Santa Fe, Texas - A 17-year-old student
dressed in a trench coat and armed with a shotgun and pistol
opened fire at his high school outside Houston on Friday,
killing nine students and a teacher, before surrendering to
officers, authorities said.
Santa Fe High School, southeast of Houston, joined a long
list of US campuses where students and faculty have been
killed in a spray of gunfire.
The Texas shooting stoked the nation's long-running debate
over firearms ownership and came about three months after 17
teens and educators were fatally shot in Parkland, Florida.
Students said the gunman, identified by law enforcement as
Dimitrios Pagourtzis, opened fire in an art class shortly before
8am. Students and staff fled and a fire alarm triggered a full
evacuation.
Classmates described Pagourtzis as a quiet loner who played
on the football team. On Friday, they said, he wore the trench
coat to school in Santa Fe, about 30 miles (50km) southeast of
Houston, on a day when temperatures topped 90 degrees Fahrenheit
(32 degrees Celsius).
Texas Governor Greg Abbott said Pagourtzis obtained firearms
from his father, who had likely acquired them legally, and also
left behind explosive devices.
"Not only did he want to commit the shooting, but he wanted
to commit suicide after the shooting," Abbott told reporters,
citing a police review of the suspect's journals. "He didn't
have the courage to commit suicide."
Ten people were wounded, Abbott said.
Pagourtzis was charged with capital murder and denied bail
at a brief court hearing later on Friday, where he appeared in
handcuffs and wearing a green prison jumpsuit. He spoke in a
soft voice and said "Yes, sir" when asked if he wanted a
court-appointed attorney, along with other questions.
Pagourtzis spared people he liked so he could have his story
told, a charging document obtained by Reuters showed.
Abbott said investigators had seen a T-shirt on the
suspect's Facebook page that read "Born to Kill," and
authorities were examining his journal. But there were no
outward signs he had been planning an attack, he said.
"Here, the red flag warnings were either non-existent or
very imperceptible," Abbott said.
Two young girls pray during a vigil held at the Texas First Bank after a shooting left several people dead at Santa Fe High School in Santa Fe, Texas. Picture: Trish Badger/Reuters
Some aspects of Friday's shooting had echoes of the massacre
at Columbine High School in 1999. The two teenaged killers in
that incident wore trenchcoats, used shotguns and planted
improvised explosives, killing 10 before committing suicide
themselves.
It was the second mass shooting in Texas in less than a
year. A man armed with an assault rifle shot dead 26 people
during Sunday prayers at a rural church last November.
Flags in Texas and in many other parts of the United States
flew at half-staff on Friday to mourn the victims of the
fourth-deadliest mass shooting at a U.S. public school in modern
history.
A vigil was held Friday night for the victims, who have not
been officially identified. Local reports said those killed
included a substitute art teacher and a Pakistani exchange
student.
Courtney Marshall, 15, said the gunman came into her art
class shooting.
"I wanted to take care of my friends, but I knew I had to
get out of there," Marshall said, adding that she saw at least
one person hit. "I knew the guy behind me was dead."
Two school officers engaged the shooter, including school
district police officer John Barnes, who was in critical
condition after a gunshot wound to his elbow that almost caused
him to bleed out, hospital officials said.
Two others among the injured were also in critical
condition.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton told CNN authorities were
investigating whether anyone else helped in the attack.
The school, which has some 1,460 students, will be closed on
Monday and Tuesday.
US President Donald Trump called the latest school
massacre "absolutely horrific."
Days after the Parkland massacre, Trump said elected
officials should be ready to "fight" the powerful National Rifle
Association lobby group, which argues that any gun control
contradicts the constitutional right to bear arms.
But no major federal gun controls have been imposed since
Parkland, and early this month Trump embraced the NRA, telling
its annual meeting in Dallas, "Your Second Amendment rights are
under siege. But they will never, ever be under siege as long as
I'm your president."
At the vigil in Texas, many sought solace with friends and
classmates.
"This will bring us closer together - hopefully, a positive
impact from something negative," said Clayton George, 16, who
played football with the suspect.