When Terror Enrolled at Santa Monica College
A Year After a Devastating Shooting, a Professor Tells His Story—and Those of His Campus—as the Community Continues to Heal
Terror arrived at my college a year ago. On June 7, 2013, a man, wielding a .223 caliber assault rifle and a handgun and strapped with 1,300 rounds of ammunition, killed his brother and father in Santa Monica and set their house ablaze. Then he commandeered a passing car, shot up a bus, and sprayed bullets across an intersection, before ordering the driver to take him to Santa Monica College.
His stroll westward across the campus took about 10 minutes—10 minutes in the history of a college in existence since 1929. …
