Police in Madison, Wisconsin, said Tuesday that they were working to establish a motive for the shooting at a small, private Christian school that killed a teacher and a student and wounded six other people.
“Identifying a motive is our top priority,” Police Chief Shon Barnes said of the shooting Monday that he called a “hurting and haunting situation.”
Police were trying to verify a document posted online by the 15-year-old shooter, who apparently died of a self-inflicted wound.
Authorities said the shooter, Natalie Rupnow, was a student at the Abundant Life Christian School, which has an enrollment of just over 400 students from kindergarten to high school. She opened fire in a study hall late Monday morning.
“We don’t know nearly enough yet,” Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway told reporters Tuesday about the shooting.
Rhodes-Conway also said it was too early to determine whether the shooter’s parents, who were cooperating with the police investigation, would face criminal charges.
“We have to allow law enforcement the time and space for a careful and methodical examination,” she said.
Barnes said Tuesday that several schools across the Madison metropolitan area “were targeted by false threats, often known as swatting.” He said police and the school district were working together to determine who initiated the scheme.
The mayor lashed out at reporters’ requests Tuesday for more information about the victims.
“I’m going to say this and then we’re done,” she said. “It is absolutely none of y’all’s business who was harmed in this incident. Please have some human decency and respect for the people who have lost loved ones or were injured themselves or whose children were injured. Just have some human decency, folks.”
Vice President Kamala Harris, speaking in Maryland, said, “Our nation mourns for those who were killed, and we pray for the recovery of those who were injured.”
The vice president said stronger gun controls were needed.
“Solutions are in hand,” she said, “but we need elected leaders to have the courage to step up and do the right thing.”
President Joe Biden said in a statement Monday that the shooting was “shocking and unconscionable.”
“Every child deserves to feel safe in their classroom,” he said. “Students across our country should be learning how to read and write, not having to learn how to duck and cover.”
Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers ordered flags to be flown at half-staff to honor the shooting victims.
Some information for this report came from The Associated Press.
