Detection of a Newly Open Fireball at a Christian Elementary School in Nashville, Tenteen minutes after an Elementary School Shooting
Police in Nashville are digging into the background and motivations of a former student who entered a Christian elementary school armed with AR-style weapons and detailed maps and opened fire, killing three children and three adults.
Police were dispatched to the scene of a shooting at Covenant school at 10:13 a.m. The police officers heard gunfire from the second floor.
As police work to piece together what led up to the violence, officials said they had determined where the shooter lived in the Nashville area and have interviewed Hale’s father. Investigators were expected to spend Tuesday processing the scene and gathering more details about what happened during the roughly 14 minutes of terror at the elementary school.
The 19th shooting at a university or school so far in 2023, that left at least one person wounded was the most recent attack. It was also the deadliest US school shooting in nearly a year, since the May attack in Uvalde, Texas, left 21 dead.
The police chief said that he was moved to tears when he saw the kids being sent out of the building.
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The victims of the shooting included three 9-year-old students: Evelyn Dieckhaus, William Kinney and Hallie Scruggs, the daughter of lead church pastor Chad Scruggs. Cynthia Peak, who was a substitute teacher, was one of the people who were killed.
Shaundelle Brooks, who lost her son Akilah DaSilva during a 2018 mass shooting at a Nashville-area Waffle House, said she was brought back to that painful moment as her other son was placed on lockdown at a nearby school Monday.
The shooter was “someone that had multiple rounds of ammunition, prepared for confrontation with law enforcement, prepared to do more harm than was actually done,” the police chief said in a news conference.
But Hale, who was under care for an emotional disorder, had legally bought seven firearms that were hidden at home, Drake said. Three of those weapons, including an AR-style rifle, were used in the attack Monday.
As the officers went up to the second floor to clear the rooms, they heard gunfire and saw a person drop to the ground, the video shows.
I was hoping this day wouldn’t come in the city. But we will never wait to make entry and to go in and to stop a threat especially when it deals with our children,” Drake said in a Monday news conference.
“This school prepared for this with active shooter training for a reason. We don’t want to think that this is going to happen to us. But experience has taught us that we need to be prepared because in this day and time it is the reality of where we are,” Nashville Metropolitan Councilman Russ Pulley told CNN.
The head of the school was identified on the website as a graduate from Georgia State University and also attended school in Nashville, where she received her degree.
Mike Hill can be found on the Covenant Presbyterian Church website which is offline. He was listed as facilities/kitchen staff. A friend confirmed Hill’s image to CNN. Hill, 61, was a custodian at the school, per police.
While we know there is a lot of interest, and there will be a lot of discussion around the issue, we will continue to prioritize the well-being of our community. The support we have received and the quick actions of the first responders, who acted quickly to protect our students, faculty and staff, are what we are most grateful for. We ask for privacy as our community grapples with this terrible tragedy – for our students, parents, faculty and staff,” the statement continued.
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The Covenant School is a private Christian school that was founded in 2001 and teaches preschool through 6th grade, according to its website.
“It is important that we stand together on this dark day for Nashville,” he said in the tweet. Cooper stated that the city has set up a fund for the survivors of the shooting.
The study, which was published in December, found that homicides were a leading cause of death for children in the United States and that the rate had increased each year for nearly a decade.
Biden said Congress needs to pass an assault weapons ban because we “need to do more to protect our schools.” A bipartisan solution is extremely unlikely with a slim Democratic majority and a GOP-led House.
On Tuesday, a day after a deadly shooting at a Nashville school, police released body camera footage that shows a deliberate and rapid response by officers, who shot and killed the attacker within minutes of arriving.
The police chief told reporters he didn’t have a problem with the gap between when police got the first call for an active shooter and when they arrived at the school. We want to get better. There is a lot of things that could have happened if we had gotten there in two or three minutes.
In Uvalde, the classroom where the officers believed the man had been firing at was closed and they were able to find it three minutes after he entered. They approached the door and tried to get a view of the gunman but could not. As they did so, he began firing through the closed door in their direction with an AR-15-style rifle, striking two officers with shrapnel and preventing them from seeing his position in a pair of classrooms full of students.
The suspected attacker was killed by police after they responded to the first call of an active shooter.
President Biden was among those who sent messages of sympathy to the president and many other politicians in the U.S.
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Hale, who is from the Nashville area, was a student at the school. Hale was initially identified as a female but later it was known that she used the pronoun he.
There are two children that are missing and a woman that is outside the school telling people that the school is on lock down.
The children are locked down, but there are two children that we don’t know where they are. She also describes the layout of the school and says children are upstairs.
The school’s first floor is being searched by two other officers as an alarm blares. They check several rooms, including what appear to be classrooms. The rooms are dark and some doors are locked.
The gunshots grow louder, and Engelbert enters an atrium and encounters the shooter standing near a window. Engelbert fires four times, and the shooter falls to the ground.
Engelbert is a four-year veteran of the force, and Collazo is a nine-year veteran. Fourteen minutes after the first emergency call, the officers shot and killed Hale.
The police chief said that the two officers were trying to make sense of what happened after the shooting. Drake said Biden told him that he intended to reach out to the officers as well.
Drake said during a Tuesday press briefing that the shooter had legally purchased seven firearms from five local gun dealers. The weapons used in Monday’s attack, were part of that group.
The Nashville Davidson County Sheriff’s Office and Tennessee State University Shooting Center on Wednesday at 11:14 a.m. ET
“All of Tennessee was hurt yesterday, but some parents woke up without children, children woke up without parents and without teachers, and spouses woke up without their loved ones,” said Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, who also lost a close family friend in the shooting.
The shooter sent a disturbing Instagram message to a childhood friend just before 10 a.m. Monday, saying “I’m planning to die today” and that it would be on the news, the friend Averianna Patton told CNN on Tuesday.
Patton, a Nashville radio host, told CNN she was the shooter’s childhood basketball teammate but they hadn’t spoken in years and is unsure why she received the message. Patton said she then called a suicide prevention line and the Nashville Davidson County Sheriff’s Office at around 10:13 a.m.
Writings left behind by Hale revealed the attack “was calculated and planned,” police said. The shooter had a drawing of how to enter the building and “assaults that would take place,” Drake said at a Tuesday news conference.
Hale graduated from Nossi College of Art & Design in Nashville last year, the president of the school confirmed to CNN. Hale worked as a freelance graphic designer and a part-time grocery shopper, a LinkedIn profile says.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/29/us/covenant-school-shooting-nashville-tennessee-wednesday/index.html
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Collazo then appeared to shoot the person on the ground four times with a handgun, yelling “Stop moving!” The officers radio “Suspect down!” when they approach the person. The suspect down!
Sissy Goff, one of Koonce’s friends, went to the reunification center after the shooting and suspected something was wrong when she didn’t see Koonce there.
She would have been in front of the people handling things if she had been there.
Bill Lee said in a video statement that Peak was going to dinner with Maria Lee, the first lady of Tennessee.
Maria and Cindy Peak were all teachers at the same school and have been family friends for decades.
Some families of the victims have released statements as they mourn their loves ones. The family of Hill said he was a father of seven children and grandfather to fourteen who loved to cook and spend time with his family.
The city of Nashville is planning a vigil on Wednesday night to mourn those lost in the mass shooting, according to Nashville Mayor John Cooper. It will take place at One Public Square park at 5:30 p.m. local time.