auctioneers Inc., which holds internationally known auctions of coaches, carriages...
2006-10-16 18:21:12
P. J. Reilly
Around 3,000 bikers from Pennsylvania, Maryland, New Jersey and Delaware rode their motorcycles to Dutch Wonderland Sunday morning to support the victims of the deadly Oct. 2 shootings at West Nickel Mines School in Bart Township.
As the bikers poured in, the parking lot of the children’s amu...
2006-10-14 02:53:30
Brett Hambright
Following the Oct. 2 shootings of 10 Amish girls at West Nickel Mines School, she told police her husband gave no indication of his horrific plans.
In the days that followed the massacre, members of the Amish community reached out to Mrs. Roberts, knowing she too was grieving. The story of fo...
2006-10-14 02:48:36
Brett Hambright
With him on the afternoon of the Oct. 2 tragedy were a few co-workers, and they searched for a way to respond.
“I said, ‘Oh my God, what can we do?’ ” Smaltz recalled Friday. “So we called on the motorcycle community to do something.”
Their idea will come to fruition Sunday, when hundr...
2006-10-13 14:46:29
Jane Holahan
Could we possibly forgive their murderer, Charles Carl Roberts IV? Could we attend his funeral and declare that all funds raised to defray the cost of his horrible crime be shared with his widow and children? Could we find love in our heart for a man responsible for so much tragedy and sorrow in our...
2006-10-13 14:22:15
Cindy Stauffer And Janet Kelley
The statement came from the family of Charles Carl Roberts IV, who shot 10 girls before killing himself Oct. 2. Five girls remain hospitalized. “Our family wants each of you to know that we are overwhelmed by the forgiveness, grace and mercy that you’ve extended to us,” reads the statement, which......
2006-10-13 14:22:07
The statement came from the family of Charles Carl Roberts IV, who shot 10 girls before killing himself Oct. 2. The statement was released to the New Era by Wendy Nagle, president of the Pennsylvania Dutch Convention & Visitors Bureau.
The text of the release is as follows:
From ......
2006-10-13 01:54:00
Jennifer Todd
At 4:45 a.m. Thursday, an excavator equipped with a backhoe began ripping down the one-room schoolhouse in Bart Township where Charles Carl Roberts IV shot 10 young Amish girls Oct. 2. Five of the girls died.
Under bright spotlights that illuminated the entire schoolyard, the excavators reduc...
2006-10-13 01:49:45
P. J. Reilly
But it did.
So did thousands of other pieces of mail and gifts sorted this week by Hoover and three other women at the Bart Township Fire Company building in Georgetown.
“I can’t say I’ve been overwhelmed by the quantity of mail because I think everyone expected it would be a lot,” sai...
2006-10-12 12:57:43
Cindy Stauffer And Ad Crable
The West Nickel Mines School got its own funeral today, as every part of it was torn down, trucked away and buried. Before the sun rose, in just 20 minutes, heavy-equipment operators had wiped the earth clean of the tragic place. Charles Carl Roberts IV, a 32-year-old truck driver, shot 10 Ami......
2006-10-12 12:55:56
Janet Kelley And Cindy Stauffer
Members of the Amish community believe it was the presence of a higher power inside the Bart Township schoolroom — the same power Americans relied upon for courage on Sept. 11 — that gave these girls strength in that horrible hour. Today, as the West Nickel Mines school was demolished, police and......
2006-10-12 09:11:05
Janet Kelley
Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia announced Tuesday that it — like Lancaster General, Christiana Care Health System, Reading Hospital and Medical Center — would absorb the costs of treating the surviving children who were shot last week. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations ......
2006-10-12 09:10:39
Naomi Rose Ebersol
Read the obituary
View the book of condolences
...
2006-10-12 09:11:14
Brett Hambright
Amish community leaders decided earlier this week to level West Nickel Mines School at 4876 White Oak Road, according to Mike Hart of Bart Township Fire Company.
“It will be a group effort between a number of (excavators) that have the equipment to do it,” he said.
The demolition will ...
2006-10-11 00:53:12
First Call: Citizen Amos Smoker 10:35:29 a.m.
911 dispatcher: Lancaster County 911, do you need police, fire or ambulance?
Mr. Smoker: Yes, this is Amos Smoker.
911 Dispatcher: OK.
Mr. Smoker: There’s a, there’s a guy in the school with a gun.......
