Transcripts For KGO Nightline 20121220 : vimarsana.com

Reporter she came face to face with unthinkable horror and fought to save her first graders. Laid to rest today, 27yearold sandy hook teacher vicki soto. Those remembers her were green ribb ribbons, her favorite color. Her sister jillian, already know what the world is remembering, saying you have been a hero to me for a lot longer than five days. Youve been my big sister, the one ive always looked up to. Among the mourners, family friend musician paul simon who performed the sound of silence. Soto did everything she could to keep her School Family safe and worried teachers across the country are desperately working to make sure another sandy hook never happens again. At middleton elementary in chicago, security measures begin the moment you set foot on campus with this camera equipped doorbell. The visitor rings the doorbell and the person inside can already see us. They can see you. They can see what kind of mood youre in, if youre angry and assess it if you get in one more layer towards the building. Reporter the first set of locked doors only get you as far as the entryway. Hi, welcome to middleton. Reporter the front desk then takes my i. D. , scans it and performs an instant criminal background check using a system called raptor. The technology has already spread to 8,000 schools across the country. There you go. Reporter once cleared, i get this bright orange lanier that visitors must wear. There are cameras watching your every move. Administrators can even pull up the cameras 24 7 on their smart phones. The superintendent and Security Consultant have invested more than 175,000 over the last two years beefing up security at the three schools in this tiny district in illinois. I dont know that theres too big a price tag to put on keeping your kids safe as they can absolutely be. Reporter while administrators admit theres no way of making the school 100 safe and immune to threats, prevention is the focus. Classroom doors were updated to open inward and lock from the inside, eliminating the need to step out of the room if theres a threat in the hallway. And theyre also considering bullet resistant glass for the building. Too often we hear were not going to be able to afford that, and the truth of it is what we really cannot afford is a terrible incident. Reporter in tiny wichita, texas, the Herald School district is taking a different approach, arming teachers. I like it because it makes me feel safer. We dont have a Police Station here. Reporter since 2007, the district has allowed teachers with concealed handgun licenses to carry guns in the classroom, a controversial move, but one the superintendent is convinced will prevent a School Shooting here. My goal is if someone comes in to try to hurt my little ones, that they are killed. Reporter and since the nightmare at sandy hook, lawmakers across the country are pushing for a similar solution, armed teachers in classrooms. I wish to god she had had an m4 in her office locked up. You should be able to carry your handgun anywhere in the state. Reporter at Edison High School in tulsa, oklahoma, armed guards patrol the hallways. Whats up, buddy . Reporter the gun, guards say, is necessary to be ready for the unexpected. We hoped that we would never have to use it. I hope i never have to use my gun. But with today being the way they are, i do have it and its a resource that we would rely on and would use if we had to to keep someone safe. Reporter but bill believes more guns, more bloodshed. He was principal when a 14yearold gunman opened fire, killing three students. If teachers and principals had guns, i think a lot of innocent kids would be killed by the principals and the teachers trying to stop something. Reporter as the gun debate grows louder, the community continues to mourn. This time, a tribute held at connecticut state university. Back in newtown, a familiar face and the sign of hope. Donna, the retired principal of sandy hook elementary, is returning to her old post. Charged with a difficult task of leading students and staff forward. Her presence, a small reminder of this communitys commitment to each other after a tragedy that will never be forgotten. For nightline, im alex perez in chicago. Our schools becoming fortresses and maybe armed fortresses. Next up, a Virginia Tech shooting survivor goes undercover to show how easy it can be to buy a gun in this country in cash without i. D. Captions paid for by abc, inc. Sfx sounds of african drum and flute look whos back. Again . Its embarrassing its embarrassing we can see you carl. We can totally see you. Come on youre better than this. All that prowling around. Yeah, youre the king of the jungle. Have you thought about going vegan carl . Hahaha you know folks who save hundreds of dollars by switching to geico sure are happy. How happy are they jimmy . Happier than antelope with nightvision goggles. Nice get happy. Get geico. Fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more. Is the same frequent heartburn treatment as prilosec otc. Now with a fancy coating that gives you a burst of wildberry flavor. Now why make a flavored heartburn pill . Because this is america. And we dont just make things you want, we make things you didnt even know you wanted. Like a spoon fork. Spray cheese. And jeans made out of sweatpants. So grab yourself some new prilosec otc wildberry. [ male announcer ] one pill each morning. 