A student friend of a student shot in the shoulder went to school, and Macey and her family stayed together for the rest of their lives
It was difficult for Dr. Pattman, an educator for 22 years, to accept that so many students have to live with such a possibility every day that they set foot on an American high school campus. But she said that she and her daughter would find a way to soldier on. She spoke on Wednesday afternoon with a resolve that seemed laced with resignation.
Macey’s friend, a fellow freshman, had been shot in the shoulder, and Macey was worried about her. She did not want to go back to school and get shot, she told her mother.
The mother and daughter sat down together about an hour later. A friend had picked Macey up from Apalachee and taken her to a convenience store, where her mother was waiting. They hugged each other and cried.
Her school went into lock down mode. Students hid in a corner. There is a light out. Quiet. They stayed that way from 11 a.m. to about 1:30 p.m.
“I think most of it just comes from not living in fear, knowing that things like this happen,” she said. “Not just in schools, but in grocery stores, in churches. I’m almost to the point where I feel that no place is exempt.”
“At that moment, the primary thing was continuing this communication with my daughter, but now I’m also responsible for keeping my other children safe,” she said of her students.
The Shooting at Apalachee High School: Two Shooters, Two More, and Heroes to My Dad, Jeffrey Irimie
The shooting at Apalachee High School in Winder, Ga., on Wednesday killed two teachers and two students, becoming the most violent school shooting in Georgia’s history. At least nine others were injured.
Two 14-year-olds were identified by the authorities as dead. According to officials, the educators killed were Richard Aspinwall and Christina Irimie. Spellings of the names were not confirmed by the authorities.
Chris Hosey is the director of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. The patients that are in the hospital are heroes to me.
According to friends of his family, Mason was a fun teenager who enjoyed spending time with his family, playing video games, and visiting Walt Disney World. He started at the school recently.
“He really enjoyed life,” said Doug Kilburn, 40, a friend who has known Schermerhorn’s mother for a decade. “He always had an upbeat attitude about everything.”
When Mr. Briscoe learned about the shooting at the high school in the afternoon, he called Schermerhorn’s mother to ask if everything was OK. She told him: “Mason’s gone.”
Officials said the student who shot and killed a faculty member at the school would be charged with murder. Students barricaded themselves in classrooms as they heard gunfire.
The math special education teacher and the golf coach were injured in the shooting. On Wednesday, his daughter said on her Facebook page that he had been shot in the hip and foot.