WASHINGTON — Fifty years ago this month, Charles Whitman shot 49 people, killing 16 on the University of Texas at Austin campus. The rampage, which went on for about 96 minutes, was the deadliest university shooting until Virginia Tech in 2007, where a college senior killed 32 people. Now a new documentary is revisiting legislation that was shaped in its wake.
On Aug. 1, 2016, the state of Texas implemented a so-called campus carry law, which allows for concealed weapons to be allowed nearly everywhere on public universities in the state, provided the carriers have a permit.
Investigation Discovery did a special titled “Guns on Campus: Tamron Hall Investigates,” which explores the new challenges the law creates in Texas, as well as discusses the story of Colin Goddard, a survivor of the Virginia Tech shooting who is now an anti-gun violence advocate working in Washington, D.C., with a group called Everytown for Gun Safety.
Before Goddard’s story in the documentary, Hall spoke with Amanda Collins, who survived a rape in a University of Nevada parking garage less than 50 feet away from a closed campus security booth. Collins supports a measure called S.B. 11, also known as the Campus Carry Law.
Goddard and Collins joined WTOP to preview the documentary and provide differing viewpoints after their traumatic experiences.
“Guns on Campus: Tamron Hall Investigates” airs Sunday, Aug. 7 at 10 p.m. ET only on Investigation Discovery.
