School shooting
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School shooting is a term used to refer to gun violence in educational institutions, especially the mass murder or spree killing of people connected with an institution. Unlike acts of revenge against specific people, school shootings usually involve multiple intended or actual victims, often randomly targeted.
Definition
The term "school shootings" most commonly describes acts committed by either a student or intruders from off campus. They are to be distinguished from crowd-containment shootings by law-enforcement personnel, such as the shootings at Kent State and Jackson State in the United States. They are also differentiated from other kinds of school violence, such as the mass killings of the Bath School disaster (which involved a homemade bomb rather than shooting) or the Beslan school hostage crisis (usually described as an act of terrorism).
One of the most prominent school shootings was that at Columbine High School, in Littleton, Colorado, on Tuesday, April 20, 1999, perpetrated by Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. Harris and Klebold took their own lives before the end of the event. Perpetrators of school killings frequently[citation needed] voice severe anger and isolation preceding their actions. They may have a history of violence, or uncommon inappropriate and extreme behaviors at school.
In the United States, one-on-one public-school violence, such as beatings and stabbings or violence related to gang activity, is more common[citation needed] in some densely populated areas (which tend to be impoverished sections of cities). Inner-city or urban schools were much more likely than other schools to report serious violent crimes, with 17 percent of city principals reporting at least one serious crime compared to 11 percent of urban schools, 10 percent of rural schools, and five percent of suburban town schools in the 1997 school year.[1] Student-perpetrated school shootings in North America have mostly been in overwhelmingly white, middle-class, non-urban areas.[citation needed] In some cases, the victims of the shootings were involved in bullying or other acts of violence and intimidation against the perpetrators. However, school shootings in other countries may take on more national or religious overtones, such as the Merkaz HaRav shooting.
Profiling
School shooting is a topic of intense interest in the United States.[2] Though companies like MOSAIC Threat Assessment Systems sell products and services designed to identify potential threats, a thorough study of all U.S. school shootings by the U.S. Secret Service[3] warned against the belief that a certain "type" of student would be a perpetrator. Any "profile" would fit too many students to be useful and may not fit the potential perpetrators. Some lived with both parents in "an ideal, All-American family." Some were children of divorce, or lived in foster homes. A few were loners, but most had close friends. Some experts such as Alan Lipman have warned against the dearth of empirical validity of profiling methods.
While it may be simplistic to assume a straightforward "profile", the study did find certain similarities among the perpetrators. "The researchers found that killers do not 'snap'. They plan. They acquire weapons. These children take a long, considered, public path toward violence."[4] Princeton's Katherine Newman points out that, far from being "loners", the perpetrators are "joiners" whose attempts at social integration fail, that they let their thinking and even their plans be known, sometimes frequently over long periods of times. The shootings seem as though an attempt to adjust their social standing and image, from "loser" to "master of violence."
Many of the shooters told Secret Service investigators that alienation or persecution drove them to violence. According to the United States Secret Service, instead of looking for traits, the Secret Service urges adults to ask about behavior:
