Teachers Killed in Nevada and Massachusetts
Two recent school killings – one in Sparks, Nevada, the other in Danvers, Massachusetts – have, once again, renewed the fears of an entire nation. Coming almost a year after the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings in Newtown, Connecticut, these two attacks, though much smaller in scale, are the most recent reminder that no one is ever safe.
Sparks Middle School in Sparks, Nevada was the location of a shooting on the morning of Monday, October 21st. According to multiple reports, the gunman, a seventh grader, shot and wounded two 12-year-old students and killed one teacher.
Teacher Mike Landsberry – a military veteran – died after confronting the shooter in an effort to save children who were on a nearby playground. The gunman shot one of the two injured students in the abdomen, the other in the shoulder.
The seventh grade shooter, according to reports, brought a pistol to school that morning and, after shooting the two students and the teacher, shot himself to death.
Although authorities haven’t said exactly why they believe the boy committed this violent act, a student at Sparks Middle School, Kyle Nucum, told CNN’s “The Lead,” that bullying might have played a part in the shooter’s actions.”
A second attack in a school – this one isolated to a single teacher – took place only one day later, on Tuesday, October 22nd in Danvers, Massachusetts, a small town about 20 miles north of Boston. In the attack, a 24 year old teacher, Colleen Ritzer, suffered fatal stab wounds in a bathroom at Danvers High School where she taught math.
Philip Chism, a 14-year-old student at the school, is accused of beating the teacher and stabbing her to death with a box cutter, reported CNN. Ritzer’s body was dumped behind the school in the woods, and blood was found in a bathroom on the second floor of the school.
Video surveillance led to the arrest of Chism, and he was arraigned Wednesday afternoon in a court in Salem, Massachusetts. Chism was ordered to be held without bail, and he is scheduled to be back in court for a probable cause hearing on the 22nd of November.
