Hamill: Newtown families find solace in gun laws passed since tragedy

Hamill: Newtown families find solace in gun laws passed since tragedy

Michael Cunningham, an uncle of Chase Kowalsk (pictured), one of the 20 children murdered in the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre, stood behind President Obabma's proposals against guns.

Newtown is onboard with the President.

Michael Cunningham, an uncle of Chase Kowalski, 7, one of the 20 children murdered by a monster with an assault rifle in Sandy Hook Elementary School, agreed with all of President Obama’s proposals.

“Yeah, I agree with the universal background check the President called for,” he says. “I also think we need a tougher scrutiny of the mentally ill having access to guns. I also agree with the ban on assault rifles.

Mary Altaffer/AP

JUST SAD: Gene Rosen, who found a bunch of terrified kids from the school on his lawn the day of the shooting, is receiving threatening phone calls from lunatics insisting the massacre is a hoax.

There is absolutely no need for anyone except law enforcement and the military to have one of those.

“Like Obama said, if it saves one kid’s life, it’s worth it.”

A kid like Chase Kowalski, a Cub Scout and athlete who drew a big crowd in Seaside Heights, N.J., last summer knocking down kewpie dolls with baseballs with the precision of Tom Seaver.

A kid who had to be waked in a closed coffin because the monster had so disfigured him with the bullets fired at close range.

Chase’s mother, Rebecca Kowalski, sent me an email about Obama’s speech.

“We all must make a commitment to change to ensure our children are safely protected,” she said.

“Our leaders in government must step up to meet their commitment to drive the necessary policy and legislative changes to ensure our children are safely protected from similar school shootings ever happening again. We are encouraged by President Obama’s initial steps in this direction.”

At noon in the Sandy Hook diner, Ellie Lewis served me an egg salad sandwich.

I told her some of the victims’ families were appearing with the President at the White House.

“I probably know them,” she says. “I was most shocked last night when I read online about Gene Rosen, who found a bunch of terrified kids from the school on his lawn that day who’d seen their teacher shot dead.

He took them in and comforted them. Gave them teddy bears to play with. Now he’s getting threatening phone calls from crazies who insist the shootings were a hoax. How mean and crazy can people be?”

The crazies, called “truthers,” are conspiracy nutbags who claim the Newtown shootings are a hoax, and they have created bogus online accounts in Rosen’s name and sent him threatening emails and phone calls.

“Gene comes in here all the time,” she said. “Sweetest, kindest, most caring man you’d want to meet.”

Lewis thinks the law passed in New York this week is great. “No one needs an assault rifle or big clip magazines and we really need better background checks.

Monsignor Bob, who did eight funerals, comes in here all the time, every day. He’s a wreck. He needs rest.

He went away for awhile to find peace. The families of many of the kids also come in. It’s just so sad.”

Not even local gun owners like Tom Adams, who sat at the counter sipping coffee, oppose the President’s proposals.

“I’m a gun owner and I want my Second Amendment rights protected,” he said. “But I believe strongly in background checks. I truly want the nuts screened out. I don’t hunt anymore, but no hunter needs an assault rifle. No hunter needs an extended clip, or it’s slaughter, not sport. I don’t see the President’s proposals limiting my rights.”

Adams, a local contractor, was across the street in the Demitasse Café on the morning of the shootings.

“At first we thought a principal was wounded and someone else was shot in the foot,” he says. “Then I left. I returned at 11:30 and learned that there were 20 dead kids. I was stunned. This is a morning I will never forget. Horrifying. But what we all know now is that the shooter went to the high school first. He was seen there. But there was a police car there. So he came to the elementary school. There was no cop car there. So he did what he did.”

Adams believes that if police cars can sit at radar spots for hours, we can have one sitting outside every school.

“I’m for anything that would prevent this happening again,” he says. Chase Kowalski’s uncle Michael Cunningham agrees. “In my nephew’s name, let’s hope the Congress will also do something.”

In honor of the dead of Newtown.

dhamill@nydailynews.com