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 The trip by state Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum comes a day
before Oregon state police planned to hold a news conference to give
an update on the role played by officers who exchanged gunfire with
the suspect before he committed suicide.
Authorities initially suggested the gunman had been killed in a
shootout with two Roseburg police officers arriving on the scene of
Thursday's attack in a classroom building at Umpqua Community
College in Roseburg.
But Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin later revealed medical
examiners had determined the assailant, Christopher Harper-Mercer,
26, died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Hanlin also has said police were on the scene within five minutes of
the first call for help, that they reported confronting the gunman
two minutes later, and that their exchange of gunfire had
"neutralized" the suspect.
Authorities have disclosed few details about the circumstances of
the rampage itself. And they have revealed little of what they know
about the motives driving Harper-Mercer - by all accounts a
troubled, socially awkward loner with a passion for guns - to carry
out the deadliest U.S. mass shooting in two years, and the bloodiest
in modern Oregon history.
According to survivors' accounts, the suspect stormed into his
introductory writing class to shoot his professor, then began
gunning down cowering classmates one at a time as he questioned them
about their religion.
Parents of two survivors revealed over the weekend that the
assailant had handed an envelope containing a flash-drive to one of
the male students in the class, whose life the suspect deliberately
spared.
In addition to the nine people slain, nine others were wounded in
the hail of gunfire.
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One, Chris Mintz, 30, a U.S. Army combat veteran who served in Iraq,
was credited with likely saving lives when he confronted the gunman
outside another classroom before police arrived, drawing fire that
left him with seven bullet wounds and two broken legs, according to
his former girlfriend.
Rosenblum, a Democrat and former federal prosecutor who became the
first woman elected Oregon attorney general in 2012, visited
Roseburg at the invitation of District Attorney Rick Wesenberg.
Democratic President Barack Obama, who spoke out forcefully in favor
of stricter gun control measures after the massacre, plans to visit
Roseburg on Friday to meet privately with families of the victims,
the White House said this week.
Roseburg Mayor Larry Rich, a Republican and self-described supporter
of gun rights in the former timber community 180 miles (300 km)
south of Portland, said he welcomed the Democratic president to
visit when the White House called on Monday to ask whether Obama
should make the trip.
(Writing by Steve Gorman; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)
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