A second student has died after being shot by a teen gunman at Chardon High School near Cleveland, Ohio. Three additional students were injured, and the 17-year-old shooter is in custody. TODAY's Savannah Guthrie reports.
By NBC News, msnbc.com and wire
A second teen was confirmed brain dead after Monday's shooting at a high school in Chardon, Ohio, the medical examiner's office said Tuesday.
Russell King Jr., 17, was flown to Cleveland's MetroHealth Medical Center where he was treated but pronounced brain dead on Monday, NBC News reported.
The medical examiner's office received the word about Russell King Jr. early Tuesday morning, office administrator Hugh Shannon said in a statement. It was unclear whether King remained on life support; the statement referred to him as both deceased and brain dead, The Associated Press reported.
"The cause and manner of death of this case are under on-going investigation and will be released upon completion," Shannon said in a statement. A spokeswoman at MetroHealth System said Tuesday morning that no information on his condition was available.
Sixteen-year-old Daniel Parmertor also died when a teen opened fire inside a high school cafeteria at the start of the classes on Monday.
In rare situations, students who are isolated from their peers, and lose interest in activities they used to like doing, can sometimes become violent. NBC's Chris Jansing reports.
Three others were wounded, police said, and one was in critical condition, according to NBC affiliate WKYC-TV. All of the injured are students.
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Police have not formally identified the suspected gunman, but the family of T.J. Lane, the suspected shooter, released a statement Monday night.
"The family wanted me to convey to the citizens of Geauga County and Northeastern Ohio that the family is devastated by this most recent event," the Lane family's lawyer Bob Farinacci told WKYC.
"This is something that could never have been predicted. T.J.'s family has asked for some privacy while they try to understand how such a tragedy could have occurred and while they mourn this terrible loss for their community."
The entire school district was closed on Monday and will be closed again on Tuesday as the community grapples with the violence and waits for word on the wounded students.
"We want them to stay home and spend some time reflecting on family," an emotional Joseph Bergant, superintendent of Chardon schools, told a news conference.
He urged parents to hug and kiss their children, and praised the actions of teachers, who had been through disaster training and acted quickly to protect the students.
The one victim listed in critical condition was taken by medical helicopter to MetroHealth Medical Center in Cleveland, WKYC reported. The other two victims were taken by ambulance to Cleveland Clinic's Hillcrest Hospital in Mayfield Heights.
The victims at Hilcrest, a 17-year-old boy and an 18-year-old girl, are both listed as being in serious condition, said WKYC.
The students who were shot were found at three different locations throughout the school, according to the news station.
The motive for the shooting, which took place while students were studying and eating breakfast, remains a mystery. Fellow students told local media the suspect was a quiet loner who may have been bullied.
Some witnesses told local media he appeared to deliberately target a table where a student who had started dating his former girlfriend was seated with friends, but Reuters could not immediately confirm that.
Suspect's sister 'was surprised as anyone' when shooting erupted
The Lane family's lawyer described the suspected shooter as a fairly quiet "good kid" who had never been in trouble.
"His grades are pretty impressive... He's a sophomore. He's been doubling up on his classes with the intent of graduating this May. He pretty much sticks to himself but does havesome friends and has never been in trouble over anything that we know about," Farinacci said.
A Chardon High School student, Danielle Samples, 16, who was in the cafeteria at the time, told Reuters she heard a series of "pops" and someone yelled to run down the hallway into a classroom. While Samples was in the hall, she heard another round of pops.
She said the suspected shooter was a student at Lake Academy in Willoughby, which serves at-risk students, and that he had been at Chardon's cafeteria waiting for a bus. She said the student lived with his grandparents and sister.
Chardon freshman Sofia Larkins, 14, was sitting with Lane's sister when the shooting began. "She didn't know anything," said Larkins. "She was surprised as anyone."
The two girls fled to a teachers' lounge when the shooting erupted, and began hearing talk that T.J. was the shooter, Larkins said. His sister began crying. Larkins said school officials came to the lounge and took the sister away.
The mother of a student in Chardon, who asked not to be identified, said her son knew the accused gunman.
"My son's reaction was 'this doesn't surprise me.' T.J. (Lane) was a nice sweet kid who was misunderstood and he probably cracked from being different," she said.
Chardon, the seat of Geauga county, is a semi-rural, fairly well-educated and affluent town about 35 miles from Cleveland with a population of about 5,000, according to the U.S. Census and Chardon's web site. The town, which describes itself as the center of the state's maple syrup industry, contains neatly restored brick buildings downtown.
The high school has about 1,100 students, according to WKYC-TV.
The deadliest school shooting in the United States was a 2007 massacre at Virginia Tech University that left 33 people dead. The worst high school shooting was a 1999 attack at Columbine High School in Colorado that killed 12 students and a teacher.
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