Cops say female teen, 15, killed teacher and student in horrid shooting at Abundant Life Christian School in Madison, Wisconsin
A gun-toting teenage girl at a Christian school in Madison, Wis., shot dead another teen pupil and a teacher inside a classroom during study hall on Monday morning, according to police.
Six more people were injured — including two students who were left with “life-threatening” wounds, authorities said. The other four people hurt were three students and a teacher, authorities said. Two of them had been released from the hospital by Monday evening.
The 15-year-old shooter, Natalie “Samantha” Rupnow, suffered a self-inflicted gunshot wound, authorities said during a Monday night press conference. She was pronounced dead on the way to the hospital.
Both fatal victims were pronounced dead at the scene, officials said.
The gunfire broke out just before 11 a.m. local time at Abundant Life Christian School, a K-12 facility with about 400 students, where police found multiple victims with gunshot wounds, cops said.
A second-grader believed to be in a nearby classroom called 911 for help, according to Madison Police Chief Shon Barnes.
Barnes said during one of several briefings that authorities arrived at the school within three minutes of receiving a 911 call about an active shooter.
He said the shooter’s family is “cooperating” with law enforcement but that the motive behind the bloodshed remains unclear into Monday evening.
There were no clear warning signs that “suggested violence would occur” at the school, Barnes said.
“We do not know that the shooter had any prior contact with law enforcement,” he said.
A law enforcement official told CNN Rupnow planned the attack ahead of time, and evidence gathered so far indicate she wrote some of her problems down, writings that are being reviewed by investigators.
Barnes said police are aware of an alleged manifesto that might have belonged to the shooter and is circulating online, but they have not verified the authenticity of the documents.
The police chief added that the school appeared to be divided into sections by age groups, and “There’s no evidence anyone was injured who was not in the age group,” suggesting those hurt might be teens or teens and their teachers.
“ Today truly is a sad day for Madison and for our country,” Barnes said. “It is a day that I believe will live in our collective minds for a very, very long time.”
At an earlier press conference, police erroneously said five people, including the gunman, were dead. They later walked back that death toll.
Police did not fire their weapons at the shooter.
“ We know that this was the middle of the day, of a school day, and so there will be other injuries that we’ll have to face for a very, very long time,” Barnes said. ”We’re going to do everything we can as a community to heal those injuries as well.”
Parents were reunited with their children following the unnerving chaos, authorities said Monday evening.
Bethany Highman, whose daughter attends the school, described her terror before she FaceTimed with her child and learned she was safe.
“As soon as it happened, your world stops for a minute. Nothing else matters,’’ Highman said. “There’s nobody around you.
“You just bolt for the door and try to do everything you can as a parent to be with your kids.”
She said that unfortunately, such violence is all too frequent a reality these days.
“I bring my daughter to school knowing well that this happens in the world. That people are struggling,’’ the mom said. “And I pray for my daughter’s safety, and I pray for the entire school’s safety.
“I pray for the hearts of the students, the teachers, the staff members. It’s a very real thing.”
School official Barbara Wiers said the shooting has “rocked our school community.”
“But we know it affects not just our school community, but Madison and the greater area and all schools,” the director of elementary and school relations for Abundant Life Christian School said during a Monday evening press conference with police.
She added that students “handled themselves magnificently” and knew the shooting was real when they heard “Lockdown, lockdown.”
The school does not have metal detectors or a school resource officer, but has other security measures in place like visual scanning, Wiers said.
Barnes noted during his third press conference that some Madison police officers were actually training for a similar situation when the active shooting call came in and they rushed to the building.
The shooting took place just two days after the 12th anniversary of the Sandy Hook shooting this past Saturday. It also follows the March 2023 shooting at a Nashville-area Christian school where gunman Audrey Hale killed six people at the facility she once attended.
President Biden called the latest school shooting “shocking and unconscionable” as he urged Congress to pass stricter gun laws.
“From Newtown to Uvalde, Parkland to Madison, to so many other shootings that don’t receive attention — it is unacceptable that we are unable to protect our children from this scourge of gun violence. We cannot continue to accept it as normal,” he said in a statement.
“Every child deserves to feel safe in their classroom. Students across our country should be learning how to read and write — not having to learn how to duck and cover.”
Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers said in a statement, “We are praying for the kids, educators, and entire Abundant Life school community as we await more information and are grateful for the first responders who are working quickly to respond.”
