Newtown, CT — A law enforcement official said that the 20-year-old suspect in the Newtown, Connecticut, school shooting killed his mother at their home Friday before driving her car to Sandy Hook Elementary School and going on a deadly rampage.
Nancy Lanza was a teacher at the school, according to the law enforcement official.
The gunman’s brother, 24-year-old Ryan Lanza, was questioned by law enforcement in Hoboken, New Jersey. He was mistakenly identified as the gunman , but it later turned out that he was at work at the time of the shooting.
Lanza was extremely cooperative during the investigation, a law enforcement official said, and was not believed to have any involvement in the shooting. He is not under arrest or in custody, but investigators are still searching his phone records and his computers.
Lanza told law enforcement that his brother, Adam Lanza, was believed to suffer from a personality disorder and be “somewhat autistic.”
According to the first official, three guns were found at the scene of the shooting: two pistols — a Glock and a Sig Sauer — and a .223-caliber rifle. The rifle was recovered from the back of the car at the school and the two pistols were recovered from inside the school.
Adam Lanza died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound at the scene. Twenty-six people, including 20 children, were killed in the shooting.
An official said earlier Friday that a girlfriend of one of the Lanza brothers and another friend were missing in New Jersey. Another official said police had spoken with the girlfriend, and that one of the friends had to be reached in California.