Emily's gift

Meredith Vieira • Profile

BAILEY, COLO. - It is a sad — and almost cruel — twist of fate. 16 years ago, Ellen and John Michael Keyes were happily anticipating the birth of twins, due September 27^th, 1990. The babies, who they named Emily and Casey, arrived early. But last week, that September 27^th date became significant again—this time all too tragically.

Ellen Keyes, Emily's mother: The irony of the date is pretty painful.

Meredith Vieira, NBC News:  September 27^th was the day. That’s got to go through your mind. That’s so strange.

Ellen Keyes: It does. And I haven’t been able to connect that loop in my head at all.

This year, September 27^th fell on a Wednesday, and for the Keyes family, it was a day that began uneventfully. Just as she had done every morning for years, Ellen took her 16-year-old twins to school.

Ellen Keyes: The little things, driving them to school every day… and I drove back home, and it was worth every moment to have done this for years and years. To have done it that morning especially.

Vieira:  Who drove the car that morning?

Ellen Keyes: Emily. Had the music loud (laughter). Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Vieira: And John Michael where were you?

John Michael Keyes, Emily's father:  I was probably eating breakfast (laughter).

At 7 a.m., Emily Keyes drove down the winding dirt road that leads from the family’s mountain top home in Bailey, Colorado, gazing at a serene landscape dotted with gorgeous yellow Aspens.  At 7:17, she and her twin brother got out of the car at Platte Canyon High School.

It should have been just another routine school day. Casey was going on a field trip.  Emily was relieved she had no tests.  But a few hours later, September 27^th became anything but ordinary— a day when the small, close-knit town of Bailey would lose its innocence to violence—a day that would intertwine the lives of the Keyes family, a local sheriff, and a hateful stranger in ways they never could have envisioned.

Vieira: When did the two of you realize that something was wrong?  That something was going on at the school?

John Michael Keyes: I got a call. Ellen was going downtown to pick up toner cartridges, some you know, mundane stuff. And she gave me a call and said “Something’s going on at the school, shots fired in room 206.”

Vieira: How did you know?

Ellen Keyes: They had it on the police scanner. It was about 20 or 30 minutes after it started.

An employee at this gas station heard the call come across the police scanner at 11:40 a.m.  Ellen told her husband to get on the computer to check the twins’ class schedule—their hearts sank. Emily was scheduled to be in room 206.

John Michael Keyes: I was in denial. "Well, maybe she’s not there."

Emily’s mom headed to a local sheriff’s station, where she heard there would be more information—and her dad raced for the school.

John Michael Keyes: A lot of erratic driving. Saw that there was a road block on the highway. And there’s a back road and I got to a couple hundred feet away from the school.

There, standing along the highway outside the school, Emily’s dad found 30 other distraught parents.

John Michael Keyes: A lot of parents, angry, crying, tears.

Vieira: What do you mean, angry?

John Michael Keyes: What’s going on here, in our place?

Bailey is only 28 miles from Columbine, where 7 years ago, 12 students and a teacher were murdered in this country’s deadliest school shooting.  And soon images of that tragedy would echo all too eerily—and visibly—right there at Platte Canyon high. There were streams of kids coming out with their hands on their heads and the buses evacuating them. The panic and frustration as parents desperately tried to determine whose children were still inside.

John Michael Keyes: The authorities really didn’t want us there. At one point one of the deputies came out and said “You guys have to go back to the substation” and 20 heads turned and said “no.”

Vieira: "We’re staying"?

John Michael Keyes: Yeah, absolutely.

Vieira: Did you say to any of those parents “I think my daughter is in that classroom”?

John Michael Keyes: Yeah, yeah. And it was still spotty information there.

Vieira: You just don’t know what to believe.

And then details of the horror unfolding inside began to emerge—a man dressed like a student, with a dark-hooded sweatshirt and backpack  had calmly walked into the school and taken seven girls hostage in room 206, lining them up face first against the chalkboard.  Armed with a semi-automatic pistol and revolver, he claimed he had a bomb and fired off a warning shot.

Seven terrified hostages and Emily’s frightened parents knew she was probably one of them.

Ellen Keyes: That was scary. That was real scary.

Vieira: You knew there were guns, and the possibility of a bomb.

John Michael Keyes: Yeah.

Vieira: At this point, you did know that?

John Michael Keyes: Yeah.

Vieira: I don’t even know how you process that.

Ellen Keyes: It was pretty hard.

Making it worse, Emily’s parents weren’t even together — her dad on the highway outside the school, her mom still at the sheriff substation, a couple of miles away.

Vieira: I have trouble even imagining that you have to be separated at this point and how hard that must be…

Ellen Keyes: We talked about him coming to substation, us being together.  And I thought, I really wanted him there.

Vieira: You mean there, closer to the school?

Ellen Keyes: Just knowing that he could see the school and I couldn’t—

Amid the chaos, there was some good news: Emily’s twin brother Casey was perfectly safe, 40 miles away, on his field trip... far from this scene of terror.

But then, their worst fear was confirmed --  someone at the sheriff substation had sobering news.

Ellen Keyes: They pulled me in, and were able to tell me that she was in the room it was grim, because that’s when we were told she was a hostage.

John Michael Keyes was now desperate to make contact with his daughter — but how?

John Michael Keyes: I’m a tech guy, but I look at my cell phone, and I’ve never sent a text message.  And I looked around and said, “Is there anyone here under 30?  I need to do a text message.” (laughter) And the reporter from the flume was up there.  And she looked at the phone and quickly typed in the letters, “R u ok?”  And that’s what I asked her to type is, “Are you okay?”                  