1. What has this child said?
2. Do they have grievances?
3. What do their friends know?
4. Do they have access to weapons?
One "trait" that has not yet attracted as much attention is the gender difference: nearly all school shootings are perpetrated by young males, and in some instances the violence has clearly been gender-specific. Bob Herbert addressed this in an October 2006 New York Times editorial.[6] One female carried out a school shooting in an exceptionally rare incident.[7]
Discussion
School shootings receive extensive media coverage and are infrequent.[8] They have sometimes resulted in nationwide changes of schools' policies concerning discipline and security. Some experts have described fears about school shootings as a type of moral panic.[9]
Such incidents may also lead to nationwide discussion on gun laws.[10]
Notable shootings
North America
United States
Template:Fnb not a "school shooting" in the contemporary sense
Canada
| Name | Location | Date | Year | Death toll | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Centennial Secondary School shooting | Brampton, Ontario Canada | May 28 | 1975 | 2 | [12] |
| St Pius X High School School | Ottawa, Ontario, Canada | October 27 | 1975 | 1 | [13] |
| École Polytechnique Massacre | Montreal, Quebec, Canada | December 6 | 1989 | 14 | [14] |
| Concordia University massacre | Montreal, Quebec, Canada | August 24 | 1992 | 4 | [15] |
| W. R. Myers High School shooting | Taber, Alberta, Canada | April 28 | 1999 | 1 | [16] |
| Dawson College shooting | Montreal, Quebec, Canada | September 13 | 2006 | 1 | |
| C. W. Jefferys Collegiate Institute shooting | Toronto, Ontario, Canada | May 23 | 2007 | 1 | |
| Bendale Business and Technical Institute shooting | Toronto, Ontario, Canada | September 16 | 2008 | 0 | [19] |
Europe
| Name | Location | Date/Year | Death toll | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Raumanmeri school shooting | Rauma, Finland | January 24, 1989 | 2 | [20] |
| Aarhus University Shooting | Aarhus, Denmark | April 4, 1994 | 3 | [21] |
| Dunblane massacre | Dunblane, Scotland, United Kingdom | March 13, 1996 | 18 | [22] |
| Erfurt massacre | Erfurt, Germany | April 26, 2002 | 17 | [23] |
| Coburg shooting | Coburg, Germany | July 3, 2003 | 1 | [24] |
| Beslan school hostage crisis | Beslan, Russia | September 1, 2004 | 385+ | [25] |
| Grund- und Hauptschule von Rötz shooting | Rötz (Oberpfalz), Germany | March 2005 | [26] | |
| Geschwister Scholl School attack | Emsdetten, Germany | November 20, 2006 | 1 | [27] |
| Jokela school shooting | Tuusula, Finland | November 7, 2007 | 9 | [28] |
| Kauhajoki school shooting | Kauhajoki, Finland | September 23, 2008 | 11 | [29] |
| Tromsø school shooting | Tromsø, Norway | January 23, 2009 | 2 | [30] |
| Winnenden school massacre | Winnenden, Germany | March 11, 2009 | 16 | [31] |
South America, Asia, Africa and Australia
| Name | Location | Date/Year | Death toll | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ma'alot massacre | Ma'alot, Israel | May 15, 1974 | 29 | [32] |
| 6 October 1976 Massacre | Bangkok, Thailand | October 16, 1976 | 41+ | [1] |
| Sanaa massacre | Sanaa, Yemen | March 30, 1997 | [33] | |
| University of the Philippines shooting | Quezon City, Philippines | February 19, 1999 | [34] | |
| Monash University shooting | Melbourne, Australia | October 21, 2002 | 2 | [35] |
| Pak Phanang school shooting | Nakhon Si Thammarat, Thailand | June 6, 2003 | 2 | [36] |
| Islas Malvinas School | Carmen de Patagones, Argentina | September 28, 2004 | [37] | |
| Beirut Arab University shooting | Beirut, Lebanon | January 25, 2007 | [38] | |
| Euro International school shooting | Gurgaon, India | December 12, 2007 | 1 | [39] |
| Mercaz HaRav shooting | Jerusalem, Israel | March 6, 2008 | 9 | [40] |
Media-famous cases
| Name | Location | No of victims |
|---|---|---|
| Andrew Kehoe | Bath School disaster | 45 |
| Seung-Hui Cho | Virginia Tech massacre | 32 |
| Thomas Hamilton | Dunblane massacre | 17 |
| Robert Steinhäuser | Erfurt massacre, Germany | 16 |
| Tim Kretschmer | Winnenden school shooting, Germany | 15 |
| Charles Whitman | University of Texas at Austin Tower Massacre | 15 |
| Marc Lépine | Ecole Polytechnique massacre | 14 |
| Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold | Columbine High School massacre | 13 |
| Matti Juhani Saari | Kauhajoki school shooting, Finland | 10 |
| Jeff Weise | Red Lake High School massacre | 9 |
