'Blood on their hands': campus chiefs accused
Updated on 17 April 2007
Authorities under fire for not taking action after first shootings.
Students and staff have held a vigil for the 32 victims of the university shooting in Virginia, while campus chiefs are accused of having "blood on their hands".
Police are trying to work out how the massacre at Virginia Tech University happened and the authorities are facing tough questions about their decision to wait more than two hours to inform students and staff of the first murders.
Students were expected to flee but many were trapped and terrified as the gunman launched a killing spree.
Survivors described how the calm young Asian man, dressed in what one said was a Boy Scout type uniform, roamed around in search of victims.
First year student Erin Sheehan, who played dead to survive, said: "I saw bullets hit people's body. There was blood everywhere."
Planet Blacksburg, a local student-run website, quoted computer engineering student Ruiqi Zhang, who said: "A student rushed in and told everybody to get down.
"We put a table against the door and when the gunman tried to shoulder his way in and when he saw that he couldn't, he put two shots through the door."