2006-10-11 02:52:13
Colby Itkowitz
The first lady was referring to Marian Fisher, 13, and her 11-year-old sister, Barbie Fisher, both of whom beseeched Charles Carl Roberts IV to shoot them first, hoping he would spare the lives of the younger Amish girls locked inside their one-room schoolhouse Oct. 2.
Roberts shot all 10 of ...
2006-10-11 02:35:49
Brett Lovelace
“Right now or they’re dead in two seconds,” Roberts said, according to a transcript of the 911 call. “Two seconds, that’s it.”
Transcripts of conversations between Roberts and dispatchers at Lancaster Countywide Communications were released Tuesday by Lancaster County District Attorney Donald...
2006-10-11 02:34:44
Brett Lovelace
The reports have attempted to link Roberts, who killed five girls and wounded five others at West Nickel Mines School in Bart Township Oct. 2, to a variety of incidents, including a 2005 sexual assault near the Georgetown Road mobile home he shared with his wife and children.
State police Sgt...
2006-10-10 11:29:50
Cindy Stauffer And Janet Kelley
“There’s a, there’s a guy in the school with a gun,” a man who identified himself as Amos Smoker blurted out to dispatchers. Twenty minutes later, shortly after state police pulled up to the West Nickel Mines School in Bart Township, the guy with a gun called 911 himself. “I just took, uh, 10 ......
2006-10-10 17:29:38
Lancaster Online Staff
Nickel Mines, Pennsylvania – On October 2 seven Amish families in our community experienced the unimaginable -- ten of their young daughters were shot, five fatally, by a gunman who invaded the Amish school where their children attended.
The whole community, Amish and others, were horrified ...
2006-10-10 11:25:14
Tom Murse
The victim in the August 2005 assault, who lived less than one-quarter mile from Roberts, called police last week after she learned Roberts had shot 10 young Amish girls at a one-room schoolhouse. The victim’s father, who interrupted the assault, said that neither he nor his daughter got a good l......
2006-10-10 10:53:25
Jon Rutter And Eric G. Stark
But if that happened, as the gunman himself claimed, his inner turmoil was well camouflaged.
People who knew Roberts as a young man say they saw no sign of the 32-year-old killer who stunned the world last Monday by attacking 10 Amish schoolgirls in Bart Township.
Instead, they painted...
2006-10-09 11:39:36
Cindy Stauffer
Bells tolled across Lancaster County today to mark a gunman’s invasion of a Bart Township schoolhouse one week ago. As the ringing echoed through communities from Willow Street to New Holland, people paused in their Monday morning routines to think about the five Amish girls who died, the five wh......
2006-10-09 07:49:52
Colby Itkowitz
But members of the Amish families still wanted to meet the gunman's loved ones, Lloyd Welk, Roberts' wife's grandfather, said.
"I don't know how they had the strength to do it," Welk said Sunday night. "For them to express what they thought -- there are no hard feelings, no grudges."
T...
2006-10-09 07:47:52
Colby Itkowitz
Amid a colorful array of potted flowers, bouquets, teddy bears and cards is a note written by Kristin from New York.
Kristin left a simple message, in blue crayon and childlike handwriting, on the back of a paper placemat: Welcome to God's Land, Love Kristin from New York.
The small vi...
2006-10-09 07:17:13
Joan Kern
Fischer, executive director of the Lancaster County Council of Churches, was previously a minister in Oklahoma. The council has asked churches throughout the county to ring their bells beginning at 10:45 a.m. Monday in memory of the tragedy that has rocked the world, just as the Oklahoma City bom......
2006-10-09 07:16:55
Janet Kelley And Chad Umble
Donations are coming in from around the world to help the victims carry the financial burdens resulting from Monday’s tragedy in Bart Township. Hundreds of people came to the Christiana Fire Company’s annual auction Friday night and early this morning, offering to pay a little extra, knowing that......
2006-10-09 07:16:31
Patricia Poist And Jon Rutter
Charles Carl Roberts IV, 32, was buried in a family plot behind the Georgetown United Methodist Church, a few miles away from the scene of last Monday's massacre.
His grave lies next to that of his infant daughter, Elise Victoria, whose death nine years earlier had tormented him.
...
2006-10-07 13:43:10
Janet Kelley And Chad Umble
Donations are coming in from around the world to help the victims carry the financial burdens resulting from Monday’s tragedy in Bart Township.
Hundreds of people came to the Christiana Fire Company’s annual auction Friday night and early this morning, offering to pay a little extra, knowing ...