| Pekka-Eric Auvinen | Jokela school shooting, Finland | 8 |
| Mitchell Johnson and Andrew Golden | Westside Middle School massacre | 5 |
| Steven Kazmierczak | Northern Illinois University shooting | 5 |
| Patrick Purdy | Cleveland School massacre | 5 |
| Charles Carl Roberts IV | Amish school shooting | 5 |
| Kip Kinkel | Thurston High School shooting | 4 |
| Valery Fabrikant | Concordia University massacre | 4 |
| Barry Loukaitis | Frontier Junior High School shooting | 3 |
| Luke Woodham | Shooting at Pearl High School | 3 |
| Michael Carneal | Heath High School Shooting | 3 |
| Robert Poulin | St. Pius X High School shooting | 2 |
| Evan Ramsey | Bethel Regional High School shooting | 2 |
| Jamie Rouse | Richland High School shooting | 2 |
| Michael Slobodian | Brampton Centennial Secondary School shooting | 2 |
| Brenda Ann Spencer | Cleveland Elementary School shooting | 2 |
| Charles Andrew Williams | Shooting at Santana High School | 2 |
| Andrew Wurst | Shooting at Parker Middle School | 1 |
| Laurie Dann | Hubbard Woods Elementary School shooting | 1 |
| Todd Cameron Smith | W. R. Myers High School shooting | 1 |
| Kimveer Gill | Dawson shooting | 1 |
Impact
Political impact
School shootings have had a political impact, spurring some to press for more stringent gun control laws. The National Rifle Association is opposed to such laws, and some groups have called for fewer gun control laws, citing cases of armed students ending shootings and halting further loss of life, and claiming that the prohibitions against carrying a gun in schools does not deter the gunmen[41]. One such example is the Mercaz HaRav Massacre, where the attacker was not stopped by police but rather a student, Yitzhak Dadon, who stopped the attacker by shooting him with his personal firearm which he lawfully carried concealed. At a Virginia law school, two students retrieved pistols from their cars and stopped the attacker without firing a shot. Also, at a Mississippi high school, the Vice Principal eventually stopped the attacker. In this case his car was over 1/4 mile away due to the "gun free zone", and multiple students were shot in the time it took to retrieve his gun (though he still ended the shooting five minutes before the first police arrival).
Armed classrooms
Some areas in the US are experimenting with the idea of armed classrooms to deter (or truncate) future attacks, presumably by changing helpless victims into armed defenders. Students at the University of Utah have been allowed to carry concealed pistols (so long as they possess the appropriate state license) since a State Supreme Court decision in 2006.[42][43] In 2008, Harrold Independent School District in Texas became the first public school district in the U.S. to allow teachers with state-issued firearm-carry permits to carry their arms in the classroom; special additional training and ricochet-resistant ammunition were required for participating teachers.[44]
In a Vernon Daily Record op-ed, Joseph Gutheinz, who is both a criminal justice college instructor and a retired Senior Special Agent, took his opposition to pilots flying armed in commercial jets and extended it to armed teachers in classrooms. He said "anyone who has ever gone to an indoor pistol range will see ... bullet holes in the ceilings, floor, walls and support beams. The bullet holes were not the target the shooters intended but were due to accidental discharges. Even the best trained with pistols have an off day, and off days can be fatal." He criticized the Harrold school district for not imposing the same standards on its armed teachers that progressive police departments require for rookie police officers; those requirements include extensive training, and passage of both a psychological examination and lie detector test. [45] [46] [47]
A commentary in the conservative National Review Online argues that the armed school approach for preventing school attacks, while new in the US, has been used successfully for many years in Israel and Thailand[48]; however, Israel does not arm its teachers or students, but rather provides armed guards at all school entrances. [49]
References
- ^ National Center for Education Statistics' Violence and Discipline Problems in U.S. Public Schools, 1996-97.
- ^ "'Profiling' School Shooters". Frontline. 2007-03-17. Retrieved 2007-03-17.
{{cite news}}:|first=missing|last=(help) - ^ "The Final Report and Findings of the Safe School Initiative" (PDF). 2002-05-01.
