A Year After Massacre, Family Lives 'in Darkness'

At an undisclosed private home in Northern Virginia, they poured out their hearts to Aradhana A. "Bela" Sood, medical director of a children's treatment center at Virginia Commonwealth University and a member of the Virginia Tech Review Panel.

In the emotional three-hour interview, Hyang Im described her struggle to socialize Seung Hui, who rarely spoke as a child in South Korea and withdrew even more after the family came to the United States when he was 8.

Hyang Im, with her daughter translating, told Sood how she had tried unsuccessfully to find friends for her son. She later turned to psychiatry, despite the stigma -- in Korean and American cultures -- of mental illness. She and her husband worried when Seung Hui decided, against the advice of a counselor, to go away to Blacksburg.

The parents told Sood about their shock when they learned, after his death, of his violent writings; the red flags raised by professors and students who said they were afraid of him; and his brief hospitalization after a judge determined he was a suicide risk.

Had they known, "we would have taken him home and made him miss a semester to get this looked at," the Chos told Sood. "But we just did not know . . . about anything being wrong."

Sood felt a "great sense of empathy and sympathy for them," she recalled this week.

"It was, by any description, a very poignant and touching interview," she said. "It was a double whammy for them, losing a son and then not being able to grieve in a traditional sense because of his actions."

Sood said she is not surprised that the Chos have declined to speak publicly or accept offers of help from friends and family. Most parents feel responsible for the actions of their children, she said, a feeling that would be amplified in collectivist Asian families.

Moreover, she said, some kinds of grief can seem too intense for any kind of solace.

"In that circumstance, there would be a feeling of, what can people do to help you?" she said. "There is nothing that can be done."

Cho's great-aunt in South Korea began to weep as she imagined Hyang Im's pain.

"My heart aches for my niece as I think about what she could have been going through, to pick up the pieces and carry on with life," Kim Yang Soon said.

On Wednesday, a shaken Virginia Tech community will gather at the university to remember the students and professors who died in Cho's rampage exactly one year before. There will be a candlelight vigil at dusk. Each of Cho's 32 victims will be honored, their names read during a ceremony on the Drillfield.

Cho's name will not be mentioned.

But the breadth of human compassion has room for people such as Cho. For a time, some family members of Cho's victims considered reaching out to his parents. "We said amongst ourselves, 'They've lost a son, too,' " said Andrew Goddard of Richmond, whose son Colin was shot but survived.

An impromptu memorial, a semicircle of stones, that was assembled on the Drillfield shortly after the shootings initially had 33 stones, including one for Cho.

Over the past year, the university has received a flood of letters, Bibles, teddy bears and other condolences for the dead, including Cho.

"I remember that there were a lot of letters of forgiveness," said Tamara Kennelly, the university's archivist.

The FBI helped deliver to Cho's family hundreds of letters and other items left at Virginia Tech, the FBI agent said. Some of the letters contained threats, blaming them for what happened. But most were filled with prayers and words of comfort and sympathy, assuring them that what their son did was not their fault.

Church groups from across the country also sent prayer quilts, shawls and blankets that members had crocheted with prayers pinned into the corners. "May our prayers keep you warm," some said.

"They've been overwhelmed with the support they have received from complete strangers," the agent said. "They are a very warm, loving and giving family. Now they are trying to get their lives back on track."

Researcher Meg Smith and staff writers David Cho, Amy Gardner, Tom Jackman, Chris Jenkins and Cecilia Kang contributed to this report. Special correspondent Stella Kim reported from South Korea.