Officials begin external review of UVA shooting response and commit to sharing public report

An outside special counsel will conduct a review of the University of Virginia campus shooting that left three students dead and two others injured earlier this week, university and state officials announced Thursday.

In a letter, University of Virginia President Jim Ryan and University Rector Whitt Clement asked the state's attorney general to appoint outside counsel to investigate both UVA's response to the Sunday shooting, as well as the efforts it undertook prior to the violence to assess the potential threat of the suspect.

"After a tragedy of this nature, it is important for the affected institution to take a hard look at what circumstances led up to the event and, how the University responded in the moment," Clement said in a statement. "Once an external review commences, we expect it to be the central avenue by which we gain a deeper understanding about what led to this tragic event."