Florida high school under lockdown after reports of shooter, victims, police say

[Teh One Who Knocks]

FOX News




A Florida high school is under lockdown and police are on the scene after reports of shots fired and potential victims, officials said Wednesday.

The scene, according to a tweet from the Broward Sheriff's Office, was still active and the shooter is still at large.

Dispatch at the sheriff's office confirmed the school was on lockdown and police were on location.

Coral Springs Police asked the public to avoid the area of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, saying it was an active scene.

Authorities also said students and teachers should remain barricaded in the school until they could be reached by police.

According to WSVN, the Margate Fire Rescue team described the scene as a mass casualty incident, which reportedly means at least 20 people were injured.

The is a developing story; please check back for updates.

[redred]

Is it sad that I don't find school shootings in your country shocking no more

[Hal-9000]

Apparently it's a really large high school. Just heard an interview with a student who is already at home. He said the buildings are numbered and he estimated there are at least 10.

I'd like to have a discussion about process after this thing is contained. No arguments about why, more about how they handle the incident. The kid interviewed above said he had to run to Walmart after being let out of the school, and then on to home. Shouldn't they try to contain the victims on buses or in another area, rather than let them run home?

Scary thought - The shooter could wear two pairs of clothes and possibly blend in with the crowd on the way out. Unlikely probably, but still a possibility.

Just saw a pic taken and posted from a student sitting under a desk. Modern media..

[deebakes]

17 dead last i heard, so sad

[DemonGeminiX]

They're saying the kid got in trouble a lot, that he was expelled from school due to threatening other students and other behavioral problems, and that he was troubled for years. Didn't somebody along the way think to, oh I don't know, have the fucking kid psychologically evaluated?!? Or did they just figure that somebody else would do something about it? This is how it always is. "It's not my problem. Let somebody else deal with it." Nobody ever takes the fucking initiative! Nobody can stand pointing and saying, "Hey, I don't want to be the bad guy, but I think there's something wrong here. Maybe he should see a professional?" Nobody can stand getting their fucking hands dirty.

[RBP]

They're saying the kid got in trouble a lot, that he was expelled from school due to threatening other students and other behavioral problems, and that he was troubled for years. Didn't somebody along the way think to, oh I don't know, have the fucking kid psychologically evaluated?!? Or did they just figure that somebody else would do something about it? This is how it always is. "It's not my problem. Let somebody else deal with it." Nobody ever takes the fucking initiative! Nobody can stand pointing and saying, "Hey, I don't want to be the bad guy, but I think there's something wrong here. Maybe he should see a professional?" Nobody can stand getting their fucking hands dirty.

What? No. Clearly guns are the problem.

[Teh One Who Knocks]

Scary thought - The shooter could wear two pairs of clothes and possibly blend in with the crowd on the way out. Unlikely probably, but still a possibility.

Didn't wear extra clothes, but he did try and run out with the other students. See article below this post.

[Teh One Who Knocks]

By Ryan Gaydos | Fox News




Nikolas Cruz tried to blend in with panicked students fleeing the Florida high school he had just opened fire in, killing 17, authorities said late Wednesday.

Cruz concealed himself in the crowd and was seen running out of the school with hundreds of terrified students, authorities said.

Authorities said Cruz was later taken into custody “without incident” by Coconut Creek police in a Coral Springs neighborhood, located just a few miles from the high school itself.

The Broward County Sheriff’s Office said Cruz, 19, was identified as the only possible gunman after looking at security footage from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

Police said Cruz was taken to the hospital because he “exhibited labored breathing.” He was later seen being escorted into Broward Sheriff's headquarters in a medical robe.

The carnage, however, had already taken its toll.

Noah Parness, 17, told the Associated Press that the fire alarm went off for the second time in the day at around 2:30 p.m. Parness said students were calmly filing out of the school when he suddenly heard several pops.

"Everyone was kind of just standing there calm, and then we saw a bunch of teachers running down the stairway, and then everybody shifted and broke into a sprint," Parness said. "I hopped a fence."

An unidentified student described the gruesome scene in an interview with Fox News.

"The police came through the hallway to get us and in the hallway, I saw a big pile of blood, like, kind of smeared as if they were dragged away, and I saw two girls probably dead in the hallway," she said. "And then, coming down the stairs, there was some more blood and outside the building there was another guy – I think it was a teacher – who was, [I’m] pretty sure was dead."