- ^ PBS article on murder profiles
- ^ Bill Dedman, Deadly Lessons: School Shooters Tell Why, description of Secret Service study. (October 15 2000) Chicago Sun-Times. Accessed April 8 2006
- ^ http://select.nytimes.com/2006/10/16/opinion/16herbert.html?_r=1&n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and%20Op%2dEd%2fOp%2dEd%2fColumnists%2fBob%20Herbert&oref=slogin
- ^ Police: Female student kills 2 others, self at Louisiana college - CNN.com
- ^ CNN (March 25, 1998). School shootings have high profile but occur infrequently.
- ^ Killingbeck, Donna. The Role of Television News in the Construction of School Violence as a 'Moral Panic." Journal of Criminal Justice and Popular Culture, 8(3) (2001) 186-202
- ^ "Government Vows to Take Action Following Kauhajoki Shootings". YLE. Retrieved 2008-09-23.
- ^ http://www.wcax.com/Global/story.asp?s=5324836
- ^ The Brampton Centennial Secondary School massacre was a school shooting, which occurred at Brampton Centennial Secondary School in Brampton, Ontario, Canada. 16-year old gunman Michael Slobodian shot and killed a fellow student, a teacher and injured 13 other students before turning the gun on himself and committing suicide in a school hallway. It was the first school shooting in Canada. Slobodian is the first recorded high-school killer in the country
- ^ The St. Pius X High School shooting was a school shooting that occurred on October 27, 1975, at St. Pius X High School in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Robert Poulin, an 18-year-old St. Pius student, opened fire on his classmates with a shotgun killing one and wounding five before turning the gun on himself and committing suicide. Poulin had raped and stabbed his 17-year-old friend Kim Rabot to death prior to the incident. A book entitled Rape of a Normal Mind was written about the incident.
- ^ The École Polytechnique Massacre, also known as the Montreal Massacre, occurred on December 6, 1989, at the École Polytechnique in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Twenty-five year-old Marc Lépine, armed with a legally obtained semi-automatic rifle and a hunting knife, shot twenty-eight people, killing fourteen (all of them women) and injuring the other fourteen before killing himself.
- ^ The Concordia University massacre was a school shooting on August 24, 1992, that resulted in the deaths of four people at Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The shooter was Dr. Valery Fabrikant, a former Associate Professor of mechanical engineering at Concordia and a colleague of the slain men.
- ^ The W. R. Myers High School shooting occurred on April 28, 1999, at W. R. Myers High School in Taber, Alberta, Canada, when a 14-year-old walked into his school and randomly shot at three students, killing Jason Lang and injuring another. One dead, one wounded in Alberta school shooting, cbc.ca, November 10, 1999. This shooting took place only eight days after the Columbine High School Massacre, and is widely believed to have been a copycat crime.
- ^ The Dawson College shooting occurred on September 13, 2006, at Dawson College, a CEGEP in Westmount near downtown Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The perpetrator, Kimveer Gill, began shooting outside the de Maisonneuve Boulevard entrance to the school, and moved towards the atrium by the cafeteria on the main floor.
"The Montreal Killer Was a Death-Obsessed Goth". Toronto Daily News. 2006-09-14. Retrieved 2006-09-15. "Two gunmen open fire at Dawson College". The Gazette. 2006-09-13. Retrieved 2006-09-13.
One victim died at the scene, while another 19 were injured, eight of whom were listed in critical condition with six requiring surgery. "Press Release". Service de police de la ville de Montréal. September 13, 2006. "UPDATE 7-Gunman kills one, wounds 19 at Montreal college". Reuters. September 13, 2006. Retrieved 2006-09-14.
"Woman, gunman dead in Montreal school rampage". CBC News. 2006-09-13. Retrieved 2006-09-13.
The shooter later committed suicide by shooting himself in the head, after being shot in the arm by police. ""Montreal gunman killed himself: autopsy"". CBC. Retrieved 2006-09-15.
