The man who led Colorado's Columbine High in 1999, when two students gunned down a dozen classmates and one teacher, spoke to West Virginia educators Tuesday - about a week after 49 people were killed in Orlando, Florida, in the worst mass shooting in recent U.S. history.
But Frank DeAngelis, who had been Columbine's principal for 18 years and stayed at the school 15 years after the tragedy, only mentioned the Orlando shooting in passing during two roughly one-hour presentations to educators at the KidStrong Conference, a three-day event touching on multiple education-related subjects that brought about 1,800 people to the Charleston Civic Center Tuesday.
"I'm amazed whenever these other shootings occur, just like what you saw in Orlando or what you saw in San Bernardino, the first thing the politicians wanna talk about is gun control," DeAngelis told hundreds of educators gathered in the Civic Center's coliseum floor to hear his keynote speech kicking off the conference. "But what about the mental health of these kids? They're crying out for help."
DeAngelis, who said funding shouldn't be cut for mental health services and suggested an early warning system to identify students who may harm others, didn't use his speeches to share many specifics on how to prevent future mass shootings. Rather, he spoke about how he responded to the tragedy and helped rebuild the school community, and discussed broad themes like the importance of loving and including all students and the qualities that make effective school leaders.
DeAngelis' remarks came the day after the U.S. Senate rejected, in largely party line votes, gun control proposals from both Democrats and Republicans, with the Democrats calling the Republicans' proposals too weak and the GOP calling the Democrats' recommendations too restrictive.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., had proposed letting the government block many gun sales to known or suspected terrorists, while Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, suggested a National Rifle Association-backed plan that would allow denying a gun sale to a known or suspected terrorist, but only if prosecutors could convince a judge within three days that the would-be buyer was involved in terrorism.
Last week, Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., led a nearly 15-hour-long filibuster demanding that senators respond to the Orlando shooting, which occurred at the Pulse gay nightclub. Many of the victims were Latino. The gunman, Omar Mateen, pledged allegiance to the Islamic State, though the FBI has said it's found no evidence the attack was directed by a foreign terrorist organization.
The U.S. death rate from gun homicides is about 31 per million people, or about 27 people killed every day of the year, according to The New York Times, making America an "extreme outlier" compared with other advanced countries. The Times reported that for U.S. men 15 to 29, gun homicides are the third-leading cause of death after accidents and suicides.
DeAngelis told the Gazette-Mail after his speech that he wasn't arguing gun control wouldn't be effective in stopping future mass shootings, and he said he questions why people need certain weapons - though he noted his weapons terminology wasn't good.
"I think you have to look at everything, but the first thing that we talk about is gun control, gun control, gun control, and we forget about some of the other warning signs," DeAngelis said.
DeAngelis - who noted during his speech that the Columbine shooters tried to kill more students with homemade propane bombs that failed to ignite - said he doubted laws could stop a person dead-set on harming others. He said of the Islamic State mindset that religion justifies murder, "I don't care what gun law you have, they're going to find a way to get a weapon. And so, are there other means to stop them before they get to the guns?"
While he said schools should prepare for the possibility of active shooters, he also expressed both some support and concern about other current methods meant to stop shooters.
"I look at everything we had in place that day, we had a school resource officer, we had a camera, we tried the emergency planning and things like that, but they were still able to do what they were doing," he said.
Active shooters' circumstances vary. Referencing the findings of criminologists and forensic psychiatrists, The Washington Post reported earlier this year that most mass shooters aren't mentally ill. Dave Cullen, whose book "Columbine" DeAngelis recommended, noted that the popular narrative that the Columbine shooters were bullied loners is also wrong.
DeAngelis noted they were in Advanced Placement classes, one had just been accepted to the University of Arizona, and remembered seeing one hanging out in a stretch limousine with his date and four other couples a few days before the shooting occurred. But he said tapes showed that long before the attacks one respected Adolf Hitler and believed people deserved to die.
He said after the killings, he went out to skateparks, smoking areas and other places to reach students who weren't connected to the school's "family."
Reach Ryan Quinn at ryan.quinn@wvgazettemail.com, facebook.com/ryanedwinquinn, 304-348-1254 or follow @RyanEQuinn on Twitter.