2006-10-07 13:32:37
Jane Holahan
A 36-year veteran of the Bart Township Fire Company, Hart, 52, and several of his fellow officers, tried to restore some order to West Nickel Mines School, where 10 Amish girls were shot in a massacre that killed five of them and ended in the shooter’s suicide Monday.
“We worked with environm...
2006-10-07 01:48:30
Brett Lovelace
Friday, under a steady, cold rain, 12-year-old Anna Mae Stoltzfus — killed by a gunman Monday at West Nickel Mines School in Bart Township — was laid to rest at Bart Cemetery.
The four other slaying victims — Marian S. Fisher, 13; sisters Mary Liz Miller, 8, and Lena Z. Mill...
2006-10-07 01:46:54
The Rev. Tom Purdy of St. James Episcopal Church led a prayer vigil for the girls. The massacre claimed the lives of five girls, left five wounded and ended the life of the shooter, Charles Carl Roberts IV. Many residents also offered condolences during the vigil, held on the steps of Lancaster Coun...
2006-10-07 01:46:24
Carla Di Fonzo
Following is just a sampling of the communiqués sent Friday to Lancaster Newspapers Inc.
•••
Jasmina Tosic, a Bread of Life missionary based in Belgrade, Serbia, wrote:
“Dear Friends, we heard the news about victims in the Amish school in Pennsylvania. We cannot...
2006-10-06 12:06:59
Cindy Stauffer And Janet Kelley
Anna Mae Stoltzfus, 12, an Amish girl killed in a Bart Township schoolhouse shooting Monday, was buried today on a dreary, rainy day, following four funerals that took place Thursday under blue October skies. An Amish-community contact said today that families hope three of the five other girls w......
2006-10-06 22:19:36
Naomi Rose Ebersol
Read the obituary
View the book of condolences
...
2006-10-06 18:16:06
State Police Commissioner Jeffrey B. Miller holds up a copy of the first page of a not......
2006-10-06 02:24:38
Colby Itkowitz
As the Amish community laid Marian and three of her classmates to rest Thursday, details emerged of the grim moments inside West Nickel Mines School before Roberts opened fire, killing five girls.
Marian’s 11-year-old sister, Barbie, who was wounded in the attack, is now awake and telling her...
2006-10-06 02:24:32
Brett Hambright
It was the aunt, great aunt and grandfather of Marie Roberts, who was married to Charles Carl Roberts IV for nearly 10 years.
Monday, Roberts, a 32-year-old milk truck driver, entered a one-room schoolhouse and murdered five Amish girls before killing himself.
Five of the girls’ classm...
2006-10-06 01:55:38
P. J. Reilly
For about 48 hours following Monday’s tragic shootings at West Nickel Mines School in Bart Township, Pennsylvania State Police Commissioner Col. Jeffrey B. Miller shouldered the burden of describing to the world what happened inside the one-room Amish schoolhouse.
He discussed in great detail...
2006-10-05 17:50:53
Jack Brubaker
By horse-drawn carriage and on foot, somber men and women garbed in black traveled through protective police barriers on White Oak and Mine roads. They headed for the home of Naomi Rose Ebersol, 7, the only daughter of Amos and Katie Ann Fisher Ebersol. The two-story house with yellow siding, ......
2006-10-05 17:42:56
Janet Kelley And Cindy Stauffer
The funeral of 7-year-old Naomi Rose Ebersol was the first of several such funeral processions this week as the Amish community buried five victims of Monday’s horrific shooting inside a Bart Township schoolhouse. The procession of 34 gray, horse-drawn Amish buggies, plus vans and cars full of Am......
2006-10-05 17:42:40
Tom Murse
For larger bills, they are able to tap into a “church aid” plan, an informal pool of offerings held for disasters. Community members might also hold special auctions of quilts, furniture and crafts to raise money. But for something as catastrophic as Monday’s mass shooting at a one-room schoolhou......
2006-10-05 01:54:57
Brett Hambright
In his final conversation with his wife, Marie, seconds before opening fire on the victims and killing himself, Roberts said an event had tortured him for two decades: He claimed he molested two children 20 years ago.
His reasoning for the massacre was dismissed Wednesday, after police interv...
2006-10-05 01:53:37
Larry Alexander
A number of funds have been established to help cover medical expenses for the families of the five Amish girls wounded in the attack inside the one-room West Nickel Mines School.
To cope with the expected influx of money, Amish elders and others have formed an accountability committee. This ...
