Shooter dead, 2 fellow students wounded after shooting at Maryland high school

Student shooter was shot dead after he wounded two fellow students with a handgun at a high school on tuesday morning in southern Maryland. A school resource officer pursued and shot the gunman soon after he wounded a female student and another male at Great Mills High School in St. Mary’s County, south of Washington, D.C. The shooter also opened fire on the officer.

St. Mary’s County Sheriff Tim Cameron confirmed the shooter was a student at the school and appeared to have a relationship with a 16-year-old female victim who is in critical condition with life-threatening injuries.

A 14-year-old male student was also injured and is in stable condition.

“There was a mass response, this is what we train for, this is what we prepare for and this is what we pray that we never have to do,” Cameron said. “And on this day we realized our worst nightmare, that our greatest asset, our children were attacked in one of our places of bastions of safety and security, our schools.”

The incident comes just over a month after a mass shooting at a Florida high school left 17 people dead. A march against school violence and for gun control is planned for later in the week.

Great Mills High School Principal Jake Heibel told parents last month that the school had investigated threats of a possible shooting and found they were “not substantiated.” He said school officials interviewed two students in February who were overheard mentioning a school shooting, and found that they posed no threat.

But Heibel said the school still has increased security after social media posts about a possible school shooting “circulated quite extensively.”

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan released a statement thanking the sheriff’s office and first responders while offering condolences for the the victims.

“We need more than prayers,” Hogan said in an afternoon briefing. “We’ve got to take action.”

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