Newtown 'an assembly line of wakes and funerals'

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• "We have to take action," Vice President Joe Biden says


• Nancy Lanza is buried at an undisclosed location, a family friend says


• Adam Lanza will be buried "if anything ... in the spring," he adds


• Three 6-year-old victims are buried; bells will ring Friday in observance of one-week mark

(CNN) -- Much of the nation was set to mark the passage of a week since last Friday, when a young Connecticut man fatally shot 27 people -- 20 of them children -- and then turned a gun on himself in a rampage that has breathed new life into the gun-control movement.

Church bells are to toll across the region at 9:30 a.m. and some websites plan to go dark in honor of the victims at the urging of Silicon Valley venture capitalist Ron Conway, who came up with the idea at a Christmas party attended by Gabby Giffords, the former Arizona congresswoman who was wounded in a 2011 shooting that killed six.

Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback and Texas Gov. Rick Perry have called for residents of their states to pause to reflect one week after the shooting rampage. Perry also asked that churches ring their bells 26 times in honor of the victims at the school.

The observances are to come a day after President Barack Obama's administration put into motion an effort to change U.S. gun laws, less than a week after the Newtown, Connecticut, school shootings.

Vice President Joe Biden met with Cabinet members and law enforcement leaders at the White House to start formulating what Obama called "real reforms right now" in the wake of the shootings that killed 27 people -- including 20 children -- and the shooter himself.

"We have to take action, and there are a number of things ... we can immediately do," Biden said moments before the meeting began. "For anything to get done, we're going to need your advocacy."

Also Thursday, burials were held for three children and two teachers killed when Adam Lanza opened fire inside Sandy Hook Elementary School.

"It's an assembly line of wakes and funerals," said Lillian Bittman, former chairwoman of the Newtown School Board. "We can't even figure out which ones to go to. There are so many."

The assembly line stretched more than 2,200 miles west to Ogden, Utah, the hometown of shooting victim Emilie Parker. The town was festooned with pink ribbons as her parents brought her body back for burial.

"This sucks -- there's no reason for us to be here tonight," her father, Robbie Parker, told friends and well-wishers at a memorial service Thursday night. "And I'm so thankful for everybody that's here."

His voice trailed off as he struggled for composure. Seeing the pink -- his slain daughter's favorite color -- made him and his wife, Alissa, "feel like we were getting a big hug from everybody."

"A lot of you don't even know who she is. A lot of you never even met her," he said. "And to see your love be expressed in that way for us was so meaningful, and we were so comforted."

Parker drew laughter when he said, "A lot of people have been asking how we're doing. My opinion is, we need to come with an alternate way to greet somebody in this country." He said the first days after the shooting felt like "we were mourning inside of a glass house, because there was so much attention on the whole situation, and it was really hard to deal with.

"But then, as we come here and we start to see and feel all your love, we just know that everybody's just deeply concerned and we can feel that love and it's from a pure place and your intentions are so pure, we don't feel like people are prying," he continued. "We understand that you guys are there with us and that your pain and your sorrow is real and it's deep."

Also buried Thursday, at an undisclosed location, was Nancy Lanza, the shooter's mother, said Donald Briggs, a friend of the family who grew up with her in Kingston, New Hampshire.

Plans had not been finalized for the burial of her son, Adam, who fatally shot her Friday at their home before targeting the Newtown school and eventually taking his own life. "That's still under discussion," Briggs said. "If anything, it would be in the spring."

Three 6-year-olds were among those buried Thursday: Allison Wyatt, who loved to draw and wanted to be an artist; Benjamin Wheeler, who loved the Beatles; and red-haired Catherine Hubbard, who loved animals.

Teachers Lauren Gabrielle Rousseau and Anne Marie Murphy were also to be buried.

Victims of the slaying

The deaths have prompted a national outpouring of sympathy that continued Thursday. Carloads of teenagers from a Minnesota school that suffered a mass shooting in 2005 headed toward Newtown to offer their support.

The bloodshed has prompted an outcry among many to address gun laws and violence.

A slight majority of Americans favor major restrictions on guns: 52%, up 5 points from a survey taken in August after the July shooting inside a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, where 12 people died, according to a CNN/ORC International poll released Wednesday.

