Sandy Hook-inspired game sparks outrage

This screen capture was taken from an online game that simulates Adam Lanza's movements at Sandy Hook Elementary School, where he murdered 20 children and six educators on Dec. 14, 2012.

This screen capture was taken from an online game that simulates Adam Lanza’s movements at Sandy Hook Elementary School, where he murdered 20 children and six educators on Dec. 14, 2012.

The mother of a Sandy Hook Elementary School teacher who made the ultimate sacrifice is condemning the developer of an online simulation that allows video gamers to copycat the madman who ambushed 20 children and six educators last December.

The release of “The Slaying of Sandy Hook Elementary,” which directs gamers to storm virtual classrooms with an AR-15 assault rifle in the same vein as Adam Lanza and displays a kill ratio at the end, comes less than a month before the first anniversary of the Dec. 14 massacre.

Donna Soto, the Stratford mom whose late daughter, Victoria, 27, was awarded the Presidential Citizens Medal for shielding her students from the gunfire during the rampage, is calling on the site’s developer to pull the plug on the controversial game.

“It’s absolutely disgusting that somebody thinks this is funny,” Soto told Hearst Connecticut Newspapers Tuesday. “We’re all suffering. All the families are suffering. We’re coming up on December.
My daughter’s birthday just passed. It just adds insult to the suffering that we’re dealing with. It’s just incomprehensible that someone would think this kind of thing is wanted.”

The credits section of the site identifies the game’s creator as Ryan Jake Lambourn of Australia and strangely includes links that direct visitors to gun control websites and to their elected representatives.

A request for comment was sent to Lambourn’s Twitter account by Hearst.

The game opens by directing users to grab a Glock handgun and shoot their mother while she is sleeping, just as Lanza did. The game closes with an alert that police have arrived, with the shooter turning a gun on himself.

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Neil Vigdor