2006-10-05 01:51:08
P. J. Reilly
Traffic on multiple roads in the Georgetown area will be “restricted and limited at various times throughout the day,” said state police Trooper Blaine Hertzog.
“It is the goal of the Pennsylvania State Police, as directed by Gov. Edward G. Rendell and Commissioner Jeffrey B. Miller, to ensur...
2006-10-05 00:49:46
Linda Espenshade
The reasons that Roberts left behind — a child who died shortly after birth, an admission of molesting young relatives when he was 12 and the urge to sexually assault children again — just don’t seem to be enough to justify a shooting rampage, according to several psychiatric experts....
2006-10-05 00:49:30
Jennifer Todd
In the rear of The Lord’s House of Prayer in Quarryville, some members of the congregation waved large, colorful flags, synchronizing their movements to the upbeat music blaring through the public-address system.
And though quite different than the more traditional service conducted the night...
2006-10-04 14:14:21
Associated Press
Instead, members of the Westboro Baptist Church issued a statement Wednesday saying a representative will appear on a nationally syndicated radio talk show.
The Web site of show host Mike Gallagher indicated that the group was offered an hour of airtime on Thursday morning in exchange for dro...
2006-10-04 12:03:23
Janet Kelley And Ad Crable
Inside the large, multi-family farmhouse on a slight hill, the body of 13-year-old Marian Fisher lay in an open, plain wooden coffin set inside her parents’ bedroom. Dressed all in white, with a white head covering — as is customary in funeral services for Amish girls — the bodies of Fisher and t......
2006-10-04 11:57:08
Tom Murse
The gunman then told the boys to leave and ordered the girls — just the girls — to line up facing the chalkboard. His intention was to sexually assault them. In the end, the intruder opened fire on the young girls before finally turning the gun on himself, seconds before the police rushed in. ......
2006-10-04 11:55:24
Jane Holahan
Everyone’s life is shaken. If this happened at a peaceful, one-room school house in a quiet, rural community, it could just as easily have been your child’s school. It could have been your child. “A crime of this type attacks some of the most fundamental understandings we have of ourselves in ......
2006-10-04 11:54:29
Cindy Stauffer
The guilt he said he felt about molesting two young family members 20 years ago was being worsened by dreams that he would molest again. He was angry and sick with grief over his own infant daughter’s death. Today the community is trying to make sense of what seems like a senseless act. But......
2006-10-04 11:50:38
Ryan Robinson
But that doesn’t mean the community hasn’t rallied to support the families of the five girls killed and five girls wounded, as well as the firemen and others helping out with the aftermath. The Bart Township Fire Company does have one modest-sized table holding flowers, cards and a large, stuffed......
2006-10-04 11:42:19
Joan Kern
Their vehicles filled the sprawling asphalt parking lot and spilled onto the grass, and the overflow crowd watched the moving service on closed-circuit televisions set up in the church vestibule. “Lord, allow this event to transform our community,” proclaimed the Rev. Duane Britton, one of nearly......
2006-10-04 10:59:01
“As a native of nearby Farmersville, his personal connections to the people of Lancaster County run deep,” a posting on the Web site said of Landis. The bicyclist will be donating funds to assist victims of the tragedy. The posting also encourages others to visit the Coatesville Savings Bank Web ......
2006-10-04 10:49:59
News Service Reports
The note read:
I don’t know how you put up with me all these years. I am not worthy of you, you are the perfect wife you deserve so much better. We had so many good memories together as well as the tragedy with Elise. It changed my life forever I haven’t been the same since it affected ......
2006-10-04 10:48:36
Bernard Harris
In response to the outpouring, at least four funds have been established to help pay medical costs connected to Monday’s shootings. And neighbors and organizations have stepped up to offer money and other types of support. Ken Sensenig, assistant director of the Mennonite Central Committee Eas......
2006-10-04 10:54:54
Cybercast News Service
The Westboro Baptist Church — described as a hate group by the Anti-Defamation League — has made a name for itself by picketing the funerals of U.S. troops killed in Iraq. The troops are dying as punishment for America's tolerance of homosexuality, the group says. The Kansas group says the Amish ......
2006-10-04 01:58:00
Brett Hambright
Barricaded inside the one-room West Nickel Mines School with the victims bound and lined in a row, Roberts told his wife, Marie, via cell phone he had molested two young children when he was 12, police said.
He also confessed to having had dreams of molesting children for the past couple of y...
2006-10-04 01:57:50
Colby Itkowitz
From this awkward exchange, the Amish schoolteacher sensed trouble.