And 46% say they believe the government must play a role in solving the issue, up 13 points from January 2011, after the Tucson, Arizona, shooting that killed six and wounded Gabby Giffords, who was then a member of Congress.

Task force begins work

Joining Biden at Thursday's task force meeting on gun violence were Attorney General Eric Holder, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. Law enforcement officials also attended.

On Wednesday, Obama ordered the group to provide proposals by the end of January.

"The fact that this problem is complex can no longer be an excuse for doing nothing," he said. "The fact that we can't prevent every act of violence doesn't mean we can't steadily reduce the violence and prevent the very worst violence."

Obama highlighted suggestions to restrict gun sales to criminals and the mentally ill and to improve access to mental health care.

Holder was to travel later in the day to Connecticut to meet with law enforcement officials and first responders, a Justice Department official said.

Since the shootings, a number of conservative Democrats and some Republicans who have supported gun rights have said they are open to discussing the issue.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-California, said she will introduce legislation to reinstate the assault weapons ban that expired in 2004. The White House has said that the president supports that effort.

More than 195,000 people have signed an online White House petition supporting new gun-control legislation.

The gun industry itself has been largely silent on the issue; the National Rifle Association said Tuesday it would offer "meaningful contributions to help make sure this never happens again." The group has scheduled a news conference for Friday morning.

Gun control advocates say they believe the killings have so shocked the nation's conscience that change may be possible.

"I think that we are at a historic moment," said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Connecticut.

Strengthening security

In Ontario, Premier Dalton McGuinty made $10 million available to pay for security upgrades to establish a locked-door policy at 4,000 of the province's elementary schools.

"We're not going to brick up these windows; that would be unreasonable. But I believe there is a reasonable expectation by parents that when their kids go to elementary school in Ontario that we will have a locked-door policy in place," he said.

HLN journalist Rita Cosby and CNN's Matt Smith, Deborah Feyerick, Ben Brumfield, Jessica Yellin, Dave Alsup, Susan Candiotti, Sandra Endo, Faith Karimi and Daphne Sashin contributed to this report.

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Obama to hold moment of silence for Conn. victims

President Obama speaks at a memorial service for the victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting on December 16, 2012 in Newtown, Conn. / MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images

WASHINGTON President Barack Obama plans to observe a moment of silence at the White House on Friday morning in honor of the victims of the Connecticut elementary school massacre.

The White House says the president will observe the moment of silence at 9:30 a.m. EST, about one week after the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., in which 20 children and six adults were killed at the school.

Obama has asked Vice President Joe Biden to produce recommendations on new gun laws by next month and pledged to push new legislation without delay.

The White House said the president's observance of the shootings would take place in private without press coverage.

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Fiscal Cliff 'Plan B' Is Dead: Now What?

Dec 20, 2012 11:00pm

The defeat of his Plan B — Republicans pulled it when it became clear it would be voted down — is a big defeat for Speaker of the House John Boehner.  It demonstrates definitively that there is no fiscal cliff deal that can pass the House on Republican votes alone.

Boehner could not even muster the votes to pass something that would only allow tax rates on those making more than $1 million to go up.

Boehner’s Plan B ran into opposition from conservative and tea party groups -including Heritage Action, Freedom Works and the Club for Growth – but it became impossible to pass it after Senate Democrats vowed not to take up the bill and the president threatened to veto it.  Conservative Republicans saw no reason to vote for a bill conservative activists opposed – especially if it had no hopes of going anywhere anyway.

Plan B is dead.

Now what?

House Republicans say it is now up to the Senate to act.  Senate Democrats say it is now up to Boehner to reach an agreement with President Obama.

Each side is saying the other must move.

The bottom line:  The only plausible solution is for President Obama and Speaker Boehner to do what they have failed repeatedly to do:  come up with a truly bi-partisan deal.

The prospects look grimmer than ever. It will be interesting to see if the markets react.

SHOWS: This Week

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Big-spender ex-PM to be Japan's finance chief: report

TOKYO: A former Japanese prime minister known as a big spender in his political and personal life, will likely become the country's next finance minister and deputy premier, a report said on Thursday.

