10 Dead After School Shooting
Boy kills
grandparents, then fires on students and staff on a Minnesota Indian
reservation.
P.J. Huffstutter and Stephanie Simon, Times Staff Writers
Los Angeles Times,
March 22, 2005
MINNEAPOLIS - A student on a remote Indian reservation in Minnesota
burst through the
metal detector at his high school Monday and shot dead five classmates,
a teacher and a security guard before turning the gun on himself,
authorities said.
Before his rampage at the school, the student shot and killed his
grandparents at their home on the Red Lake Indian Reservation,
authorities said.
His grandfather, Sgt. Daryl Lussier, had served for more than 35 years
on the Red Lake police force.
"The boy took his grandfather's duty belt with the guns. That's what he
used," said Roman Stately, the Red Lake fire director.
It was the deadliest school shooting since the carnage six years ago at
Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo. In that incident, two
students killed 12 classmates and a teacher before committing suicide.
Stately described a devastating scene at the small high school in Red
Lake.
The school's security guard, who was unarmed, was dead at the front
door. The slain students and teacher were bunched in one classroom,
along with several wounded teenagers.
The gunman, an underclassman, had shot himself in the face. His body
lay near those of his victims.
Authorities said as many as 15 students were injured.
"It was just so sad to see the children lying on the floor like that,
lying on top of each other. Just a terrible sight," Stately said. "I've
seen a lot of bad scenes in my time, but nothing like this."
The FBI, which is investigating the shooting along with tribal police,
would not speculate on a motive.
"It will probably take the rest of the night to put it all together,"
FBI Special Agent Paul McCabe said. "We still have a lot of work to do."
Though rumors swirled through the reservation, few could attempt to
explain the bloodshed.
"I don't understand it," said Darrell Seki Jr., a security guard at
North County Regional Hospital in nearby Bemidji, where six of the
victims were taken.
"We can't believe what's going on," Seki said. "I can't think right
now, I'm so shocked."
Seki attended Red Lake High School; his father is the treasurer of the
Red Lake Tribal Council.
Darrell Seki Sr. said he arrived at the high school shortly after the
shootings.
"All I saw was kids running around crying, hugging each other, parents
crying, teachers crying," he said. "A tough, tough day."
School officials were herding some students onto buses to send them
home. Others refused to leave, said local newspaper editor Molly Miron,
who arrived at the school soon after the shooting.
Many students were too traumatized to talk, she said. One teacher told
her that she had heard gunshots and shouted to her students: "Get out,
run out, get out."
Miron, editor of the Pioneer of Bemidji, said she then hurried to Red
Lake Indian Health Services Hospital. The scene there was equally
chaotic.
"The lobby was jammed," she said. "People were in a panic, not knowing
who was hurt. Everyone here knows everyone out here, and everyone is
related to everyone somehow."
Miron added: "I have no idea what this is going to do to that town.
This is like a quarter of the class that's dead or injured."
Though rattled, the younger Seki said he had always half expected
violence to break out at the high school, which has about 300 students.
"It's just the kids up here," he said. He tried to find the words to
describe the sense of despair he thought might lead to a violent
outburst.
"It's poverty," he finally said. "That would be part of this situation
too."
Poverty and unemployment have long gripped the reservation in northern
Minnesota, about an hour's drive from the Canadian border.
The land is rich in natural bounty, famous for wild rice beds, peat
bogs and world-class walleye and crappie fishing.
Yet 39% of the families on the reservation live in poverty. Four in
five students at the school are eligible for free or reduced-price
lunches.
Though the Red Lake Band of the Chippewa tribe runs some small casinos,
the reservation is too remote -- about 240 miles from Minneapolis -- to
attract many tourists.
The school has produced some top basketball teams, but has also long
ranked among the worst in Minnesota in standardized test scores.
"A horrible incident," Seki Sr. said. "It's time for the nation to
mourn."
Huffstutter reported from Minnesota and Simon from St. Louis. Times
researcher Lynn Marshall in Seattle contributed to this report.
Copright
Los Angeles Times,
posted here under Fair Use. |
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Sondra Hegstrom, Marla
Hegstrom and Ashley
Morrison weep after a fellow student at Red Lake High School shot to
death five students, a teacher, a guard and himself on campus.
(Molly Miron /
Bemidji Pioneer)
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Red Lake
School
Superintendent Stuart Desjarlait comforts a teacher after the shootings.
(Molly Miron / Bemidji Pioneer) |
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An
ambulance leaves Red Lake High School. Eight died on campus and
authorities said as many as 15 students were injured when a student
opened fire.
(Monte
Draper / Bemidji Pioneer)
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