But she never imagined the man would reappear within minutes brandishing a gun he’d use to viciously execute five young girls and severely wound five others.
Inside the Zook home Tuesday evening, Emma Mae and her two s...
2006-10-04 01:48:09
Patrick Burns
Since the victims are from the same Amish church district, the funerals will take place at different times to allow all to attend the individual rites.
The first service, for Naomi Rose Ebersol, 7, a second-grader, takes place at 8 a.m. Eastern Standard Time Thursday morning at the family’s h...
2006-10-04 01:48:03
Larry Alexander
At least four funds have been established to help pay medical costs connected to Monday’s shootings.
Working through Herman Bontrager, secretary/treasurer of the National Committee for Amish Religious Freedom, a fund has been established at the Strasburg office of HomeTowne Heritage bank,...
2006-10-04 01:48:00
Brett Lovelace
Deputy Coroner Janice Ballenger had the grim task Monday of checking the body of a 7-year-old girl slain by a gunman at the West Nickel Mines School.
The coroner examined the tiny body of Naomi Rose Ebersol, who weighed about 50 pounds, on the playground of the Amish schoolhouse in Bart T...
2006-10-04 01:47:54
Brett Lovelace
Some of the boys who had fled the school before Charles Carl Roberts IV opened fire on their female classmates were hiding at the Mine Road farmhouse.
Hours passed with little word about the girls attacked in the rampage. As the day wore on, more people — neighbors, friends, the student...
2006-10-04 01:47:49
Lori Van Ingen And Jennifer Todd
Hymns of faith and hope resonated from the small village chapel, and pastors spoke of God’s undying love and eternal life.
And so, 150 members of the Amish and English communities joined together in prayer.
“We come here tonight to begin picking up the pieces of our lives,” the Rev. Mi...
2006-10-04 01:47:31
Carla Di Fonzo
News of the tragedy has touched many, inspiring individuals from all over the country and the world to write e-mails to Lancaster Newspapers.
Following are just a few of the communiqués received in the past two days expressing grief, confusion and anger.
•••
“Wh...
2006-10-03 13:29:29
Cindy Stauffer, Janet Kelley, Ryan Robinson And Ad Crable
The 32-year-old milk-truck driver also was still distraught over the death of his premature infant daughter nine years ago. On Monday, he loaded himself down with weapons and supplies to molest and to kill: bullets, guns, lubricating jelly, eyebolts and tape, police said. Then Roberts unloaded......
2006-10-03 13:10:01
Tom Murse
But the suicide notes he scribbled before shooting 10 Amish girls Monday portray a much darker personality — that of a man tortured by the stillborn death of his first child, and someone fixated by a 20-year-old secret. “In one note he references an incident that occurred 20 years ago and suggest......
2006-10-03 12:17:26
Jack Brubaker
— John Hostetler, “Amish Society.’’
Each of the 150 Old Order Amish schools in Lancaster County contains one room, 30 feet wide by 34 feet long. The room hosts between 25 and 35 desks for pupils in grades 1-8. One unmarried female teacher and several young aides preside. Every sc......
2006-10-03 12:16:50
Jane Holahan
The school shootings at a one-room Amish schoolhouse in Bart Township led the national newscasts Monday night. All day and into the evening the shootings were reported on national cable stations such as CNN, MSNBC and Fox. Monday afternoon’s news conference led by state police Col. Jeffrey Mille......
2006-10-03 12:16:17
David O'connor
So on the most awful of days — when "this" involves a dozen young people fighting for their lives after being shot, at close range, by a gunman in a suicidal rampage — it took special teamwork among area hospitals Monday to give the patients their best chance at survival. It takes medics at the s......
2006-10-03 12:16:00
Bernard Harris
People within the Bart Township community went to the Nickel Mines School to pray. Those farther away responded as they could, electronically. Through the electronic mail of the New Era, messages were received from as far away as Australia, Britain, Canada and Texas. “They did not deserve this......
2006-10-03 12:15:40
Chad Umble
More than 40 media trucks parked in the lot of Nickel Mines Auction near the school, and scores of vehicles lined Mine Road, which had a view of the school across a field of dry corn. Six vehicles were parked outside the school house, but no one could be seen coming or going this morning. Photog......
2006-10-03 12:15:22
Jack Brubaker
Because all of the children live in one Amish church district, funerals will be held at separate times. They probably will be held two a day — the first Thursday morning, the second Thursday afternoon and so on, according to an Amish source. That schedule will permit hundreds of mourners to a......