The leading Nikkei business daily said incoming Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will tap 72-year-old Taro Aso as finance chief and his own deputy, in a new government set to be formed next week.

Aso's past spending habits are in line with those of Abe, whose conservative Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) swept to victory in national elections on Sunday, pledging to boost the nation's ailing economy.

Aso, a fourth-generation politician who became Japan's prime minister in 2008, served as foreign minister during Abe's 2006-2007 stint in Japan's top political job.

As prime minister, Aso launched a series of economic stimulus packages worth hundreds of billions of dollars to prop up Japan's long-struggling economy.

But his time as premier ended in less than a year as the long-ruling LDP lost a historic election to the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) in 2009, while Aso's own missteps dented his popularity.

The scion of a wealthy family, he faced criticism for regular outings to luxurious hotel bars and mispronouncing commonly-used Chinese characters that make up part of the Japanese writing system.

Just a week before before his party lost to the DPJ, and as the economy sputtered, Aso was quoted as saying that "if you don't have money, you'd better not get married", dealing another blow to his profile.

In 2006, while he was foreign minister, a New York Times editorial branded Aso "Japan's offensive minister" for praising aspects of his country's colonial history in Asia, a particularly sore point in China and on the Korean peninsula.

His previous spending policies, however, were similar to those pledged by Abe -- to turn on the fiscal taps.

Abe has said he will pressure the Bank of Japan into more aggressive easing to power the world's third-largest economy, which may have slipped into recession in the third quarter.

A senior LDP official said on Wednesday that the incoming government would launch a spending package worth about 10 trillion yen ($118 billion) aimed at injecting life into the nation's limp economy.

- AFP/al

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Blizzard warning issued for large swath of Midwest

Drivers in Colorado contend with heavy snow Wednesday.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• NEW: 156-mile stretch of freeway closed in Colorado


• 23-car pileup in Texas dust storm kills one, injures 17


• Heavy snow, high winds stretch from Colorado to Wisconsin in season's first blizzard


• Storm to crawl from Midwest to New England by Friday

(CNN) -- People traveling early for Christmas in the center of the country will be dashing through the snow and the rain and the wind.

The first major storm of the season has prompted the National Weather Service to issue a blizzard warning for a huge swath of the Midwest stretching from eastern Colorado to Wisconsin's Lake Michigan shoreline, including virtually all of Iowa. The declaration warns of snow accumulations of up to 12 inches, complemented by 25- to 35-mph winds that will occasionally gust to 45 to 50 mph.

A 156-mile stretch of Interstate Highway 70 between Denver and the Kansas state line was closed in both directions for a time Wednesday. The westbound side reopened about 7 p.m. MT, but the eastbound lanes remained closed.

Cheyenne Wells, in east-central Colorado, reported a 67-mph wind gust with zero visibility just after 2 p.m. MT, CNN meteorologist Sean Morris said. U.S. Highway 385 was closed for 65 miles in the Cheyenne Wells region, Colorado's Department of Transportation reported.

"Most of the storm is on its way out across the state, except for the Eastern Plains, where there are still high winds, blizzard conditions, and highway closures," the department's Facebook page said.

"Whiteout conditions are likely and travel could become impossible" Wednesday night and into Thursday, the service's Omaha, Nebraska, office warned.

Is the storm hitting you? Send images to iReport

"Far southeast Nebraska and extreme southwest Iowa could see rain or a wintry mix for several hours yet this evening, so blizzard conditions may not develop over that area until mid-evening or later," the service said.

Airlines were reporting relatively few cancellations or delays in areas affected by the storm Wednesday night, but that could change overnight.

The storm will race into western Illinois, the weather service said. Rain will quickly change over to snow as the storm advances northeast, with the heaviest snow occurring overnight.

"Snow drifts several feet deep will be possible given the strong winds," the blizzard warning states.

At least 17 people were sent to hospitals near Lubbock, Texas, after a 23-vehicle chain-reaction crash on Interstate Highway 27 north of New Deal, Texas, state safety officials told CNN. There was at least one fatality, said Clinton Thetford, emergency management coordinator of Lubbock County. A stretch of the freeway in Lubbock County remains closed indefinitely.

