2 Local Connections to Shooting in Colorado

A former Cary resident escaped while a Crystal Lake man is missing

There were two Chicago area residents among those in the Aurora, Colorado theater where James Holmes opened fire on the audience during a midnight screening of "The Dark Night Rises."

A former Cary resident, 27-year-old Steve Ostergaard escaped uninjured, while another man from Crystal Lake is missing, according to a Northwest Herald report.

Ostergaard, who lives in the Lake Bluff area, was in the theater next door, when shrapnel struck an 18-year-old boy in his group, the report said.  He rushed the teen to the lobby and saw the area begin to fill with smoke and bloodied moviegoers running out of the theater doors, Ostergaard told the Northwest Herald.

John Thomas Larimer was also at the midnight screening, but he was in the theater where the gunman killed 12 people, according to Larimer's father Scott who has been unable to contact his son since the shooting.

“We have literally been calling for 15 hours,” Scott Larimer, of Crystal Lake, told the Chicago Sun-Times. “We cannot get any help from the military, the police, the hospitals, the Red Cross. ... We cannot get a single answer if he is alive or dead. ... We are more than frantic.”

John Larimer was a sailor in the U.S. Navy. The U.S. Department of Defense said Friday that three members of the U.S. Armed Forces were wounded in the shooting and another one is unaccounted for.

This story is still developing. Please check back for updates.
 

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