Text 4568, 70 rader
Skriven 2004-11-07 04:07:00 av Jeff Binkley (1:226/600)
Ärende: Democrats
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http://www.newsday.com/news/local/newyork/nyc-
suic1107,0,2157220,print.story?coll=ny-nynews-headlines

Man commits suicide at Ground Zero
   
  
  
    
BY ROCCO PARASCANDOLA, DEBORAH MORRIS AND SEAN GARDINER
Staff Writers

November 6, 2004, 7:11 PM EST

Distraught over the re-election of President George W. Bush, a Georgia 
man traveled to New York City, went to Ground Zero and killed himself 
with a shotgun blast, police said yesterday.

The suicide victim, Andrew Veal, 25, was discovered just before 8 a.m. 
yesterday when a worker for the Millennium Hotel looking at Ground Zero 
from an upper floor saw a man lying atop the concrete structure through 
which the 1 and 9 subway lines run.

The worker, thinking the man was sleeping, alerted colleagues and the 
Port Authority police were notified.

But when they got to Veal's body, they realized he had killed himself 
with a shot to the head from a .12-gauge shotgun.

No suicide note was found, but according to a Port Authority police 
source, family members said Veal, a registered Democrat, was despondent 
over Bush's defeat of Sen. John Kerry. A second source said Veal, who 
lived in Athens, Ga., and worked for the University of Georgia, was also 
adamantly opposed to the war in Iraq.

More than three years after the Sept. 11 terror attacks, Ground Zero 
remains a top tourist attraction, the site rife with symbolism.

Visitors there yesterday reacted in different ways to news of Veal's 
suicide. Bobbie Jensen, 54, a Republican from Phoenix, said that while 
she understood how Bush's victory disturbed those who dislike him, 
Ground Zero is not the place to act on those emotions.

"You can be upset about the war, about Bush, but this is a sacred 
place," she said. "You got to accept what happened and not kill 
yourself." But Frank Franca, an East Village artist and registered 
Democrat, suggested the suicide was symbolic.

"I'm very moved by it," he said. "Obviously, this person was devastated. 
I can see why he would come here."

Franca's friend, Jeffim Kuznetsov, a 25-year-old student from Russia who 
lives in Atlanta, said the suicide is evidence of how deeply many 
Americans were affected by Kerry's defeat.

"It's a national tragedy," he said. "This election is devastating to all 
who believe in democracy."

Another visitor to Ground Zero, Arushi Raval, 34, a businesswoman who 
lives in Chelsea, said Veal might have been active in campaigning for 
Kerry, only to taste defeat.

"Maybe he felt ineffective," she said of the victim. "You feel 
ineffective if you tried and it all failed.

"I know so many New Yorkers who are depressed over this." 

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