Another shooting inside a school left two students dead in Nashville, Tennessee, as the United States continued to witness another grim reminder and manifestation of its runaway gun violence crisis.
Metro Nashville Police Department said the first call to the 911 emergency number was made of the shooting at 11:09 a.m. Wednesday. The shooter, according to police, killed one student and later turned the gun on himself, dying from wounds he inflicted upon himself.
Another student received a grazing wound from the shooter, police said.
The police named the deceased, 16-year-old Josselin Corea Escalante, and identified the shooter, 17-year-old Solomon Henderson.
According to the school district (@MetroSchools), "Antioch High School is currently under lockdown due to shots fired within the school building. Metro Police are on the scene, and we cannot find anyone who could be a threat. We will be taking students into the auditorium and will provide information regarding reunification as quickly as possible."
The Wednesday shooting occurred nearly two years after three nine-year-old students and three adult staff members were killed in a shooting at another school in the same city. The shooter was also killed by police.
The Wednesday shooting was the first in President Donald Trump's second term.
"The President and his team are monitoring the news out of Nashville," the White House said in a statement.
"As details emerge, the White House extends its deepest thoughts and prayers to those affected by this senseless tragedy and thanks the courageous first responders responding to the incident."
School shootings have become tragically endemic in the United States as is gun violence generally.
There were 39 school shootings in 2024, according to a tracker kept by Education Week, which noted that it was the highest since it started tracking such shootings in 2018.
The 2024 aggregate translated into more than two school shootings per month.
The deadliest of those shootings occurred in 2012 at a Connecticut school that left 20 elementary school students and six adults dead.
Six years ago, a shooter opened fire in a Florida school, killing 17 people and wounding 17.
In total, according to the Gun Violence Archive, 16,088 people died from gun violence in 2024.
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