The motive behind the massacre was not immediately clear. Lawmakers and officials suggested the shooting may have been planned.

Sheriff Scott Israel, from Broward County, said at an evening news conference that the suspect carried an AR-15 rifle and had “countless magazines.” He did not specify how many rounds were fired.

"It's catastrophic. There really are no words," Israel said.

Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., told Fox News that Cruz was wearing a gas mask and may have had smoke bombs during the rampage.

Nelson said in a separate interview with CNN that Cruz used the fire alarm “so the kids would come pouring out of the classrooms into the hall.”

After speaking with authorities, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla, said in a tweet “it is clear attack was designed & executed to maximize loss of life.”

Cruz’s classmates had described him as a “loner” and “that weird kid that you see at school.”



Officials described Cruz as a volatile teenager whose strange behavior had caused others to end friendships with him, particularly after a fight that led to his expulsion.

Cruz was also described as having an “obsessive interest in weapons,” according to the Miami Herald. One teacher said Cruz was banned from entering campus with a backpack, the newspaper reported.

"All he would talk about is guns, knives and hunting,” Joshua Charo, 16, a former classmate, told the Herald. “I can’t say I was shocked. From past experiences, he seemed like the kind of kid who would do something like this.”

Another unidentified student told WJXT-TV that “everyone predicted” the shooting.

“Honestly, a lot of people were saying it was gonna be him,” the unnamed student told the news station. He said kids joked around that the student would be the one to “shoot up the school.”

An Instagram page apparently belonging to Cruz showed pictures of guns and knives. Israel said some of Cruz's social media posts were "very, very disturbing."

The Parkland shooting is the nation’s deadliest school shooting since Newtown.

Students and families will be able to see grief counselors at the Pines Trials Park Recreation Center, Coral Springs Gymnasium and Coral Springs Center for Performing Arts starting Thursday at 8 a.m., Broward County Schools officials said.

Counselors will also be made available for students and staff at Westglades Middle School and the Parkland Library, officials said.



Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School will be closed Thursday and Friday.

Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi said her office would pay for the funeral expenses of the victims.

"We will pay for the funeral expenses of these poor victims," Bondi said. "We will take care of it."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

[RBP]

Reporting says the weapon was legally purchased (background check passed), owned by the shooter, and was stored in a gun safe at the trailer park where he was staying.

[Muddy]

Nicholas De Jesus Cruz is his full name.

[Teh One Who Knocks]

From the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:


Here’s what we know about Cruz now:

• Cruz’s mother died in November. His father had died years earlier.
• He and his brother were adopted.
• He went to live with a friend’s family after his mother’s death.
• Cruz had been expelled from school
• He had posted “disturbing” material on social media, according to Israel.
• Buzzfeed is reporting that the FBI was warned about a YouTube user named Nikolas Cruz after he posted in September that he was “going to be a professional school shooter.
• The Miami Herald reports that a teacher at the school said Cruz had been identified as a potential threat to fellow students in the past. Math teacher Jim Gard told the Herald, “There were problems with him last year threatening students, and I guess he was asked to leave campus.”
• The shooting started outside the building, then Cruz went into the school and continued shooting
• Authorities think he walked out with other students after the shootings
• He had “multiple” magazines of ammunition
• He had an AR-15 weapon
• He had a gas mask and smoke grenades
• He pulled the fire alarm as he went into the school and then began shooting
• He was taken into custody off-campus

[Hal-9000]

"Buzzfeed is reporting that the FBI was warned about a YouTube user named Nikolas Cruz after he posted in September that he was “going to be a professional school shooter."

I just read the rumor that the FBI were aware of him since September.

Of course we're not going to hear much on that front...

[Hal-9000]

Reporting says the weapon was legally purchased (background check passed), owned by the shooter, and was stored in a gun safe at the trailer park where he was staying.

So this kid stole the weapon? Apologies, I haven't read much on the logistics yet.

If the gun owner was responsible and followed every rule he could, I guess in a way he becomes another victim. Now he has to live with the knowledge that POS used his gun.

[Hal-9000]

A strange coincidence is that they just had a fire drill in the morning. He pulled the alarm and some students thought it was another drill.

[Hal-9000]

Jesus there seemed to be warning signs in all aspects of his life. If 16 year old kids were thinking he's most likely to commit this sort of crime, there's a big problem with how we read the signals.