Texas shooting suspect 'hid shotgun under coat' before opening fire on students
The Texas shooting suspect was wearing a long coat and hiding a shotgun underneath when he walked into Santa Fe High School and opened fire, Lt. Gov. of Texas Dan Patrick said at a news conference on Friday.
Suspect Dimitrios Pagourtzis, 17, is being held on capital murder without bond at Galveston County Sheriff’s Office, the Galveston County Sheriff’s Office says.
The male student who allegedly entered the high school on Friday and shot dead ten people, including fellow pupils, had planned to end the attack with his suicide but instead surrendered to police, Texas Governor Greg Abbott said.
Students said a gunman opened fire in a classroom at Santa Fe High School shortly before 8am (local time), and that they fled in panic after seeing classmates wounded and a fire alarm triggered a full evacuation.
It was the latest in a long series of deadly shootings at U.S. schools. Seventeen teens and educators were shot dead at a Parkland, Florida, high school in February, a massacre that stirred the nation’s long-running debate over gun ownership.
Ten people were also wounded in Friday’s attack, Abbott told a news conference, and the gunman had used a shotgun and a .38 revolver taken from his father.
“Not only did he want to commit the shooting, but he wanted to commit suicide after the shooting,” Abbott said, citing a police review of the suspect’s journals. “He didn’t have the courage to commit suicide.”
Two other people are in custody, Abbott said. He did not identify the suspected gunman or the two others.
One of the people detained is Dimitrios Pagourtzis, according to a law enforcement source who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to publicly discuss the investigation told Reuters.
Explosive devices had also been found at the school, located about 48km southeast of Houston, and off campus, Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez tweeted. “Law enforcement is in the process of rendering them safe.”
Police were searching two homes and a vehicle linked to the suspect, where they have found multiple homemade explosive devices, Abbott said.
With Reuters.
