Fund raises $6.3 million for victims and survivors of Pittsburgh synagogue shooting
More than $6 million raised after the Pittsburgh synagogue massacre will primarily be split among the families of the dead and survivors of the worst attack on Jews in U.S. history, organizers of the fund announced Tuesday.
The Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh set up the Victims of Terror Fund after the Oct. 27 attack at Tree of Life synagogue that killed 11 and wounded seven. The fund took in more than 8,500 donations from 48 states and at least eight countries totaling $6.3 million.
The donations are "expressions of love, generosity, compassion and a desire to help in the healing process," the independent committee overseeing the fund wrote in its report Tuesday. The committee acknowledged that "no amount of money can compensate for the loss of a loved one's life" or "completely heal our hearts or our communities."
Most of the money, about $4.4 million, will be given to those most directly affected by the attack, including victims' families and two seriously injured congregants. The committee directed $437,000 to nine congregants who were trapped inside Tree of Life, "fearing for their own lives and, in some cases, watching relatives and friends being murdered," the report said. Police officers who were shot and wounded while responding will split $500,000.
The committee also set aside $650,000 for the three congregations that share space at Tree of Life and were gathered for Sabbath services elsewhere in the building when the gunman walked in and opened fire. Some of that money will pay for repairs to the heavily damaged synagogue, which the committee noted will be "a costly, complicated and extended process." The balance of the fund, $300,000, will be used for a future memorial, as well as an education initiative.
The fund stopped accepting donations Feb. 27.
"The outpouring of support from around the world has been tremendous," Meryl Ainsman, chair of the Jewish Federation's board of directors, said in a statement.
An anti-Semitic truck driver named Robert Bowers has been charged in the attack. Authorities have said Bowers expressed hatred of Jews as he opened fire with an AR-15 rifle and other weapons. Bowers pleaded not guilty to federal hate crimes and dozens of other counts, but his lawyer has signaled he might be open to a plea deal.
Federal prosecutors in Pittsburgh have previously indicated their intention to seek the death penalty.
One of the survivors of massacre told CBS News correspondent David Begnaud she doesn't believe Bowers should receive the death penalty because that would be "too easy."
"I want him to spend the rest of his miserable life rotting in jail," Carol Black said in November. "He has no remorse and I think his only regret is that he didn't get us all."
Black survived the attack by hiding in a pitch-black storage closet with several others. Her brother, Richard Gottfried, was among the 11 people killed.
"I think that's too easy, and I don't want him to have it easy," Black said.
In the interview with Begnaud, she described how the tragic day unfolded. Soon after arriving at the synagogue for services that morning, Black said she heard what sounded like a metal table falling against a tile floor. Initially, she assumed someone had just dropped something, but when the sound happened again, and this time closer, Rabbi Jeffery Myers ushered her and two others to a back hallway and into dark storage closet.
"I don't know how long we were in there," she said. "It felt like a year, but it was probably closer to 20 minutes."