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You can't even escape it... school tragedy


stormshadow19

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http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050322/ap_on_re_us/school_shooting

BEMIDJI, Minn. - A high school student went on a shooting rampage on this Indian reservation Monday, killing his grandparents at their home and then seven people at his school, "grinning and waving" as he fired, authorities and witnesses said. The gunman was later found shot to death. It was the nation's worst school shooting since the Columbine massacre in 1999.

Reuters Photo Photo

Reuters Photo

Slideshow Slideshow: Eight Killed in Minn. High School Shooting

Students pleaded with the gunman to stop shooting.

"You could hear a girl saying, 'No, Jeff, quit, quit. Leave me alone. What are you doing?" Sondra Hegstrom told The Pioneer of Bemidji, using the name of the suspected shooter.

Before the shootings at Red Lake High School, the suspect's grandparents were shot in their home and died later. There was no immediate indication of the gunman's motive.

Six students including the gunman were killed at the school, along with a teacher and a security guard, FBI (news - web sites) spokesman Paul McCabe said at a news conference in Minneapolis.

Fourteen to 15 other students were injured, McCabe said. Some were being cared for in Bemidji, about 20 miles south of Red Lake. Authorities closed roads to the reservation in far northern Minnesota while they investigate the shootings.

Hegstrom described the gunman grinning and waving at a student his gun was pointed at, then swiveling to shoot someone else. "I looked him in the eye and ran in the room, and that's when I hid," she told The Pioneer.

McCabe declined to talk about a possible connection between the suspect and the couple killed at the home, but Red Lake Fire Director Roman Stately said they were the grandparents of the shooter. He identified the shooter's grandfather as Daryl Lussier, a longtime officer with the Red Lake Police Department, and said Lussier's guns may have been used in the shootings.

Stately said the shooter had two handguns and a shotgun.

"After he shot a security guard, he walked down the hallway shooting and went into a classroom where he shot a teacher and more students," Stately told Minneapolis television station KARE.

Students and a teacher, Diane Schwanz, said the shooter tried to break down a door to get into her classroom.

"I just got on the floor and called the cops," Schwanz told the Pioneer. "I was still just half-believing it."

Ashley Morrison, another student, had taken refuge in Schwanz's classroom. With the shooter banging on the door, she dialed her mother on her cell phone. Her mother, Wendy Morrison, said she could hear gunshots on the line.

"'Mom, he's trying to get in here and I'm scared,'" Ashley Morrison told her mother.

All of the dead students were found in one room. One of them was a boy believed to be the shooter, McCabe said. He would not comment on reports that the boy shot himself and said it was too early to speculate on a motive.

Martha Thunder's 15-year-old son, Cody, was being treated for a gunshot wound to the hip.

"He heard gunshots and the teacher said 'No, that's the janitor's doing something,' and the next thing he knew, the kid walked in there and pointed the gun right at him," Thunder said.

The shooter fired twice. The first bullet struck a clock on the wall behind Cody, who ducked. The second bullet hit him in the hip, she said.

The school was evacuated after the shootings and locked down for the investigation, McCabe said.

"It will probably take us throughout the night to really put the whole picture together," he said.

It was the nation's worst school shooting since two students at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo., killed 12 students and a teacher and wounded 23 before killing themselves on April 20, 1999.

The rampage in Red Lake was the second fatal school shooting in Minnesota in 18 months. Two students were killed at Rocori High School in Cold Spring in September 2003. Student John Jason McLaughlin, who was 15 at the time, awaits trial in the case.

Red Lake High School, on the Red Lake Indian Reservation, has about 300 students, according to its Web site.

The reservation is about 240 miles north of the Twin Cities. It is home to the Red Lake Chippewa Tribe, one of the poorest in the state. According to the 2000 census, 5,162 people lived on the reservation, and all but 91 were full-blooded Indians.

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The sadest part of it is - I can't begin to think of a way to keep it from happening again. Anybody who wants to can get their hands on a gun. My heart goes out to the many families and kids who've been hurt by this horrific display of mental illness.

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This is terrible. I see though, the first things they've said is, he wore black and was a loner.

I suppose Marilyn Manson caused it again.

AS A matter of fact this morning on the news they made it a point to say that he was listening to manson......thats bullsh*t, no way music puts this sh*t in these kids head..i listen to manson/rob zombie and i dont feel like killin people....total bull...im sure i dont listen as much as these kids but its still BULL....

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AS A matter of fact this morning on the news they made it a point to say that he was listening to manson......thats bullsh*t, no way music puts this Sh#t in these kids head..i listen to manson/rob zombie and i dont feel like killin people....total bull...im sure i dont listen as much as these kids but its still BULL....

I agree. It's BS. There has to be a problem with the individual to begin with.

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do you understand english dooshie?? :shock:

ARE YOU A GOTHIK TX??? :ahhh:

what the hell does GOTH have to do with a nutcase killin other school mates and teachers.....just because he wears a black jacket.....your stereotyping just like the a-holes on the news....

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listen, I go to school in the current times unlike all or most of you people, and there are goths that I have talked to and all they talk about is crap like

"I hope 1 day that somebody brings a gun to a school"

"I hate this world, I hate my life"

I am just telling all you by my 1st hand account that its people like these that go to school 1 day and start blasting everybody for 1 reason or another. christ, sorry if I tried to tell you people of what I see and hear everyday! its people that hate their life and want to bring guns to schools that end up doing this crazy crap, and I think its safe to say alot of them are "gothics" like this moron from minnesota. they need alot of counseling or something because I bet you that there will be more and more of these things happening in the near future. its sad but I am just an observator

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listen, I go to school in the current times unlike all or most of you people, and there are goths that I have talked to and all they talk about is crap like

"I hope 1 day that somebody brings a gun to a school"

"I hate this world, I hate my life"

I am just telling all you by my 1st hand account that its people like these that go to school 1 day and start blasting everybody for 1 reason or another. christ, sorry if I tried to tell you people of what I see and hear everyday! its people that hate their life and want to bring guns to schools that end up doing this crazy crap, and I think its safe to say alot of them are "gothics" like this moron from minnesota. they need alot of counseling or something because I bet you that there will be more and more of these things happening in the near future. its sad but I am just an observator

And you'll find out there have always been those type of kids in school. You'll find out that there are people who are always unhappy. And you'll find out that people are alot of hot air, alot of talk, and full of sh!t.

Blaming it on just 'gothic' style kids is narrow minded and undermines the tragedy. Everyone looks for something to blame in these types of situations. There isn't anything or anyone to blame. It happened. It is what it is, a tragedy. And, just to let you know big guy, I was a senior in high school the last time this type of thing happened, remember Columbine?

If there is something to blame, it'd have to be political correctness, which says you're not allowed to dicapline your child if they act out of control. And divorce being easier. Dead beat parents. Dual income homes where they work 80+ hours a week. TV raising children.

Yeah, the world is a scary place, and it's been going down hill for awhile. But, you suck it up and make the best of what's around.

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