Wrapping around the blizzard warning on the north, south and east is a winter storm warning, which will be no picnic either. The winds won't be quite as strong, but residents should expect a strong dose of rain, sleet and snow, with a few hail-packing thunderstorms thrown in for good measure.

A winter weather advisory is in effect for the Indiana-Ohio-Michigan tri-state area, as well as central Missouri and Kansas.

The "intense cyclone" will crawl across the Great Lakes region Thursday and slog into northern New England by Friday evening, the National Weather Service predicted.

Dodging the heavy precipitation but not the high winds is an area from western Texas and eastern New Mexico through the Oklahoma Panhandle and into southwest Kansas.

Much of the Southwest and Mississippi Valley is extremely dry, and the high winds have kicked up blinding dust near Lubbock, Texas.

CNN's Carma Hassan and Joe Sutton contributed to this report.

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Senate GOP proposes much smaller Sandy aid package

WASHINGTONSenate Republicans on Wednesday proposed a $24 billion emergency aid package for Superstorm Sandy victims, less than half of what Democrats hope to pass by Christmas.

The GOP alternative bill would provide more than enough money to pay for immediate recovery efforts through the spring.

Republicans complain that the $60.4 billion Democratic bill being debated in the Senate is larded with money for projects unrelated to damage from the late October storm, which battered the Atlantic coastline from North Carolina to Maine.

The Republican version does not include $13 billion Democrats want for projects to protect against future storms, including fortification of mass transit systems in the Northeast and protecting vulnerable seaside areas by building jetties against storm surges.

49 Photos

Sandy's devastation on Staten Island

Republicans said however worthy such projects may be, they are not urgently needed and should be considered by Congress in the usual appropriations process next year, not through emergency spending.

"We want to take care of urgent needs now," said Indiana Sen. Dan Coats, ranking Republican on the Senate Appropriations homeland security subcommittee, who put forward the bill. "We can look at other needs down the road when we have more time to look at them."

The GOP bill also scraps spending from the Democratic bill that is not directly related to Sandy damages, such as the $150 million for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for declared fisheries disasters in 2012 that could go to New England states, Alaska, New York and Mississippi.

The aid will help states rebuild public infrastructure like roads and tunnels and help thousands of people displaced from their homes. Sandy was the most costly natural disaster since Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and one of the worst storms ever in the Northeast.

More than $2 billion in federal funds has been spent on relief efforts so far for 11 states and the District of Columbia. The Federal Emergency Management Agency's disaster relief fund still has about $4.8 billion, and officials have said that is enough to pay for recovery efforts into early spring.

Earlier this month, Govs. Chris Christie, R-N.J., Andrew Cuomo, D-N.Y., and Dannel Malloy, D-Conn., argued in an op-ed that "in times of crisis no region, state or single American should have to stand alone or be left to fend for themselves," pointing to the "hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses damaged or destroyed, thousands still left homeless or displaced, tens of billions of dollars in economic loss" as evidence that "It's time for Congress to stand with us."

The governors, while recognizing that "our nation faces significant fiscal challenges," strive to separate the disaster-relief needs of their region from the ongoing "fiscal cliff" negotiations consuming Capitol Hill, arguing that Congress must "not allow this much-needed aid to fall in to the ideological divide."

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Obama Invokes Newtown on 'Cliff' Deal

Invoking the somber aftermath of the school massacre in Newtown, Conn., President Obama today appealed to congressional Republicans to embrace a standing "fair deal" on taxes and spending that would avert the fiscal cliff in 13 days.

"If there's one thing we should have after this week, it should be a sense of perspective about what's important," Obama said at a midday news conference.

"I would like to think that members of that [Republican] caucus would say to themselves, 'You know what? We disagree with the president on a whole bunch of things,'" he said. "'But right now what the country needs is for us to compromise.'"

House Speaker John Boehner's response: "Get serious."

Boehner announced at a 52-second news conference that the House will vote Thursday to approve a "plan B" to a broad White House deal -- and authorize simply extending current tax rates for people earning less than $1 million a year and little more.

