School Gunman Had A 'Mean Face'

(CBS/AP)  A school shooting survivor said Thursday the gunman aimed with "a mean face" as he shot fellow students, killing five among his nine victims. Officials said Red Lake High School would remain closed for two more weeks.

"I was in shock," said 15-year-old Cody Thunder, so much so he didn't feel the pain from being shot in his hip. "What is he doing? And he ended up shooting. I thought he was messing around, I thought it was a paintball gun or something."

Some witnesses have said the attacker, Jeff Weise, was smiling and waving as he shot at people, but Thunder said of Weise's demeanor: "It was a mean face."

Red Lake students and staff met at the elementary school Thursday, though classes won't resume until the week of April 12. The high school building remains closed.

Asked about returning to school, Thunder said: "I don't feel like going back." Later, he said he would not return to school this year.

That's a mistake for both Thunder and the school, psychologist Bill Pfohl told CBS News Correspondent Stephan Kaufman.

"We find that the best approach is to get the kids back with their natural support system," said Pfohl, who is heading a "psychological swat team from the National Association of School Psychologists.

"The job is mainly to be a good listener. We allow people to tell their stories about what they experienced with this particular trauma," he said, adding that the counseling is available for parents, teachers and other adults, as well as students.

The team will remain in Red Lake for three to five days.

"The real important part is to start to set up a system that will last over the next several months, if not years, because we know that events can have delayed reactions up to a year away," Pfohl told Kaufman.

Thunder said he recognized Weise immediately because he had spoken with him a couple of times, trying to connect with a person who seemed to have no friends.

"He looked like a cool guy, and then I talked to him a few times," Thunder said. "He talked about guns and shooting people."

He said Weise cultivated a dangerous appearance, including sculpting his hair to look as if he had devil horns: "It looked like he was trying to be evil."

Authorities were still trying to determine why Weise went on his rampage Monday, which began at his grandfather's house and ended at the school. Nine people were killed and seven were wounded before the gunman apparently shot himself.

"I turned around and there's Jeff Wiese, pointing a gun at me, and he started shooting," Thunder, who was shot in the hip, said. "The glass shattered, and, I don't know, I was just in shock, and then I got up and ran."

Thunder is in good condition. Another survivor, Lance Crowe, 15, also appeared at the news conference at North Country Regional Hospital but did not speak. Relatives have said he may have survived because he played dead after he was shot.

Another boy being treated at the hospital also was in good condition; two students at a Fargo hospital were in serious or critical condition.

Monday's shooting, with five students killed, was the worst in a U.S. school since the Columbine shootings in Colorado six years ago.

Authorities and witnesses say Weise killed his grandfather and the man's companion before heading to the school. He killed an unarmed security guard and a teacher before firing upon students and then, authorities believe, killing himself.

School Superintendent Stuart Desjarlait defended security measures at the school, which included a disaster plan, cameras and security guards; the guards were not armed.

"It goes to show that if something is going to happen, it's going to happen," Desjarlait said. "No matter what you do."

Authorities were investigating whether Weise, who dressed in black and wrote stories about zombies, may have posted messages on a neo-Nazi Web site expressing admiration for Adolf Hitler and using the handle "Todesengel" — German for "Angel of Death."

In its Thursday editions, The Washington Post reported that a bus driver for a health center said he drove Weise to Thief River Falls in June, where the boy was going voluntarily to a psychiatric ward.

The newspaper also cited a cultural coordinator at Red Lake Middle School who said Weise had been hospitalized at least once for suicidal tendencies and was taking the anti-depressant Prozac.

His aunts, Shauna and Tammy Luscher, confirmed his use of Prozac on CBS News' The Early Show.

On Wednesday, TheSmokingGun.com reported that Weise posted a computer animation on a multimedia Web site in October, Newgrounds.com, that showed a gunman shooting four people, blowing up a squad car and committing suicide.

The animation was accompanied by a photograph of Weise and a description of him as "nothin' but a Native American teenage-stoner-industrialist."

In another posting, on LiveJournal.com and dated Jan. 4, Weise wrote: "I should've taken the razor blade express last time around. ... Well, whatever, man. Maybe they've got another shuttle comin' around soon?"