After entering a Christian elementary school in Nashville armed with weapons resembling AR-15s and detailed maps, the suspect opened fire, resulting in the deaths of three children and three adults. The background and motivations of the suspect are currently being investigated by the Nashville police department.
Audrey Hale, age 28, was identified as the shooter and was killed by police during the attack on Monday. The shooter left behind “drawn out” maps of the Covenant School detailing “how this was all going to take place,” according to the Metro Nashville Police Chief John Drake.
Officials have said that they have questioned Hale’s father and have discovered where the gunman resided in the Nashville region. This comes as the police continue their investigation into the events that led up to the violence. Tuesday was going to be spent by investigators examining the site and getting additional information about what transpired during the approximately 14 minutes of horror at the primary school.
The incident was the bloodiest school shooting in a year, according to the police, who described it as a planned act that entailed previous preparation.
Concerned parents rushed to the school as the shooting was taking place. This added the grieving campus community to a long list of other US schools that have been marked by gun violence.
“I was literally moved to tears to see this and the kids as they were being ushered out of the building,” the police chief said during a news conference.
The ages of the three victims, who were all students, were 9 years old. It was determined that Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs, and William Kinney were the individuals in question. According to the police, the adult victims of the shooting were a 61-year-old woman named Cynthia Peak, a 60-year-old woman named Katherine Koonce, and a 61-year-old man named Mike Hill.
The attack marked the 19th shooting at an educational institution so far in 2023 in which at least 1 person has been wounded, according to a CNN tally.