Vieira:  So, Emily received the text message, “R u ok”?

John Michael Keyes:  Yeah, in that room.  And within minutes, I get one back.  And it says, “I love you guys.”

Vieira: When you saw that—

John Michael Keyes: You know, in hindsight, I’m saying she’s in there, she’s scared, horrible things are happening in that room, and she sends that.  Amazing little woman.

Ellen Keyes:  It felt dangerous.  And then he did text her back after that.

John Michael Keyes: Where Are You? nothing.

Vieira:  No other message ever came in—

Ellen Keyes: The fact that another message didn’t come back didn’t feel good.

Emily’s agonized parents could only wait, but inside the school—on the second floor, 12 police officers and 3 hostage negotiators were struggling to contain a gunman they could neither see nor begin to comprehend.

Sheriff Fred Wegener: He had turned off all the lights, and it was very dark.

Sheriff Fred Wegener, who arrived at the school minutes after that first shot rang out, was controlling the scene as negotiators tried to talk to the gunman through the classroom door.

Wegener: Initially he talked to the officers, yelling, kind of agitated. You know “Get back, stay down. You know, everything will be alright you know.”

Vieira:  He’s saying “Everything will be alright”?

Wegener: Yeah, everything will be ok.

Vieira: Was there a window on this door? Can you see through this door?

Wegener:  Yeah, it’s a solid core door and then there’s two safety windows next to it.

Vieira: And you could clearly see who was in that classroom?

Wegener: Well, you could look in.

Vieira: What could you make out?

Wegener: Shadows. That was pretty much all you make out.  And of course the screams of the girls.

Those screams made the sheriff seethe. For him, this was personal.  He isn’t just Bailey’s sheriff, he’s also a parent with his own 16-year-old son, Ben, a student at Platte Canyon High.

Vieira: It had to hit you that you’re also a dad?

Wegener: Yeah. There’s a big time emotion that’s going on there but if you lose it, you’re not going to help the other kids.

Vieira:  I can’t even imagine what that was like for you, because you’re really wearing two hats.

Wegener: Yeah, it’s easier said than done. I think afterwards is when you know it will hit you.

However this played out, it was bound to hit hard: by now Sheriff Wegener was calling the hostages “my girls.”

Vieira: How well did you know Emily’s family before all this Fred?

Wegener: My son, they had a crush on each other back in elementary school.

Vieira: Oh, you’re kidding.

Wegener: So I know her, just like I know everyone else.

The sheriff’s struggle to stay emotionally detached became increasingly difficult, especially at 12:15, when the gunman began releasing hostages and the sheriff learned more about what was happening in the shadowy darkness of room 206.

Wegener: About every 30 minutes, he’s releasing a hostage.

Vieira: And what are these girls saying as they come out?

Wegener: Each one of them had been molested in some way.

It was more horrible than anyone wanted to imagine. Not only were the girls being held hostage by this gun-wielding man, they were being sexually violated.

Vieira:  As each girl comes out, she’s obviously shaken. Relieved, but probably very shaken that she’s been assaulted. At that point are they making it clear to you that they think this guy could do something really frightening?

Wegener:  No, not yet. And even though I’m getting the reports of the molesting, I’m still hopeful.

Vieira: That it could end without any gunfire?

Wegener: Exactly.

Vieira: As one child was released after another, you were aware that that was happening?

John Michael Keyes: My firemen friends would come out and say “two girls are now out.”

Vieira:  So that must have given you a certain amount of hope, that okay, one by one, they’re being released.

John Michael Keyes: Yeah.

For a time, it had seemed encouraging. As each half hour ticked by, another free hostage, but the information from inside soon became foreboding. Emily and two other girls were still being held. The gunman had yet to make a single demand—and there was the bomb:  police had no idea when, or how, he planned to use it.

Vieira: And the negotiation—

Ellen Keyes: They didn’t know what they were negotiating. There was nothing.

Vieira:  No demands —

Ellen Keyes: No.

Vieira: Are you panicking at all at this point?

John Michael Keyes: I’m not panicking. I’m starting to say, she is in that room. They’ve let girls out at this point, and Emily hasn’t come out yet.

Then, at 3:20 p.m., just after releasing his fifth hostage, the gunman told police something “big” would happen at 4 o’ clock.

Wegener: He just says "It’ll be over at four. Something will happen at four." And he won’t talk to the negotiators anymore.

The gunman became ominously silent. And there were still two terrified girls inside room 206: one of them was Emily Keyes.

Ellen Keyes: In my heart, I knew she was gonna come out because I didn’t see any other end possible.

Emily’s parents tried to focus on the brave act of a 16-year-old who could have answered that text message “are you ok?” in so many frightened ways, but instead, simply said “I love you guys.” Her dad was now overwhelmed by the need to be closer to his daughter.

John Michael Keyes: I tried everything with the folks at the road block to say "Let me in. I need to be closer.”

Vieira:  Did you say, “my daughter is in there”?

John Michael Keyes: Yeah, and there was some humor, because it still can’t turn out bad. There’s no way. And the parents rallied. They said “we’ve got to get him closer” and the fire guy pulled me closer to the school. There was cheering on the highway from the parents.

Vieira: What provoked cheering?

John Michael Keyes: The fact that they were letting me in.

But sadly, those cheers of support from the other parents would soon dissolve into screams and tears. At 3:30 p.m., a SWAT team suddenly stormed the school.

John Michael Keyes: I heard an explosion. I heard gunfire. And I think I sat down at that point and I said, “What the hell is going on?”

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