Investigators wouldn’t say whether Mercer was included in the 10, and they said none of the victims would be identified for at least 24 hours. Law enforcement sources said that Mercer’s connection to the college, where he wasn’t a student, remained unclear.
Multiple law enforcement sources told NBC News that four weapons were recovered from the scene in Roseburg, in the southwest corner of the state about 60 miles south of Eugene — three handguns and a long gun similar to an AR-style rifle. Investigators also found several magazines for 5.56mm ammunition and a ballistics vest, one of the sources said.
“This has been a long, sad, tragic day at UCC,” Rita Cavin, the college’s interim president, said Thursday night. “And the thing we should take away from it is the power that love can bring to a community.”
A visibly frustrated President Barack Obama — who has denounced the proliferation of guns in society after more than a half-dozen previous mass shootings — said “thoughts and prayers are not enough.”
Related: Frustrated Obama Says American Gun Culture ‘Doesn’t Make Sense’
“It’s not enough,” he repeated. “It does not capture the heartache and grief and anger that we should feel, and it does nothing to prevent this carnage from being inflicted some place else in America next week or a couple months from now.”
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