On Monday, shortly after 9:00 local time, the shooter invaded Central Visual & Performing Arts High School. It was unclear how the gunman got inside the school because the doors were shut.
Witnesses claim that after the shooter’s rifle jammed mid-attack, lives were spared.
Police “immediately halted” the shooter, according to St Louis Public Schools.
The culprit, a former pupil who was 19 years old, shot at cops before eventually dying from his wounds.
It is unclear what motivated him to target the school, which has roughly 400 children.
According to police reports to the local media, one adult died in the hospital and a teenage girl was declared dead in the school.
According to local media, all seven badly hurt girls and four boys—had non-life-threatening wounds.
According to the city’s police commissioner Michael Sack, when authorities arrived and reported that the attacker had a “long gun,” students were fleeing the school.
He claimed that the seven security guards stationed there took swift action to alert other employees and call the police.
The shooter was discovered to be carrying about a dozen high-capacity magazines filled with hundreds of rounds, Mr. Sack subsequently said, adding, “This might have been much worse.”
We are all experiencing a heartbreaking day, he continued. The probe is being assisted by FBI agents.
One kid reported to the nearby TV station that the assailant approached a classmate and asked, “You ready to die?”
“We just ran really, really fast,” Raven Terry recalled, “and we were just screaming, all freaked up by it.”
Taniya Gholston, 16, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that the shooter had attempted to kill her in her classroom.
“I was trying to run and I couldn’t run,” she added. “Me and him made eye contact but I made it out because his gun got jammed.”
”I’m tired of this damn school,” the assailant was overheard saying, according to the witness.
The shooter, according to the police, passed from the institution last year and had no prior criminal activity.
Family members of one of the victims named Jean Kuczka, a health instructor.
According to an online biography, Kuczka, 61, had been a teacher at the school since 2008. She was also the grandma of seven children.
Abigail Kuczka, her daughter, told the that “my mom loved kids” and said that she had passed away defending her pupils.
According to reports, the victims’ injuries include bullet wounds, stab wounds, and heart attacks.
At a press conference following the shooting, St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones stated, “Our children shouldn’t have to experience this.”
“They shouldn’t have to go through active shooter drills in case something happens. And unfortunately, that happened today.”
According to data from the Education Week publication, this year has already seen at least 35 school shootings where at least one person has been killed or wounded.
Following a mass shooting at his high school in November of last year, a youngster in Michigan entered a plea of guilty to 24 crimes, including terrorist and first-degree murder.
