The casualties of a mass shooting are not only those killed or wounded in the burst of gunfire. The damage reverberates, often for years, sometimes magnifying a family's tragedy.
Sadly, this country has borne witness to that awful truth many times. And we are reeling once again, this time from the recent news that three people connected to two of our worst national nightmares took their own lives.
Two were students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, where 17 people were killed last year on Valentine's Day. One, a 16-year-old boy who has not been identified, was a current student and a ninth-grader at the time of the shooting. The other, 19-year-old Sydney Aiello, was a 2018 graduate who was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and was struggling with survivor's guilt after one of her best friends, Meadow Pollack, was slaughtered.
