As parole eligibility nears, CBS 8 spoke with former Santana High School students and the shooter
In March 2024, Andy Williams becomes eligible for parole. CBS 8 spoke with former students about their experience and their take on his upcoming parole hearing.
March 5, 2024 marks 23 years since Charles "Andy" Williams took his father's gun to Santana High School and shot and killed Randy Gordon and Bryan Zuckor and wounded 13 others.
As victims, their families and residents of the city of Santee commemorate the region's deadliest school shooting, they will confront a different dilemma, the fate of then-15-year-old shooter, Andy Williams.
After serving less than half of a 50-year-to-life prison sentence, Williams will be eligible for parole in March 2024, exactly 23 years since the mass shooting.
Williams's chance at parole comes due to a change in state laws that alters sentencing guidelines for juveniles who were tried as adults.
In Williams's case, the law requires that any juvenile who was charged as an adult and received a life sentence has a chance at parole no later than 25 years into their sentence.
Williams's upcoming parole means that former students, families of victims, and faculty must once again relive the pain from that day and come face to face with a tragedy that has been permanently etched into the fabric of Santee.
WATCH: Former students at Santana High School share their thoughts on Williams's upcoming parole eligibility
Since learning of Williams's upcoming parole eligibility, Santee residents, past and present, have logged on to social media to post their experiences. The posts more often than not turn into long, detailed threads about the horrors they saw that day, the pain they feel for the families, the void they feel when reminiscing about high school and the questions that they have for the then 15-year-old shooter, Andy Williams.
Ahead of his March 2024 hearing, CBS 8 sat down with former students to hear their stories of that life-altering morning when Williams emerged from a bathroom stall at Santana High just after 9 a.m., fired 40 rounds at frantic students and faculty all fleeing from what seemed like a never-ending barrage of bullets.
CBS 8 spoke to three former students who have started a petition in hopes of ensuring that justice is served and Williams pays for the horror he inflicted on the small, rural community of Santee.
CBS 8 also spoke with another former student, now a public defender, who came face to face with Williams after he emerged from the bathroom. Despite a bullet from Williams's gun missing him by inches, the Santana High alum is lobbying for Williams' release.
And, over the course of numerous calls, CBS 8 spoke to the shooter Andy Williams from a state prison in Chino. During those interviews, Williams talked about what drove him to carry out the senseless and indiscriminate violence, what he has to say to his victims, their families, and the countless others whose lives he changed and why he thinks he is no longer a reasonable risk to society.
The petition Setting a dangerous precedent
Kristen Dare, Phil Ortiz, and Lauren Gaines are former students at Santana High School and were in the quad when Andy Williams started shooting.
News of Williams' parole eligibility has brought the childhood friends, as well as hundreds of other students closer together.
Since learning about the hearing, Ortiz, who now serves on the El Cajon City Council, says the news about Williams spread like wildfire.
“Our community is very tight-knit. Because of what we went through,” Ortiz told CBS 8.
Dare, Ortiz and Gaines are now calling on others in the community to join them and ensure that Williams serves out his sentence and pays for killing two innocent teens, wounding thirteen others, and altering the lives of an entire community and region.
They hope to do so through a new petition they created which calls on the parole board to deny Williams's chance at freedom.
“It's an atrocity to imagine him out in such a short time. I haven't healed from what had happened,” Gaines said.
It was Gaines’ 16th birthday on March 5, 2001. She said she was walking with her best friend when she heard loud pops coming from the bathroom.
Moments later, Williams emerged from the restroom. Gaines remembers the terror and chaos inside the quad. She remembers the fright she felt while running for her life as Williams continued to shoot.
Similarly, Ortiz said that he will never forget the feeling that day and thinking about how he nearly crossed paths with Williams.
“By the grace of God or something, one of my friends hollered at me to come back for some reason just before the shooting, it was just chaotic,” Ortiz said. "I remember being in the back of the parking lot and jumping into some random person's truck with I think four or five other people. I didn't know who he was, or who was driving."
Meanwhile, Dare said she initially thought the chaos at school that morning was staged, part of a school-sponsored campaign to teach students about the dangers of drunk driving.
As Dare walked to the large quad to get a closer look at what was happening she saw a campus security guard who was shot and injured lying on the ground.
“The school colors are purple and gold, and everyone was wearing purple polo shirts,” Dare said. “When I got closer, I could see that the purple, in fact, was starting to get darker and I realized it was blood."
The trauma still haunts the three students.
"[Williams] is just a year younger than I am," said Gaines. "He was old enough to know that he was taking a life. Sure, your brain may not be fully formed but that's not an excuse to take another life and to traumatize an entire community, essentially stealing our childhoods. You don't get a hall pass for that."
The petition aims to provide a platform for the victims.
"If our voices aren't heard then that means that the victims' voices aren't heard and that's not a balanced approach," Ortiz said. "After 20 years, Randy and Bryan don't get to come back from the dead. The psychological effects just don't magically wipe away after 20 years. And so people have to be held accountable for their actions."
As evidenced in any small town that experiences major tragedies, the three students say that they also share a bond with shooter, Andy Williams.
For Dare, that bond has surfaced throughout the 22-plus years by including Andy Williams in her prayers while memorializing Zuckor and Gordon and those injured in the shooting.
For Ortiz, he wishes that he could have been there to try and help Williams before that fateful day.
"I've never told anyone this, but there is this duality in me," said Ortiz. "There's a side of me that says, 'Man, I wish I could have known Andy and put my arm around him and say, dude, like, don't worry about those guys. They're dumb. You know, come with me.' Then there's this other side that says, 'Well, you know, you chose this and you deserve what you got.'"