2006-10-03 13:20:40
Diane M. Bitting
“God was with us while we were taking care of those kids,” he recalled hearing a co-worker say. “That’s what I fall back on personally,” says Gilger, director of operations for Lancaster Emergency Medical Services. When LEMSA got the call to West Nickel Mines School Monday morning, the agency’......
2006-10-03 12:17:11
Robyn Meadows
Solanco locked all outside doors at Bart-Colerain and Providence Elementary schools. Both public schools are about six miles from where a gunman entered the one-room schoolhouse, tied up girl students by the feet and opened fire. Nearby, Pequea Valley School District also locked down its schools’......
2006-10-03 17:40:04
Brett Lovelace
The son of a police officer, he didn’t attend public schools, instead earning a diploma through a home-school association.
The employee of Northwest Food Products Transportation in East Earl Township shared a vinyl-sided mobile home at 1084 Georgetown Road, Bart Township, with his wife of nin...
2006-10-03 13:17:01
3 A.M.: Charles Carl Roberts IV, age 32, a milk tanker-truck driver, returns to his Georgetown Road home in Bart Township after delivering milk from area farms to a processing plant.
8:45 A.M.: Roberts walks two of his children to a nearby bus stop. He returns home and, after his ......
2006-10-03 02:34:27
Brett Hambright
State police said a fourth girl had died, but that report could not be confirmed Monday night.
Charles Carl Roberts IV, of Bart Township, walked into West Nickel Mines School, 4876 White Oak Road, around 10 a.m., dismissed the male students and bound the girls, police said.
About 45 mi...
2006-10-03 02:23:26
Colby Itkowitz
The man wore glasses, a baseball cap and jeans, probably blue.
He asked a question, but Aaron Esh, 13, can’t remember what it was.
The man then left.
Aaron, sitting at his desk, saw the man walk to a truck backed up to the front of West Nickel Mines School, a small, beige buildi...
2006-10-03 02:22:59
Jeff Hawkes
"I think the community will understand it as an aberration, a crime committed by a man with a severe psychiatric disorder," said Donald B. Kraybill, an author of scholarly books about the Amish and a senior professor at Elizabethtown College's Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies.
...
2006-10-03 02:21:01
Lori Van Ingen
The Worship Center, 2384 New Holland Pike, will host its community prayer vigil at 5:30 tonight.
"Everyone is welcome," assistant pastor Tim Keller said.
Keller said his church is hosting the vigil in part because of the connections the church has to the Amish community. Pastor Sam Smu...
2006-10-03 02:16:35
P. J. Reilly And Dave Pidgeon
Monday, they were called upon to put that training into action when a gunman opened fire at West Nickel Mines School in Bart Township.
Four people, including the shooter, were killed and seven wounded.
Helicopters and ambulances carried four girls, whom hospital officials estimated to ...
2006-10-03 02:13:42
Madelyn Pennino
Millersville University psychology professor Rita Smith-Wade-El said the fact the victims are Amish will create a large sense of worry in the non-Amish community.
“People will feel more insecure and anxious because it is in the Amish community,” Smith-Wade-El said. “It’s going to make people ...
2006-10-03 02:07:37
Carla Di Fonzo
Journalists from Philadelphia, New York, Los Angeles, Canada and the U.K. descended upon Bart Township, where Charles Carl Roberts, 32, opened fire in a Amish school, killing at least three and injuring seven.
Television cameras from major networks including NBC, CBS, ABC and CNN lined up aro...
2006-10-03 02:03:28
Jennifer Todd
They stood in small groups, talking softly, praying, sometimes hugging one another.
And at times, they were angry.
“Sick, sick, sick,” one Amish man said as he made his way to the yellow crime-scene tape with two other men.
Along with neighbors, dozens of members of the Amish co...
2006-10-02 16:23:37
Cindy Stauffer, Janet Kelley And John M. Hoober Iii
As many as five other children were injured, some of them critically, in the shooting in Bart Township, sources said. A witness said the incident began when a man pulled up in a pickup truck outside the school on White Oak Road. He went into the simple, yellow one-room building, filled with mo......
2006-10-02 15:44:00
Mark Scolforo
(AP)A 32-year-old milk truck driver took about a dozen girls hostage in a one-room Amish schoolhouse Monday, barricaded the doors with boards and killed at least three girls and apparently himself, authorities said.
It was the nation's third deadly school shooting in less than a week,...