24 hours. Zero heartburn. Satisfaction guaranteed or your money back. This special edition of nightline tragedy at sandy hook, the search for solutions, continued with terry moran. The tragedy that struck newtown, connecticut, last friday was unthinkable in so many ways, but as we all sadly know, it was not unprecedented. From aurora, to tuscan, to Virginia Tech, the litanies of names, the shooting rampages have become depressingly familiar features of american reality, that one remarkable young man is now fighting to stop. He is on a mission to expose how easy it can be to buy powerful guns in this country. This heartbreaking season continues in newtown. This season of funerals. Three more children laid to rest. As the country struggles to make sense of the horror, theres a voice you should hear. Its the worst day of your life. Its chaotic. Its hopeless. Colin goddard knows what its like to be in a classroom when an armed madman busts in and starts shooting people. Colin was a student at Virginia Tech. It was the most terrifying ten and a half minutes of my life. When youre getting shot at, youre just in shock. Colin was hit by four of the bullets. Three of them are still in him. Weeks after the shooting, he recalled those moments. The shooter came inside and we were all on the ground, not moving, not making a scene at all, just lying there acting playing dead, you know, almost every one of us. We were just at his mercy. He could have done whatever he wanted to, and he chose to go around the room in such a way that he killed all the other students in my class except for a few of us. Yeah, its been a little messy. Colin goddards moment of recovery, the rehab, the psychological therapy, the search for answers and meaning, its all led him to this. We are better than this. We are better than a nation with Mass Shootings in movie theaters and schools and on our streets. He works at the Brady Campaign to prevent gun violence, but he does more than lobby and make Public Service announcements. He goes undercover to gun shows across the country and he says he proves how ridiculously easy it is to buy guns without any kind of background check at all. As he shows us in a documentary called living for 32 after the 32 Virginia Tech students who were murdered. The llama here. The llama . I paid 300 for it. I wouldnt mess with it for less than 20. Im a retired schoolteacher. 40 of the guns sold in america are purchased at gun shows. More than five Million People attend these events every year. They generate billions of dollars in sales, and since only licensed dealers are required by the law to perform background checks on the people they sell guns to, all of the private sellers out there you can find them at every show sell guns without any check at all. Thats the gun show loophole. And Colin Goddard has made it his mission to close it. Here at a gun show in ohio, he says he and his friends were able to buy an Assault Rifle without even an i. D. You want 660 for it . Yeah, out the door. Have to be over 18, and an ohio resident. No tax, no paper work. And i need to see your drivers license. I dont have it on me. I bought tech nines, mac 11s, the same gun that was used to shoot me. I bought it all. All without a background check and it was all legal. My question is why is that legal . Were you shocked . I was. I didnt think i was going to be able to do it at first, and then once i did it once and then did it twice and then three times, i was like wow, this is really easy. And it worked . And it worked every time. Polls show a Strong Majority of americans favor closing the gun show loophole, but in newtown, that wasnt the problem. At Virginia Tech, that wasnt the problem. The killers used legally purchased weapons. Theres not one thing thats going to stop all shootings. Theres not one policy thats going to save us all. But, you know, background check is something that will make it more difficult for dangerous people to get their hands on a gun. Colin goddard is not a victim, but a survivor and a citizen activist with a youthful conviction that yes, we can be better than this. I cant do this alone. I need people to come together on this. Thats why i share my story. This is only going to be a period of my life. Its not going to be forever. But to the extent that i can share my story and move the balfour ward, lets do it. Lets help save some lives. A remarkable young voice in this National Debate thats under way. Just ahead, the president s promise for fast action to stop the epidemic of gun violence. But what will he do, and when . [ male announcer ] how could switchgrass in argentina, change engineering in