"Then, the president will have a decision to make," the Ohio Republican said. "He can call on Senate Democrats to pass that bill or he could be responsible for the largest tax increase in American history."

Fiscal Cliff Negotiations: Trying to Make a Deal Watch Video

House Speaker John Boehner Proposes 'Plan B' on Taxes Watch Video

'Fiscal Cliff' Negotiations: Deal Might Be Within Reach Watch Video

Unless Congress acts by Dec. 31, every American will face higher income tax rates and government programs will get hit with deep automatic cuts starting in 2013.

Obama and Boehner have been inching closer to a deal on tax hikes and spending cuts to help reduce the deficit. But they have not yet had a breakthrough on a deal.

Obama's latest plan would raise $1.2 trillion in new tax revenue over 10 years, largely through higher tax rates on incomes above $400,000. He also proposes roughly $930 billion in spending cuts, including new limits on entitlement spending, such as slower annual cost-of-living increases for Social Security beneficiaries.

Boehner has agreed to $1 trillion in new tax revenue, with a tax rate hike for households earning over $1 million. He is seeking more than $1 trillion in spending cuts, with significant changes to Medicare and Social Security.

The president said today that he remains "optimistic" about reaching a broad compromise by Christmas because both sides are "pretty close," a sentiment that has been publicly shared by Boehner.

But the speaker's backup plan has, at least temporarily, stymied talks, with no reported contact between the sides since Monday.

"The speaker should return to the negotiating table with the president because if he does I firmly believe we can have an agreement before Christmas," said Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., a White House ally.

Schumer said Obama and Boehner are "not that far apart" in the negotiations.

"If they were to come to an agreement by Friday, they could write this stuff over the Christmas break and then we'd have to come back before the New Year and pass it," Schumer said.

Obama said he is "open to conversations" and planned to reach out to congressional leaders over the next few days to try to nudge Republicans to accept a "fair deal."

"At some point, there's got to be, I think, a recognition on the part of my Republican friends that -- you know, take the deal," he told reporters.

"They keep on finding ways to say no, as opposed to finding ways to say yes," Obama added. "At some point, you know, they've got take me out of it and think about their voters and think about what's best for the country."

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Virginia Tech mom: Ignore gun lobby

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

Newtown funerals: A community says goodbye

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STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Lori Haas: The magnitude of the Newtown shooting shocked me


• Haas: It reminds me of when my daughter was injured in the Virginia Tech shooting


• She says our elected leaders have abandoned all sense of right and wrong


• Haas: How many victims would be alive today if leaders took their responsibilities to heart?

Editor's note: Lori Haas lives in Richmond, Virginia. After her daughter Emily was shot and injured at the Virginia Tech massacre, she became involved in gun violence prevention efforts, working for the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence and Mayors Against Illegal Guns.

(CNN) -- Sitting in front of the TV on Friday, I watched in horror as the death toll climbed with each news report coming in on the mass shooting in an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut. The magnitude of the shooting shocked me.

It also took me back to five years ago, when I received a phone call on a blustery April morning that changed my life forever. I was out shopping, and my cell phone had rung several times, but I had chosen to ignore the calls. Luckily, I answered the third call, which came in at 10:38 a.m. My daughter Emily, then a sophomore at Virginia Tech, was on the phone. She said, "Mommy, I've been shot."

Clutching the phone, my knees buckling, I tried to make sense of what I was hearing. Emily quickly handed the phone to the EMT who had triaged her and was waiting with her for an ambulance. The EMT assured me that Emily was going to be fine, that there were very seriously wounded students that needed to be transported immediately and she was waiting with Emily for the next ambulance. She also shared that the situation on campus was "very bad."

Lori Haas

The world soon knew how bad it was. The incident at Virginia Tech on April 16, 2007, remains the worst mass shooting in U.S. history in terms of casualties. Thirty-two students and school staff were killed that morning by a dangerously mentally ill student with guns, including high-capacity magazines. The killer should have been prevented from purchasing firearms, but when he purchased his weapons, his mental health records were not in the FBI database against which background checks are run. He used 30-round magazines, which had been outlawed up until 2004, when Congress let the Assault Weapons Ban expire.

