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Families of Sandy Hook victims confront mass shootings head on in new PSA

NEWTOWN, Conn. — Five years later in Newtown, families of the victims of the Sandy Hook school shooting are fighting every day to prevent what happened there from ever happening again.

Thursday will mark five years since 20 first graders and six adults were murdered inside Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.

Boston 25 News Reporter Robert Goulston talked to Nicole Hockley, whose son Dylan was killed, about her help releasing a powerful video calling on people to do more to stop this vicious cycle of mass shootings.

The Sandy Hook Promise video depicts a similar tragedy the day before it happens.

“To have it played out as something before a shooting takes place. It really hammers that message home,” she said.

Dylan was just 6 years old when he was killed.

"The end of the PSA has a little bit of a gut punch but gun violence is not comfortable and as a country I think we've become a little too comfortable with,” Nicole said.

>>RELATEDMental health care worries linger 5 years after Sandy Hook shooting

Sandy Hook Promise was co-founded by several families who lost loved ones in the shooting. The PSA was released this week as a way of trying to change behaviors that seem to play out over and over.

“The mass shootings. That tears the scab right off my heart and makes everything incredibly fresh and painful again especially when there’s children involved,” Nicole said.

The anniversaries are also incredibly difficult.

"The pain it never goes away. There is no closure on this. There is no moving on," she said.

But she says Dylan is still by her side, keeping focused preventing this violence.

"His legacy lives on through these programs and that's the only way I can think to pay tribute to my little boy,” she said. "Knowing that we are having an impact that fuels us. Because that's all we want to do and that helps save lives"

There is no permanent memorial in Newtown. A commission has been working for years to design and pick a location. Recently, a resident donated five acres not far from the school - but they are still working on a design.