The 19-year-old gunman who killed a teacher and a 15-year-old girl at a St Louis high
school was armed with an AR-15-style rifle and what appeared to be more than 600
rounds of ammunition, the local police commissioner, Michael Sack, said on Tuesday.
Orlando Harris also left behind a handwritten note offering his explanation for the
shooting on Monday at Central Visual and Performing Arts high school. Tenth-grader
Alexandria Bell and 61-year-old physical education teacher Jean Kuczka died, and
seven students were wounded.
Monday’s school shooting was the 40th this year resulting in injuries or death,
according to a tally by Education Week, the most in any year since it began tracking
shootings in 2018. The deadly attacks include the killings at Robb elementary school
in Uvalde, Texas
Monday’s St Louis shooting occurred on the same day a Michigan teenager pleaded
guilty to terrorism and first-degree murder in a school shooting that killed four
students in December 2021.
Police killed the gunman in an exchange of gunfire to put an end to an episode that
has renewed calls for officials to tighten public access to high-powered rifles, even
after Congress passed a bill earlier this year that aimed to make obtaining firearms
harder for some people who are considered to be at risk of carrying out violence.
Sack read the note in which the young man lamented that he had no friends, no
family, no girlfriend and a life of isolation. In the note, he called it the “perfect storm
for a mass shooter”.
Sack said the shooter had some ammo strapped to his chest and some in a bag, and
other magazines were found dumped in stairwells.
Read Also:12-year-old Texas girl accused of shooting herself and her father in murder pact
The attack forced students to barricade doors and huddle in classroom corners, jump
from windows and run out of the building to seek safety. One terrorized girl said she
was eye-to-eye with the shooter before his gun apparently jammed and she was able
to run out. Several people inside the school said they heard the gunman warn, “You
are all going to die!”
The attacker, 19, graduated from the school last year. The FBI was assisting police in
the investigation. Sack, speaking at a news conference, urged people to come forward
when someone who appears to be suffering from mental illness or distress begins
“speaking about purchasing firearms or causing harm to others”.
Relatives of those killed mourned their losses.
“Alexandria was my everything,” her father, Andre Bell, told KSDK-TV. “She was
joyful, wonderful and just a great person.
“She was the girl I loved to see and loved to hear from. No matter how I felt, I could
always talk to her and it was all right. That was my baby.”
Abby Kuczka said her mother was killed when the gunman burst into her classroom
and she moved between him and her students.
“My mom loved kids,” Kuczka told the St Louis Post-Dispatch. “She loved her
students. I know her students looked at her like she was their mom.”
The seven injured students are all 15 or 16 years old. All were listed in stable
condition. Sack said four suffered gunshot or graze wounds, two had bruises and one
had a broken ankle – apparently from jumping out of the three-story building.
The school in south St Louis was locked, with seven security guards near each door,
the local schools superintendent, Kelvin Adams, said. A security guard initially
became alarmed when he saw the gunman trying to get in one of the doors. He was
armed with a gun and “there was no mystery about what was going to happen. He
had it out and entered in an aggressive, violent manner,” Sack said.
That guard alerted school officials and made sure police were contacted.
The shooter managed to get inside anyway. Sack declined to say how, saying he
didn’t want to “make it easy” for anyone else who wants to break into a school.
Sack offered this timeline of events: a 911 call came in at 9.11am alerting police of an
active shooter. Officers – some off duty wearing street clothes – arrived at 9.15am.
Police located the attacker at 9.23am and began shooting at him. He was shot at
9.25am and secured by police at 9.32am.
The 11 minutes between the first 911 call and the time when police confronted the
gunman draw a stark contrast with the 77 minutes it took police in Uvalde to
confront the shooter there in May during the officers’ much-maligned response.
The attacker was armed with nearly a dozen 30-round high-capacity magazines, Sack
said. “This could have been much worse,“ he said.
http://nationalsportslink.com.ng
