Youngest killed in rampage is first laid to rest.

TUCSON — The first funeral in the aftermath of
Saturday’s shooting rampage plumbed the
profound grief that has enveloped this
community — and much of the nation — since
the attack.
Christina Taylor Green, 9, was wheeled from the
church in a small coffin to the mournful strain of
bagpipes yesterday, less than a week after the
shootings that left six dead and 14 injured,
including Representative Gabrielle Giffords, the
target of the attack.
Giffords’s condition continued to improve five
days after she was shot in the head at close range
while meeting with constituents in a Tucson
parking lot, by a gunman who also killed John M.
Roll, the chief federal judge in Arizona.
Christina’s clear-eyed gaze, her enthusiasm —
baseball, dance, and student council were all
passions — and the randomness in which she
was killed made her death particularly wrenching
for grown-ups, President Obama among them,
but also for her contemporaries.
As the president noted, the girl was attending the
event at which she was shot Saturday because of
a blossoming interest in politics and American
democracy.
“I want us to live up to her expectations,’’ Obama
said at a memorial service for the victims
Wednesday evening at the University of Arizona.
“ I want our democracy to be as good as she
imagined it.’’
Members of Christina’s Little League baseball
team, the Pirates, will wear patches on their
uniforms honoring her. The league is trying to
get players across the country, from T-ball to the
major leagues, to consider doing the same.
Teams in California, Colorado, and Florida have
already bought patches.
Oro Valley, a Tucson suburb, is considering
putting her name on a baseball field where she
played, city officials said.
Raw emotion was on display inside St. Elizabeth
Ann Seton Church yesterday, where 1,500
mourners of all ages were packed in tight, and
outside, where there were more mourners, and
down the winding road, where hundreds more
waited and watched, and across the city. Some
dressed in white, others in baseball uniforms.
Some wore angel wings. Others carried teddy
bears or bouquets of flowers.
The funeral felt almost like a state affair, with rows
of politicians, officers in dress uniforms, and the
bagpipes. It was the biggest service anyone in
Tucson could remember.
Toward the end, her father, John Green, rose to
speak. He looked out at the crowd. He
swallowed. And then, in a scratchy, baritone
voice he said her name, slowly: “Christina Taylor
Green.’’
He described a girl who picked blackberries in the
summer and went sledding in the winter. Most
times, she was the one directing the other
children in their adventures. He told of Christina
and her mother, Roxanne, dressing up “to the
nines’’ and dancing around the
house.
Baseball was in Christina’s blood. Her father is a
scout for the Los Angeles Dodgers and her
grandfather, Dallas Green, managed the 1980
World Series champion Philadelphia Phillies.
She was the only girl on the Pirates, the only one
with shoulder-length hair peeking from the green
and yellow cap. She brought a mix of playfulness
and grit to the team. She spent a week
negotiating the terms of a race in the outfield
between the players and the coach: Kids run
forward, coach runs backward, winner gets ice
cream. The kids won.
Also yesterday, doctors at University Medical
Center in Tucson said Giffords is able to keep her
eyes open for as long as 15 minutes and can
move her legs and hands, although her right
hand has only slight movement.
Doctors called her progress “a major leap
forward’’ but expressed caution, saying that for
now, they would not upgrade the Arizona
Democrat from being listed in critical condition.
Dr. Peter Rhee, head of trauma at the hospital,
said in an interview that the medical team plans to
bring in ophthalmic specialists to help assess
injuries to the bones around Giffords ’s eyes that
could have damaged her vision.
“I believe one day she will be able to think,’’ Rhee
said. “What she will be able to do physically, it is
too early to say.’’
In response to a reporter’s question about
whether Giffords’s recovery might be considered
miraculous, Dr. G. Michael Lemole Jr., the
hospital ’s chief of neurosurgery said, “Miracles
happen every day, and in medicine, we like to
attribute them to what we do or what others do
around us. A lot of medicine is outside our
control. We are wise to acknowledge miracles. ’’
Jared L. Loughner, 22, has been charged in federal
court with shooting Giffords, Roll, and three
others who were federal employees. He is
expected to face state prosecution for the rest of
the victims.
The county sheriff’s office said yesterday that it
had recovered a black bag containing 9mm
ammunition that it thought might belong to the
suspect. Loughner, according to police, grabbed
a similar bag out of one of his family ’s vehicles
Saturday, hours before the shooting. The police
said they were told by Randy Loughner,
Loughner ’s father, that when he confronted his
son about what was inside, the younger
Loughner ran into the desert carrying the bag.
A hiker found the bag while walking his dog
yesterday in a wash in the desert near the
Loughner home, the police said.

Source: Http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2011/01/14/youngest_killed_in_rampage_is_first_laid_to_rest/?rss_id=Boston.com+%2F+Boston+Globe+--+National+News