WATCH: Full interview with Kristen Dare, Phil Ortiz, and Lauren Gaines, former students at Santana High School
A Second chance A bullet missed him by inches: One former student on why the shooter deserves another chance
Like so many other students that morning, Caley Anderson, who was a junior at the time, heard what he believed were firecrackers coming from a nearby bathroom.
He quickly realized that wasn't the case as he witnessed students and staff members stumbling from the bathroom with their hands clutching at growing stains of blood on their sides.
Anderson froze.
He soon saw 15-year-old Andy Williams emerge from the bathroom about 40 feet away pointing a gun and firing.
The bullet from Andy Williams's gun missed Anderson's head by approximately 12 inches.
"I'll remember that moment for a long time, seeing Williams come out shooting, missing me by about a foot," Anderson said.
It wasn't until later that day that Anderson learned that Randy Gordon, who he knew, was dead and several other friends and acquaintances of his had been shot.
"It was a horrible experience," recounted Anderson. "I knew [Randy Gordon] and I knew a lot of the people who were shot. You certainly don't forget the moment that you know, a bullet almost hits you. But I am fortunate relatively in that it hasn't left me with you know, a ton of lasting trauma that's wrecked my life."
Quite the opposite.
Anderson, who is now a public defender but speaking only on his personal experience, has spent hours of his free time researching Williams, speaking to his attorneys, and recently advocating for the shooter's release.
Anderson said he feels that Williams should be allowed to make amends and be granted a second chance.
"It's astonishing that we would sentence anyone who's 14 or 15 years old to life in prison for anything," said Anderson. "It's a sad admission about ourselves."
"Williams is responsible for the terrible things he did that day," added Anderson. "But to decide that he must be doomed for life based on something admittedly terrible that he did when he was just turning 15 is astonishing to me."
Anderson says he wants to visit Williams before his parole hearing and hear his story. He also plans to speak on behalf of Williams at the parole hearing.
"I just do not see how taking a 14 or 15-year-old and putting them in prison for 50 years does anything to make society better," said Anderson.
The attorney tells CBS 8 that he is aware that he may be at odds with his classmates and has been for some years in regard to the shooting and Williams' sentence. But throughout it, Anderson says each side has been respectful and that no matter what their position is, the former students and the community as a whole share a bond, albeit one steeped in tragedy, that will last for decades to come.
"I don't blame anyone for feeling that he needs to pay for what he's done," said Anderson. "It's the same feeling that put [Williams] in prison for so long. It's the same feeling arguably a much worse version of it, that caused him to do what he did."
WATCH: Full interview with Caley Anderson, former student at Santana High School
In his own words Andy Williams reflects on the pain he has inflicted and how he has tried to make amends
While students, parents of the two boys who died that day, former teachers, and community members hold different views on Williams' upcoming parole eligibility, they hold one thing in common; each is united in their quest for answers.
From Bryan Zuckor's mom, Michelle, who learned of Williams' parole eligibility from CBS 8 in a phone call, to parents of former students who still see the impacts that the shooting had on their children to former students who witnessed the carnage, many of those who spoke to CBS 8 said they were open to hearing what Williams has to say.
Many said that doing so could help answer long-lingering questions about why he did what he did, and what he has become in the nearly 23 years since.
In a series of phone interviews from the California Institute for Men in Chino, Andy Williams discussed the days leading up to the shooting and the years inside state penitentiaries trying to come to terms with it.
WARNING: The following clips feature Andy Williams's voice and his recollections and may be disturbing to some.
Defending the indefensible
During the interview, interrupted every few minutes by an automated message that the caller is from a state prison, Williams says he can never defend his actions that day.
"What's your reaction when you find out that upon immediately hearing your name in this region some people automatically say, 'Monster'?," CBS 8 asked Williams.
"It's 100% fair," answered Williams. "My actions on March 15, 2001, were monstrous, they were cruel, they were callous. It was vicious. It was violent. That is a 100% accurate description. I am not the victim here."
Begging for an intervention
Throughout the interview, Williams remained adamant that he deserved all the blame while adding that he only wished others were there to answer his calls for help.
In the nearly 23 years that he has spent in prison, Williams told CBS 8 that he has reflected on just what drove him to carry out what is currently California's fifth deadliest school shootings in history.
Williams told CBS 8 that a failed plea for help to the guidance counselor two days before the shooting is what sent him over the edge. He added that despite telling numerous other students about his plans for that following Monday, nobody tried to stop him.
"You said that you were begging for someone to intervene but you didn't really voice that, right?" CBS 8 asked Williams.
"It was complete bluster," responded Williams. "'Don't go to school on Monday because I am going to do this,' when in my mind, I would think that somebody would have said, 'No, don't do this,' or if they took the threat seriously and maybe tell their parents or call the police on me. I got the exact opposite."
A reasonable risk to society
Williams' short time in Santee, after moving there in September of 2000 and up until the March 5 shooting, was filled with tragic events.
Whether that was growing more and more dependent on drugs and alcohol, the harassment from others, to the sexual abuse by his friend's mom's boyfriend, Williams said all experiences contributed to his deteriorating mental state leading up to the shooting.
"It sounds like there's plenty of blame, here. Is that what you're doing? Are you blaming others for this?" asked CBS 8.
"No, absolutely not," answered Williams. "Those are recitations. What is also true is that I stole my dad's pistol and I took it to Santana High where I committed murder and attempted murder. I'm 100% responsible for the harm that I caused."
Williams will be eligible for parole in March 2024. His hearing is tentatively scheduled for the fall of next year.
To see the list of school shootings in California, according to researcher David Riedman, view the table below.