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Natalie Rupnow, a 15-year-old student at Abundant Life Christian School, has been identified by police as the suspected shooter
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Police are investigating whether a teenage girl who killed a teacher and fellow student at a school in Madison, Wisconsin, had been bullied prior to the shocking incident.
Police responded to reports of an active shooter at Abundant Life Christian School just before 11 a.m. on Monday morning and entered the building immediately upon arrival.
The 15-year-old suspect was later identified by police as Natalie Rupnow. She was pronounced dead when police arrived at the scene of a suspected self-inflicted gunshot wound, Madison Police Department Chief Shon Barnes said on Monday.
Six others were left injured, including two left two in critical condition with life-threatening injuries.
At a press conference on Tuesday, Barnes said her motive may have been a “combination of factors” and that police were talking to students to determine whether Rupnow had been bullied. The teenager’s family are cooperating with the police.
The two victims are yet to be named.
A second-grade teacher dialled 911 to report the shooting, police clarified on Tuesday.
President Joe Biden, who was briefed on the school shooting on Monday, described the incident as “shocking and unconscionable.
As the deadly shooting was taking place at the Abundant Life Christian School on Monday one teacher took a defiant stand to protect the students.
Kellen Lewis, who has four children, said that the incident had taken place close to where his third-grade son was attending class.
“My third grade son mentioned that his teacher stood between the door and where the kids were hiding with scissors,” ready to defend the children in the classroom, Lewis told CNN’s Jake Tapper.
Lewis said his four children range in age from 4 to 12 and the older ones understood what had happened and are not afraid to go back to Abundant Life Christian School.
At a press conference on Tuesday, Madison police chief Shon Barnes did not confirm if there had been a specific connection between the victims and the suspected shooter, or whether they had been specifically targeted in the attack.
“Everyone was targeted in this incident and everyone was put in equal danger today,” he said.
At Tuesday’s press conference, Madison police chief Shon Barnes hailed the “incredible demonstration of support” following the shooting on Monday.
“The past 24 hours have been a flurry of emotion, sadness, anger, disappointment, grief for the Madison community,” he said. “We’re brought together by a tragedy, and today, three families woke up this morning to a world without a loved one, and that can never be undone.”
he added: “In the midst of this tragedy, our community has come together in an incredible demonstration of support from Madison and indeed the state of Wisconsin and our nation. I cannot express enough gratitude to the many emergency response agencies who provided direct support to the Madison Police Department.”
Melissa Agard, a Dane County Executive, praised both students and school staff in the district and nationwide for going to school a day after the deadly shooting at Abundant Life Christian School in Wisconsin.
“Kids, my kids, teachers across our community and in fact across our nation had to wake up and go to school today and that was an act of bravery,” Agard said at press conference on Tuesday afternoon.
“Parents dropping their children off after what we witnessed yesterday took an act of bravery and a belief in our community. And that’s a bravery we should not have to put on the shoulders of our children and our families and out community.”
She added: “Right now it’s OK to not feel OK.”
A student and a teacher were killed during the deadly shooting that occurred at the Abundant Life Christian School on Monday in Madison, Wisconsin.
Police were yet to officially name the two ahead of a press conference on Tuesday afternoon.
Here’s what we do know about the victims so far:
Police were yet to officially name the two ahead of a press conference on Tuesday
The shooting on Monday in Madison, Wisconsin, is the 83rd school shooting this year.
2024 has been the year with the most school shootings since 2008, according a CNN database.
The incident today in Madison is the area’s second major mass shooting in seven months.
This summer, 12 people were wounded in a shooting at a rooftop party.
Police now say at least a dozen people were hurt in a shooting at a rooftop party in Wisconsin’s capital city
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