Sandy Hook Victims Laid to Rest This Week

Police and firefighter honor guards were present at funerals throughout the Connecticut town of Newtown as victims's from last week's horriffic Sandy Hook Elementary school massacre were laid to rest. Among some of the firefighters present were New York's Bravest for the funeral of 7 year old Daniel Barden. According to Daniel's parents, Barden idolized his father's cousins who were FDNY firefighters.

The first-grader, frozen in time with a gap-toothed smile in a photo distributed by his family, was to be remembered in a morning service at St. Rose of Lima Catholic Church in Newtown and then laid to rest. Firefighters gathered outside the red-brick church, standing silently alongside the black hearse as mourners filed in.

This is a part of our extended family,” said Lt. Eddie Boles, who works with Daniel's cousins as a firefighter in New York, about 65 miles south of Newtown. “After 9/11 the whole country extended its sympathy to New York so we're here to show our support for this community."

Daniel, who had a brother and sister, was described by loved ones as “the light of his family's life” and an active boy who played soccer and swam on the Newtown Torpedoes swim team.

Fringe hate group and professional picketers Westboro Baptist Church announced their plans to picket the funeral for the students and faculty of Sandy Hook with signs proclaiming Lanza's murder spree was God's retribution. Over the weekend, hackers from Anonymous had boasted they were able to release personal information from the Westboro church and post it online [Aaron Worthing explains why as big a bunch of assholes Westboro may be, we should still be concerned about erronious/outdated info being released- NANESB!]

Meanwhile, the media had incorrectly identified gunman Adam Lanza's mother and first shooting victim, Nancy, as a former teacher at Sandy Hook immediately after the attack [they also incorrectly identified the shooter as Lanza's older brother who was in New York City at the time- NANESB!]. Reports had been circulating that Nancy Lanza was getting ready to commit her youngest son to a psychiatric institution- although under Connecticut law those records are sealed- which may have triggered her son's killing spree.

The list of victims at the elementary school include the following

-Charlotte Beacon, Age 6

-Daniel Barden, Age 7

-Rachel Davino, Age 21

-Olivia Engel, Age 6

-Josephine Gay, Age 7 (her birthday was reportedly a few days prior to the shooting)

-Ana Marquez-Greene, Age 6

-Dylan Hockley, Age 6

-Dawn Hocksprung, Age 47

-Madaline Hsu, Age 6

-Catherine Hubbard, Age 6

-Chase Kowalski, Age 7

-Jesse Lewis, Age 6

-James Mattioli, Age 6

-Grace McDonnel, Age 7

-Anne Marie Murphy, Age 52

-Emilie Parker, Age 6

-Jack Pinto, Age 6

-Noah Pozner, Age 6

-Caroline Previdi, Age 6

-Jessica Rekos, Age 6

-Avielle Richman, Age 6

-Lauren Rousseau, Age 20

-Mary Sherlach, Age 56

-Victoria Soto, Age 27

-Benjamin Wheeler, Age 6

-Allison Wyatt, Age 6

New York's WABC also posted a brief bio of each of the victims.

After the winter break, the surviving students and faculty of Sandy Hook will be attending Chalk Hill elementary in neighboring Monroe, CT. The school had been shuttered in recent years, but officials with the education department are confident they can have the building re-opened by early January.