We were one of the lucky families -- our daughter survived, when so many others did not. Eleven of the 17 students in her classroom were killed, along with her professor. A classmate dialed 911 when they first heard the shooter, but dropped his cell phone when almost immediately, the killer burst into the classroom and began spraying bullets at everyone. Emily reached over and picked up the phone and kept the dispatcher on the phone during the entire ordeal by hiding the phone. Law enforcement repeatedly told me how brave Emily was to keep them on the line.

Law enforcement has also told me that the single most effective thing we can do to prevent gun violence would be to require all purchasers for all gun sales to undergo a background check. Then-Gov. Tim Kaine appointed a panel of experts to investigate all aspects of the massacre and report back their recommendations. Recommendation VI-2 stated, "Virginia should require background checks for all firearms sales." Sadly, that hasn't happened, and gun deaths now outpace motor vehicle deaths in my state.

America has witnessed mass shooting tragedies grow in frequency in the last five years to the point that, according to one report, there have been 16 mass shootings between February 22, 2012, and December 14, 2012, leaving over 80 dead and many injured. I can't help but ache with sorrow, anguish and concern for all those families suffering the sheer agony that I saw the families of the 32 killed at Virginia Tech suffer.

And I can't help but be angered at the cowardly behavior from our elected leaders. They have abandoned all sense of right and wrong, despite epidemic deaths from guns, and ignored their duty not only to keep our communities safe from gun violence, but to keep our children safe as well.

When I think of those killed -- over 60,000 Americans have been murdered with guns since the shooting at Virginia Tech -- I have to wonder how many might be alive today if our elected leaders had taken to heart their responsibilities.

Why is it that our elected leaders have not only ignored the pleas of survivors and family members of victims of gun violence, but those of our public safety officials -- police and law enforcement officers who put their lives on the line day in and day out -- only to listen to the gun lobby when determining public safety policy? What sense can that make when the gun lobby's sole purpose is to sell as many firearms as possible to make as much money as possible?

We have come to a time when many say the unimaginable has happened again -- the mass shooting in the Newtown school where 26 people were killed, including 20 children. It is sheer senselessness. My heart goes out with the utmost compassion to the families suffering so terribly from Friday's massacre.

For those whose loved ones have been killed, there is no real closure; there are permanent holes in their hearts. Time may lend a helping hand to healing, but their lives have been changed irrevocably. As my friend Lynnette, whose son was murdered in the Virginia Tech shooting, laments, "There is no ending to the heartache." I am brought to tears thinking of all we have seen, all we have not done and all we have let die.

Follow us on Twitter @CNNOpinion.

Join us on Facebook/CNNOpinion.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Lori Haas.

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HK probes Jackie Chan "guns and grenades" claim

HONG KONG: Hong Kong police said they will investigate comments made by action star Jackie Chan that he had used guns and grenades to confront triad gang members.

The Rush Hour star told the Guangzhou-based Southern People Weekly magazine that he had been "bullied" by triads, or the Chinese organised crime societies, that were once powerful and thrived in the Asian financial hub.

"In the past, when they bullied me, I hid in the United States. They opened fire at me once I got off the aeroplane," Hong Kong's South China Morning Post quoted him as saying in the magazine interview published last week.

"From that moment on, I needed to carry a gun every day when I went out," said the Hong Kong born star, who has played a hero cop that took on crime lords in his hugely popular Cantonese crime action film series 'Police Story'.

The 58-year-old actor said he had to confront a gang of 20 members once with guns when the group surrounded him with knives at a Hong Kong eatery.

"I told them they had been going too far and that I had been hiding from them. Later on, I confronted them with two guns and six grenades," he said, without saying when the incident occurred or how it ended.

A police spokeswoman on Wednesday said they will probe Chan's comments but stopped short of saying whether they will question him.

"We will see what he has said in the interview first," the spokeswoman said.

Chan suggested in the same interview that protest in the semi-autonomous Hong Kong that was returned to Beijing in 1997 should be restricted, sparking criticism from activists and politicians.

