17 people were killed at a High School in Florida last Wednesday.
The attack began at 14:30pm local time at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, where the suspect allegedly set off a fire alarm and then he started shooting fleeing students and staff.
The suspect murderer, Nikolas Cruz, 19 years old had already been reported to the FBI for a disturbing comment he made on YouTube, where he reportedly wrote: “I’m going to be a professional school shooter,”
As local media report, Mr Cruz legally bought the AR-15 rifle which he used to commit the slaughter. He was famous to his neighbours for shooting at chickens and also planned on shooting at other small animals.
Mr Cruz was expelled from the high school for unspecified disciplinary reasons, he was also not allowed to carry a backpack to class.
17 people were killed in total. As sheriff Israel said, 12 were killed inside the school, two died outside, one died in the street and another two died later at the hospital.
Among the victims of the crazy event were both students and members of the staff.
Some of the victims have been named to be: Football Coach Aaron Feis who was killed while protecting his students from the bullets; Alyssa Alhadeff, Soccer Player; Scott Beigel, Teacher; Nicholas Dworet, Star Swimmer; Jaime Guttenberg, Student; Chris Hixon, Athletic Director.
Teacher Melissa Falkowski told the CNN: “We could not have been more prepared for this situation, which is what makes it so frustrating,” She went on saying: “We did everything that we were supposed to do. Broward County Schools has prepared us for this situation and still to have so many casualties, at least for me, it’s very emotional. Because I feel today like our government, our country has failed us and failed our kids and didn’t keep us safe.”
The shooting raised awareness over gun control, not amongst all politicians though. Rick Scott, Governor of Florida, described the shooting as “pure evil”, but he still refused to talk about gun control.
On the other end, Democratic Senator Chris Murphy said in a Tweet: “Don’t tell me tomorrow isn’t the appropriate time to debate gun violence. If you’re a political leader doing nothing about this slaughter, you’re an accomplice.”
President Trump said on a tweet: “My prayers and condolences to the families of the victims of the terrible Florida shooting. No child, teacher or anyone else should ever feel unsafe in an American school,” he did also not mention gun control.
As reported by the CNN, the small city more less one hour north of Miami, with a population of 31,000 in 2016, was named Florida’s safest city last year with just seven reported violent crimes.
Wednesday’s school shooting was classified amongst the 10 deadliest mass shooting in the history of Modern USA and the deadliest school shooting since 2012.
It is unfortunate that this has occurred. My mind is still struggling to cope with the events of the Las Vegas shooting and yet, another shooting has happened. It is a problem and it must be addressed.