Texas carry law, tower’s 50th meet
Monday marks the anniversary of a mass shooting at state’s flagship university
Fifty years ago Monday, Charles Whitman, a 25- year- old engineering student and former Marine, climbed to the top of the tower at the University of Texas at Austin with an arsenal of high- powered weapons and began killing.
For 96 terrifying minutes, Whitman fired below at students and passersby, killing at least 16 people and injuring 31 in what became known as the first mass murder of its kind in America.
Since then, the way police and health officials respond to mass shootings has evolved and similar shootings have scarred the nation in places such as Columbine, Virginia Tech, Newtown and Orlando. But it was the UT tower shooting that ushered the nation into the harsh reality of mass shooters ready to kill and be killed, said Gary Lavergne, author of A Sniper in the Tower: The Charles Whitman Murders.
“This was the largest mass murder of its kind up until then,” he said. “We were not used to the idea that a person would do something like this and not give a damn whether he was going to live or die.”
Monday also marks the day when Texas’ new campus carry law goes into effect, allowing licensed holders to carry concealed handguns at public universities in the state, including UT Austin. The law touched off heated debate in Austin, with several professors recently filing a complaint in federal court to block the law before classes begin Aug. 24.
Michael Newbern, a spokesman for Students for Concealed Carry, a national advocacy group that supported the Texas law, said the organization will refrain from media events or news releases Monday in deference to the tower shooting anniversary, but will return to defending the law when classes begin.
“It’s about the individual’s choice to defend themselves,” he said. “There’s no compelling evidence to suggest campus safety will be hurt.”
Early on the morning of Aug. 1, 1966, Whitman killed his mother at her apartment near campus, then drove to his South Austin home and stabbed and killed his wife, Kathleen. Just before noon, he made his way into the tower, killing visitors and a secretary as he went. He was armed with seven rifles and handguns, including a .30- caliber M1 carbine and 6 mm Remington boltaction rifle and about 700 rounds of ammunition. From his vantage point 300 feet above ground, the former Marine began to site and shoot victims below.
Austin police, like most other departments at the time, were grossly unprepared for such an incident, Lavergne said. They didn’t set up an incident command center, assign an assault team or even have handheld radios to communicate with one another. With police officers mostly ineffective, students grabbed rifles from pickup trucks and began firing back at Whitman.
Since then, police departments have created specialized SWAT teams to deal with active shooters and ramped up their training of individual police officers to deal with mass shooters, said Pete Blair, executive director of the Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training Center at Texas State University.
Students today shooting back at a gunman such as Whitman might cause more trouble than good, as specialized police teams could easily mistake them for bad guys, Blair said.
Austin Police Officer Ramiro “Ray” Martinez, 29 years old at the time, was off duty that day but saw the incident unfolding on TV and called in to see if he could help. He was told to help divert traffic, but when he arrived at campus he saw other officers doing that already.
He parked his car and winded his way closer to the tower. He decided to try to take out the shooter.
Martinez sprinted along the South Mall, entered the tower’s base and took the elevator to the 26th floor. As he went, he heard rifle shots outside. He was armed only with a six- shot, Smith& Wesson .38- caliber revolver.
On the 26th floor, Martinez met another officer and a civilian with a rifle. Martinez and the civilian headed up to the observation deck. Ducking under the shots fired up from the ground, Martinez confronted Whitman and emptied his revolver into the shooter.
“The only thing I knew at the time is I had done my job,” said Martinez, now retired.
Martinez went on to work as a narcotics investigator and spent 18 years as a Texas Ranger. He said he’s a firm supporter of the Second Amendment but feels campus carry is a bad idea. “It’s going to open up a Pandora’s box,” he said. “Someone running around trying to be a hero will only complicate things.”