- AFP/al

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Sandy Hook students won't return to class until January

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• 6-year-olds Jessica Rekos and James Mattioli are laid to rest


• School won't start for Sandy Hook children until January


• The NRA says it is "prepared to offer meaningful contributions"


• Investigators are so far unable to retrieve data from a computer taken from the gunman's home

Watch CNN's LIVE TV coverage of the Connecticut elementary school shooting as the story continues to unfold. People are sharing their concern and sadness about the Newtown school shooting. What are your thoughts? Share them with CNN iReport.

Newtown, Connecticut (CNN) -- Attendance was taken at schools across this devastated town on Tuesday as most students returned to the classroom for the first time since the deadly school shooting.

Not everyone was there.

Sandy Hook Elementary students won't resume classes until January, and victims of last week's massacre will never return.

Jessica Rekos and James Mattioli, both 6, were laid to rest Tuesday, while the families of Charlotte Bacon, 6, Daniel Barden, 7, and Victoria "Vicki" Soto, 27, held calling hours, or visitations, for their lost loved ones.

The teacher and children were among the 27 people killed when gunman Adam Lanza shot his mother and then went to the Sandy Hook, indiscriminately opening fire on staff and young students. The rampage reignited a debate about guns in America and sent shock waves through a nation that has seen mass killings before -- but not like this.

Connecticut school shooting

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"She had an answer for everything, she didn't miss a trick, and she outsmarted us every time. We called her our little CEO for the way she carefully thought out and planned everything," the family of Jessica said about their little girl, who loved horses and asked Santa for a cowgirl hat this year.

"We can not imagine our life without her," they said.

James liked to remind everyone that he was 6 and three-quarters. "He would often sing at the top of his lungs, and once asked, 'How old do I have to be to sing on a stage?'" his family wrote in an obituary.

In an online posting about his funeral, the Mattioli family called James "our beloved prince."

Across town, hearses could be seen traveling along roads with police escorts. Onlookers cried as they drove past.

Remembering the victims

For Sandy Hook students, no school until January

Unlike students at other schools who returned Tuesday, Sandy Hook students are not expected to go back until January.

Their school is a crime scene. The current plan is for them to resume classes next year at the former Chalk Hill Middle School, eight miles away in neighboring Monroe, Newtown Superintendent of Schools Janet Robinson said in a letter to parents.

"We need to tend to our teachers' and students' needs to feel comfortable after this trauma in this new place," she wrote.

Teachers may call parents "to invite you to visit Chalk Hill with your child this week to walk around and see the classroom and get familiar with this new Sandy Hook home."

At other schools, students went back to class with their sense of normalcy shattered. They were met by police, counselors and teachers, who all face a tremendous burden.

How do they explain to children what happened? How do they help make them feel safe?

David Schonfeld, a crisis counselor who gave a presentation to Newtown teachers about how to talk to students, said they have to meet children where they are.

"I told them that as far as I was concerned, there was really only one lesson plan that they needed to teach before they broke for the (holidays), and that was to make sure that the children knew that they were safe and that they cared about them and they were going to care for them," he said.

The teachers' union said classes would discuss the tragedy in an age-appropriate manner.

The gunman's computer and grim new details

Investigators have so far been unable to retrieve data from a computer taken from the home of the gunman, Adam Lanza, a law enforcement official said Tuesday.

It appears Lanza smashed the computer, extensively damaging the hard drive, the official said, adding that the FBI is assisting Connecticut State Police in trying to retrieve data from the computer.

Lanza's mother was shot four times in the head while she slept in her bed, said Connecticut Chief Medical Examiner H. Wayne Carver, also Tuesday.

Adam Lanza killed himself with a shot to the front of his head from a handgun, the medical examiner said.

Toxicology tests are under way to determine whether Adam Lanza had taken medication.

Growing debate over gun laws

What happened in Newtown should never happen again, advocates on both sides of the gun-control debate agree. But they're at staunch odds about how to turn words into reality.

The National Rifle Association commented Tuesday for the first time since the shooting, saying it was shocked and heartbroken by what happened. The group is planning to hold a news conference on Friday.

"Out of respect for the families, and as a matter of common decency, we have given time for mourning, prayer and a full investigation of the facts before commenting," it said. "The NRA is prepared to offer meaningful contributions to help make sure this never happens again."