{{cite news}}: Text "date 2006-09-14 18:11 EDT" ignored (help) - ^ Two 17-year-old Canadian citizens, whom the media can not identify under the provisions of Canada's Youth Criminal Justice Act, were arrested on May 27, 2007, and charged with the first-degree murder of a 15-year old student at the C. W. Jefferys Collegiate Institute. Prior to one of the arrests, police had taken the unusual step of obtaining a judicial order to publish one suspect's name and photograph as he was considered armed and dangerous. Media reported his identity and photo, then had to take the stories off their websites after he was arrested hours later.
- ^ A 16 year old boy was shot in the chest in the school's parking lot following an altercation involving several people. No name has yet been released. On September 17, 2008, Toronto Police announced it had made 2 arrests of these shooting suspects; 18-year-old Mark Deicsics, has been charged with robbery while armed with a firearm and fail to comply with recognizance and the victim of the shooting and 16-year-old teen, has been charged with robbery while armed with a firearm. His name cannot be released under the limitation's in Canada's Youth Criminal Justice Act.
- ^ Two students were fatally shot by a 14-year old student at the Raumanmeri secondary school. The shooter had claimed to be a victim of bullying.
- ^ University student shoots and kills three and wounds two others before taking his own life.
- ^ The Dunblane massacre was a multiple murder-suicide which occurred at Dunblane Primary School in the Scottish town of Dunblane on 13 March 1996. Sixteen children and one adult were killed, in addition to the attacker, who committed suicide. It remains the deadliest attack on children in United Kingdom history.
- ^ The Erfurt massacre was a school shooting that occurred on April 26, 2002, at the Johann Gutenberg Gymnasium in Erfurt, Germany. Sixteen people were killed before the perpetrator committed suicide. The victims comprised 13 school staff (12 teachers and one administrator), two students and one police officer. In addition, seven people were injured.
- ^ 16 year-old student shoots two of his teachers before taking his own life.
- ^ 30 + Riyadus Salihiin militants took over a school in Beslan, Russia. The crisis ended after 3 days, and ended with over 385 people being killed, 186 of which were children.
- ^ After being ordered to leave the classroom a 14 year old student returns with a gun threatening the life of the 35 year old class teacher. During a struggle the weapon is fired, the weapon is removed from the student. Investigators' findings state that the student did not intend to kill the teacher, but himself. No one was injured.
- ^ Bastian Bosse, an 18-year old male, and former student, had fired shots with a front loader and a sawed-off shotgun on campus, threw a molotow cocktail outside the school, and lid a pipe bomb upon arrival of the police. The incident ended with 37 people injured, including 19 students (three girls and a boys suffered gun shot wounds), one teachers, 16 police officers (most suffering from smoke inhalation), and the custodian who was shot in the abdomen inside the school. The shooter took his own life. A total of 13 pipe/smoke bombs and four shot guns where found (five smoke bombs in a backpack near the body of the student, four in the car, three where strapped to the body, one was set off by police while on school grounds).
- ^ The incident resulted in the deaths of nine people: five male students (ages 16-18) and one female adult student (age 25) the school principal, Helena Kalmi (age 61); the school nurse (age 43); and the gunman, Auvinen, himself, who was also one of the school's students. One other person suffered gunshot wounds, and eleven people were injured by shattering glass while escaping from the school building. The day before the incident, Auvinen posted a video on YouTube predicting the massacre at the school.
- ^ -
- ^ A man and a woman were killed in a shooting incident in the car park of a local school.
- ^ Former 17 year old student kills 16, injuring nine others.
- ^ 22 Religious high school students from safed were shot in netiv meir elementary school by DFLP terrorists.
- ^ The Sanaa massacre was a school massacre that occurred in Sanaa, Yemen, on March 30, 1997. Mohammad Ahman al-Naziri, 48, attacked hundreds of pupils at two schools, killing six children and two adults with an assault rifle. Naziri, whose five children attended the Tala'i school, alleged that one of his daughters had been raped by the school administrator. No evidence was found of this. Naziri was sentenced to death the next day and executed on April 5, 1997.
- ^ A student was shot dead by a fraternity member after being mistaken for a member of the rival fraternity.
