NEWTOWN,
Conn. - Worshippers
hurriedly left a church Sunday when someone phoned in a threat as
parishioners remembered 20 children and six adults who were massacred at
an elementary school, but police later said nothing dangerous was
found.
The threat interrupted a busy mass,
sent worshippers hurrying from the church and touched off a large police
response days after the worst massacre of school-age children in U.S.
history.
Halfway through the noon service, the
priest stopped and said, "Please, everybody leave. There is a threat,"
said Anna Wood of Oxford, Conn., one of the worshippers who left.
At
least a dozen police in camouflage SWAT gear and carrying guns arrived
at the St. Rose of Lima Church. An Associated Press photographer saw
police leave carrying something in a red tarp. Guns drawn, they searched
the church and adjacent buildings.
Gunman
Adam Lanza, his mother and eight of the child victims attended St. Rose
of Lima. It is a Roman Catholic Church with an adjacent school, which
Lanza attended briefly.
The church hosted overflow crowds at all three morning Masses Sunday.
Wood said everyone left calmly but described a congregation edge. One boy, about 9, left with his mother.
"He asked his mom, `Mom, why are we leaving?," Wood recalled. "The mom couldn't answer. She just started crying."
© The Canadian Press, 2012