Gunman, 15, kills 3 at school; his father purchased weapon
San Francisco Chronicle, 1 Dec 2021
Eric Seals / Detroit Free Press Parents walk away with their kids from a Meijer grocery store parking lot, where many students gathered after a shooting at Oxford High School in Oxford, Mich. The suspected shooter was taken into custody.
OXFORD TOWNSHIP, Mich. — A 15-yearold sophomore opened fire at his Michigan high school on Tuesday, killing three students, including a 16-year-old boy who died in a deputy’s patrol car on the way to a hospital, authorities said. Eight other people were wounded, some critically. Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard said late Tuesday that investigators were still trying to determine a motive for the shooting at Oxford High School in Oxford Township, a community of about 22,000 people roughly 30 miles north of Detroit. “The person that’s got the most insight and the motive is not talking,” Bouchard said at a news conference. The suspect’s father had bought the 9mm Sig Sauer used in the shooting on Friday, Bouchard said, adding that he did not know why the man bought the gun. Bouchard said the suspect had practiced shooting with the gun and “posted pictures of the target and the weapon.” The three students who were killed were 16-yearold Tate Myre, 14-year-old Hanna St. Julian, and 17-year-old Madisyn Baldwin. Bouchard said Myre died in a patrol car as a deputy tried to get him to a hospital. Bouchard said a teacher who received a graze wound to the shoulder was discharged from the hospital, but seven students ranging in age from 14 to 17 remained hospitalized with gunshot wounds, including a 14year-old girl who was on a ventilator after surgery. Undersheriff Mike McCabe said earlier that authorities were aware of allegations circulating on social media that there had been threats of a shooting at the roughly 1,700-student school before Tuesday’s attack, but he cautioned against believing that narrative until investigators can look into it. Authorities didn’t immediately release the suspect’s name, but Bouchard said deputies arrested him within minutes of arriving at the school in response to a flood of 911 calls about the attack. He said the deputies arrested him after he emerged from a bathroom with the gun, which he said had seven rounds of ammunition still in it. “I believe they literally saved lives having taken down the suspect with a loaded firearm while still in the building,” Bouchard said. Isabel Flores, a 15-yearold ninth-grader, told WJBK-TV that she and other students heard gunshots and saw another student bleeding from the face. They then ran through the rear of the school, she said.