dubai, aluminum production in south africa, and the Aerospace Industry in the u. S. . At t. Rowe price, we understand the connections of a complex, global economy. Its just one reason over 75 of our mutual funds beat their 10year lipper average. T. Rowe price. Invest with confidence. Request a prospectus or summary prospectus with investment information, risks, fees and expenses to read and consider carefully before investing. [ male announcer ] every time you say no to a cigarette you celebrate a little win. Nicorette gum helps calm your cravings and makes you less irritable. Quit one cigarette at a time. It may have taken a tragedy of the sandy hook magnitude to thrust the gun debate into the national spotlight, but with president obamas promise to take action today, it seems that real change could be on the horizon, but what will washington do and how quickly . Heres abcs jake tapper. Reporter five days after the horrific attack at sandy hook elementary school, the president fleshed out what he meant when he pledged to the citizens of newtown meaningful action. I will use all the powers of this office to help advance efforts aimed at preventing more tragedies like this. We wont prevent them all. But that cant be an excuse not to try. Reporter but for years, many of the president s strongest supporters have been disappointed by his relative silence and inaction when it comes to gun violence. Youve had a position on renewing the ban on semiautomatic rivals, but you didnt do much about it. This is not the first incident of horrific gun violence of your four years. Where have you been . Heres where ive been, jake. Ive been president of the United States dealing with the worst economic crisis since the great depression, an Auto Industry on the verge of collapse, two wars. I dont think ive been on vacation. I think all of us have to do some reflection on how we prioritize what we do here in washington. Reporter it is precisely that reflection, his aides say, that brought him to the reagan press room. Reagan severely wounded in an act of gun violence more than 30 years ago. Today the president said his administration would look at the Mental Health, education, cultural and gun control aspects of this tragedy. To head the effort, he appointed Vice President biden, an author of the 1994 crime bill which contained a ban on some semiautomatic rifles. The biden team, which will include the four relevant cabinet secretaries, will report to the president by next month, he said. This is not some washington commission. This is a team that has a very specific task to pull together real reforms right now. Reporter the president also called on congress to take real action now, banning the sale of high capacity ammunition clips, closing the so called gun show loophole that does not require background checks for many private sales, and banning the sale of what the president called militarystyle assault weapons, which the white house defined as highpowered weapons that can fire hundreds of rounds in minutes. If were going to change things, its going to take a wave of americans, mothers and fathers, daughters and sons, pastors, law enforcement, Mental Health professionals, and yes, gun owners standing up and saying enough on behalf of our kids. Reporter of course, a ban is not that simple. Take a look. This is an m16 automatic rifle. Its generally illegal to the public. It can fire continuously. With one pull of the trigger, the bullets come nonstop, 30 rounds in two seconds. This ar15 style rifle is legal and very popular. It looks similar to the m16 on the outside, but its semiautomatic. One bullet gets fired per pull of the trigger. So this legal version takes ten to 15 seconds to fire off 30 rounds. Some ar15 style rifles were covered under the ban on semiautomatic assault weapons that joe biden wrote and that expired in 2004. But not all of them. We know so little about the ar15 style rifle used in the massacre of 26 people at sandy hook elementary, its unclear if it would have been covered. These bans are technical and complicated. And often contain many loopholes. This is the difficult political terrain to which the president now treads. But he said thats where hes headed. If we are not getting right, the need to keep our children safe, then nothing else matters. Reporter this is jake tapper for nightline at the white house. Thanks to jake for that. As we say good night this evening, nine nightline teams are imbedding in various locations across the country for a special edition a day in the life of the american gun. Make sure you tune in tomorrow. Thanks for watching abc news. We hope you tune in for good morning america. Were always online at abcnews. Com. Jimmy kimmel is up next. Well see you here tomorrow. Up next on Jimmy Kimmel Live the company said if they didnt come to work by thursday, they would liquidate, which actually sounds delicious. Eric stonestreet. Stone street sounds drunk onstage. I was like, i was not drunk, i was tipsy. Do you work on thanksgiving . Absolutely not. Im an american