LAST week Friday, a student fatally shot one classmate and wounded four others when he opened fire in the cafeteria of his Washington state high school, following a fight with fellow students.
The shooter took his own life as Marysville-Pilchuck High School students scrambled to safety in the latest outburst of deadly violence at an American school.
There was little on Fryberg’s social media accounts to offer any insight into the shooting, although in February he posted a message on facebook saying: “If you ask me, hunting is the BEST sport there is.” Witnesses described the assailant as a well-liked freshman and member of the school’s wrestling and football teams.
The violence at Marysville-Pilchuck High School marked the latest in a series of deadly rampages at American schools that have played a central role in a national debate over gun laws. In 2012, a 20-year-old gunman entered Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, and killed 20 children and six adults before taking his own life in one of the deadliest mass shootings in US history.
A study released in February of this year showed that gun violence is erupting in America’s schools and colleges at a rate of more than three incidents a month, with 13 school shootings recorded in the first six weeks of 2014 alone.
The analysis by groups campaigning for tighter gun controls in the US identifies at least 44 school and college shootings since Newtown in December 2012. The total death toll from the events over the 14 months since then is 28, surpassing that of Newtown itself.
The joint analysis by Moms Demand Action, a group of concerned citizens formed in the wake of Newtown, and Mayors Against Illegal Guns, was released in Washington in an attempt to kick-start the debate on gun control.
The issue has slumped in the political agenda in recent months following congressional opposition spearheaded by the Republican leadership to reforms such as universal federal background checks on all gun purchases.
One of the most alarming statistics revealed by the study is that of the 28 shootings that happened in elementary, middle or high schools, 20 of them involved shooters under 18. In addition to the five-year-old, two shooters were aged 12, one 13, one 15 and three 16.
Twelve-year-old Jose Reyes fatally shot his teacher and wounded two other students at his middle school in Sparks, Nevada, last October before killing himself.
He used a 9mm semi-automatic Ruger handgun he had found unlocked in a case above the refrigerator at home.
In August last year, a five-year-old boy brought a loaded gun in his backpack into kindergarten in Memphis Tennessee; it discharged without causing injury.
Though the shooters are disparate in age, one common factor that many shared was that, like Reyes, they obtained their weapons at home. Three-quarters of the incidents in which it was possible to determine the source of the firearm involved guns brought from the shooter’s home.
That tallies with Newtown itself, in which the shooter at Sandy Hook elementary school, Adam Lanza, wielded guns from his home that were owned by his mother.
A group called Everytown for Gun Safety, an umbrella group started by former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a passionate and public advocate of gun control in June this year released a report which showed that in the last 18 months there have been 74 school shootings.
The report came shortly after Emilio Hoffman was shot in a locker room at Reynolds High School in Troutdale, Oregon. The motive of the shooter, identified as 15-year-old Jared Padgett, is not known. Padgett died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound elsewhere at the school.
Here are the 15 Newtown-like incidents that have occurred between the Sandy Hook massacre and the shooting in Oregon:
1. January 10 2013 Taft Union High School in Taft, California: A 16-year-old student opened fire in class. He was targeting two classmates who he felt had bullied him, law enforcement said. One student was injured. The shooter was placed into custody after a teacher and campus supervisor persuaded the student to put down his firearm.
2. January 15 2013 Stevens Institute of Business and Arts in St. Louis, Missouri: A part-time student shot and injured a school employee then apparently shot himself, according to St. Louis police.
3. January 31 2013 Price Middle School in Atlanta, Georgia: A 14-year-old was shot in the head outside his school. His mother told CNN affiliate WSB-TV that he was taken to the hospital. Atlanta Public Schools announced that another student had been taken into custody after the shooting.
4. April 12 2013 New River Community College in Christianburg, Virginia: An 18-year-old student drove to the school’s campus inside a mall and began shooting at 1:55 p.m. on a Friday. He wounded two women.
5. June 7 2013 Santa Monica College in Santa Monica, California: A gunman killed four people during a rampage that began at a home near the college campus. He opened fire in the residence where police discovered two bodies, then the gunman shot at a passing car and carjacked another.
The gunman forced the driver to drive onto the campus and shot two people in a passing vehicle, police said. Another victim was shot outside the campus library, authorities said. The gunman was killed by authorities.
6. August 20 2013 Ronald E. McNair Discovery Learning Academy, in Decatur, Georgia: A gunman fired shots and barricaded himself inside the elementary school. Antoinette Tuff, who worked in the front office, was hailed as a hero for engaging suspect Michael Brandon Hill. She managed to talk him into giving up, and no one was injured.
7. August 30 2013 Carver High School in Winston-Salem, North Carolina: A student injured another during a shooting that occurred at 2:45 p.m. during a planned fire drill.
8. October 21 2013 Sparks Middle School in Sparks, Nevada: A 12-year-old opened fire with a handgun he took from his parents, police say. Jose Reyes injured two students and killed Mike Landsberry, a teacher and Afghanistan war veteran. Reyes killed himself.
9. December 13 2013 Arapahoe High School in Centennial, Colorado: Karl Halverson Pierson opened fire on a Friday inside his suburban Denver high school. The 18-year-old allegedly shot Claire Davis, a 17-year-old senior, who later died at a hospital. Law enforcement said that Pierson apparently wanted revenge against a faculty member because of a “confrontation or disagreement.”
10. January 9 2014 Liberty Technology Magnet High School in Jackson, Tennessee: A 16-year-old student shot a classmate in the leg as classes were being dismissed for the day. The student was treated for his gunshot wound.
11. January 14 2014 Berrendo Middle School in Roswell, New Mexico: A 12-year-old boy walked into the school gym, pulled a shotgun out of a bag and fired at students waiting for the school day to begin. The boy wounded two.
12. January 21 2014 Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana: Student Cody M. Cousins, 23, opened fire in the basement of the Electrical Engineering Building. Cousins killed Andrew F. Boldt, the school said, and both were listed as seniors. The school’s police chief said that Cousins left the building right after the shooting, and a city police officer arrested him. Cousins was “booked on a preliminary charge of murder,” Purdue Police Chief John Cox said.
13. January 24 2014 South Carolina State University in Orangeburg, South Carolina: A manhunt kicked off after a student Brandon Robinson, 20, was shot to death at the school.Police arrested Justin Bernard Singleton, 19, and charged him with Robinson’s killing, according to a statement from the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division.
14. May 23 2014 University of California, Santa Barbara in Isla Vista, California: Elliot Rodger, 22, stabbed to death three people in his apartment, police said. Then Rodger fired into a deli and killed a young man inside the shop and shot to death two sorority sisters.Cheng Yuan Hong, 20; George Chen, 19; Weihan Wang, 20; Katherine Cooper, 22; Veronika Weiss, 19; and Christopher Michaels-Martinez, 20, lost their lives. Others were injured.Rodger committed suicide, leaving behind a long, hateful essay.
15. June 5 2014 Seattle Pacific University in Seattle, Washington: A 26-year-old man who was not a student at the school was tackled by a student security guard after he killed one person and wounded two others. Aaron Ybarra was fascinated with school shootings and told investigators he had visited Colorado’s Columbine High School where two students killed 12 students and a teacher in 1999.
Maybe one these days President Obama will find time out of his busy schedule to finally do something about gun control and prevent America’s school halls from becoming killing fields.