- ^ The Monash University shooting refers to a shooting in which a student shot his classmates and teacher, killing two and injuring five. It took place at Monash University in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, on October 21, 2002.
- ^ 17-year old Anatcha Boonkwan killed two, injured four of his fellow students after losing a fist-fight with one of his classmates.
- ^ Three students killed and six wounded by a 15-year-old student in a town 620 miles south of Buenos Aires.
- ^ Four people were shot dead in clashes between pro- and anti-government activists on Thursday and about 200 were hurt in the violence that flared after a scuffle between students at a Beirut university. The opposition accused the government camp of starting the riots and the four dead included two Hezbollah students, who were fired at from rooftops.
- ^ The Euro International school shooting occurred on December 12, 2007 at Euro International, a private secondary school in Gurgaon, Haryana, India. The gunmen were 14-year old Akash Yadav and 13-year old Vikas Yadav, who were both students at the school, shot and killed a 14-year old student.
- ^ Alaa Abu Dhein, an Israeli Arabic yeshiva bus driver, entered the Mercaz HaRav yeshiva with guns blazing, killing eight and wounding seven, before being shot dead himself by a part-time student. This incident, as do many massacres in the Levant, soon took on racial and religious overtones, pitting Palestinians and Israeli Arabs against Jews.
- ^ A discussion of the reasoning behind gun free zone, 2007-2008.
- ^ "Guns on college campuses allowed in U.S. state Utah" The Associated Press, in The International Herald Tribune, April 27, 2007
- ^ "Utah Supreme Court Shoots down University of Utah Gun Ban" September 9, 2006, John Lott's Website
- ^ James C. McKinley Jr.: "In Texas School, Teachers Carry Books and Guns" New York Times, August 28, 2008
- ^ Armed Teachers recipe for Disaster?, by Joseph Richard Gutheinz, Jr., J.D. Vernon Daily Record, Vernon, Texas, August 24, 2008.
- ^ { http://www.denverpost.com/headlines/ci_8686897 )Cockpit shot fired first since 2001 change, by Joey Bunch. Denver Post, March 25, 2008.
- ^ { http://www.usatoday.com/travel/flights/2008-03-31-armed-pilots_N.htm )More than 10% of pilots allowed to fly armed, by Thomas Frank. USA Today, April 1, 2008
- ^ Dave Kopel: "Follow the Leader: Israel and Thailand set an example by arming teachers." National Review Online, September 02, 2004
- ^ "Wis. lawmaker wants teachers to carry guns: He cites Israel, Thailand; school official says problems are not that bad." Associated Press, at msnbc.msn.com, Oct. 5, 2006
See also
- Bullying
- School violence
- Social rejection
- Youth subculture
- Nagerkovil school bombing, Sri Lanka
- Chencholai bombing, Sri Lanka
- List of school-related attacks
External links
- SchoolShooting.org - Map of school shootings in the US and related info.
- The Depressive and the Psychopath: The FBI's analysis of the Columbine killers' motives
- Schoolboy killing stuns Canada (The Guardian)
- Crime Library article about school shootings
- BBC timeline of US school shootings
- Indianapolis Star: School violence around the world (November 2004)
- The Scene of the Crime Was the Cause of the Crime - Excerpt from Going Postal: Rage, Murder, and Rebellion -- From Reagan's Workplaces to Clinton's Columbine and Beyond by Mark Ames.
- Dreading Columbine - Sociological exploration of suburban school shootings.
- Deadly Lessons: Understanding Lethal School Violence
- Teaching Kids to Kill
- Chronology of School Shootings
- Held Hostage at Case Western
- Student Threat Assessment and Management System Guide
- Causes of school shootings. Reviewing the social interaction of pupils.
Reports
- Mass Shootings at Virginia Tech Report of the Review Panel
- U.S. study of school shootings, "The Final Report and Findings of the Safe School Initiative"
- Advice for safe schools, Threat assessment in schools: A Guide to managing threatening situations and to creating safe school climates
- School Violence