The grassroots group Newtown United sent a delegation to Washington to meet with the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence as well as families from July's movie theater massacre in Aurora, Colorado.

The new group, which formed out of Newtown on Sunday, aims to create meaningful dialogue -- both locally and beyond -- about what may have led to the tragedy.

Until school shooting, 1 homicide in almost a decade

The debate is playing out not just in Newtown and Washington, but across the United States.

Two national polls conducted shortly after the Newtown massacre suggest that more Americans want stricter gun control.

In a Washington Post/ABC News poll, 54% of adults favor stricter gun control laws in the country, while 43% oppose.

And a new CBS News poll indicates that 57% of Americans back stricter gun laws, the highest percentage in a decade; 30% think gun laws should be kept as they are.

However, less than half of the respondents in the CBS poll -- 42% -- think stricter gun laws would have helped prevent what happened at Sandy Hook Elementary.

Sen. Joe Manchin, a conservative Democrat from West Virginia and a "proud gun owner," said he's now committed to "dialogue that would bring a total change" after the massacre in Newtown.

"Who would have ever thought, in America or anywhere in the world, that children would be slaughtered?" he asked. "It's changed me."

John Licata told CNN's iReport there needs to be better vetting before people buy guns, and assault weapons should be banned -- something Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-California, says she'll propose once the new Congress convenes in January.

But some say the shooting illustrates the need for more armed guards -- and possibly armed teachers -- in schools.

Gun lobby has laid groundwork against any new laws

Texas Gov. Rick Perry said that if school districts decide that arming teachers is the best way to keep schools safe, so be it.

If Texas residents are duly background-checked, trained and have a concealed handgun license, "you should be able to carry your handgun anywhere in the state," Perry said, according to CNN affiliate WFAA.

Out of respect for the Newtown victims and their families, Dick's Sporting Goods has removed all guns from its store closest to Newtown, the company said.

Dick's, one of the largest sporting goods retailers in the world, also has suspended the sale of some semiautomatic rifles nationwide, the company said. It was unclear how long Dick's will keep its suspension of "modern sporting rifles."

Shedding new light on the gunman

While Carver, the chief medical examiner, said he was told that Adam Lanza had Asperger's syndrome, officials are working to determine whether that diagnosis was correct, and whether he may have had other diagnosable problems.

A former director of security for Newtown Public Schools shed new light Monday night on the gunman.

Richard Novia said Adam Lanza had Asperger's syndrome, based on documents and conversations with Lanza's mother.

Novia said that as part of his job, which he left in 2008, he would be informed of students who might pose problems to themselves or others.

He also said he received "intake information," which he said "is common for any students troubled or impaired or with disabilities." The idea was to keep track of and help students who may need it.

However, Novia said he never thought Lanza was a threat and certainly never thought he was capable of such violence.

After shooting, cops take no-tolerance approach to copycat threats

Russ Hanoman, a friend of Lanza's mother, previously told CNN that Lanza had Asperger's and that he was "very withdrawn emotionally."

CNN has not been able to independently confirm whether Lanza was diagnosed with autism or Asperger's, a higher-functioning form of autism. Both are developmental disorders, not mental illnesses.

Many experts say neither Asperger's syndrome nor autism can be blamed for the rampage.

"There is absolutely no evidence or any reliable research that suggests a linkage between autism and planned violence," the Autism Society said in a statement. "To imply or suggest that some linkage exists is wrong and is harmful to more than 1.5 million law-abiding, nonviolent and wonderful individuals who live with autism each day."

Dr. Max Wiznitzer, a pediatric neurologist and autism expert at Rainbow Babies and Children's Hospital in Cleveland, also said the gunman's actions can't be linked to autism spectrum disorders.

"Aggression and violence in the ASD population is reactive, not preplanned and deliberate," he said.

Gun control: 'This one feels different'

CNN's Susan Candiotti reported from Newtown; Dana Ford reported from Atlanta. CNN's Holly Yan, Greg Botelho, Sandra Endo, Josh Levs, Miriam Falco, Wayne Drash, Carol Cratty, Paul Steinhauser and David Williams contributed to this report.

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