- NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - A
gunman armed with an AK-47 assault rifle opened fire on a student in a
packed school gymnasium on Monday, killing one boy and injuring three girls
in an apparent retaliation shooting, New Orleans police said.
-
- Police spokesman Marlon Defillo said officers arrested
four male suspects, ranging in age from 15 to 19, in the attack. Charges
are pending, he said. Witnesses told police that the gunman, accompanied
by three accomplices, confronted Jonathan Williams, 15, as he sat on the
bleachers in the gymnasium of John McDonogh High School at about 10 a.m.
The gym was filled with more than 200 students.
The gunman fired repeatedly at Williams, hitting him in the head and body
and killing him instantly. Three female students, two aged 16 and one 15,
were wounded as they tried to get away from the shooting, police said.
The attacker and the others then raced out of the school and fled in a
red Oldsmobile.
Police declined to identify the female victims. Defillo said the 15-year-old
was in serious condition at a New Orleans hospital, while the other two
were in good condition.
New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin said the four suspects were not students at
the school. He said he did not know how the attackers were able to get
past metal detectors and security guards at the school.
"It is my understanding that four outsiders were able to breach security
of the campus, got into the gymnasium and one fired several shots, killing
one student," Nagin told Reuters.
Nagin said he believed that the attack was in retaliation for a fatal shooting
that occurred in the past two weeks. Williams, the teen who was killed,
may have been involved in the earlier shooting, Nagin said.
Police first spotted two of the men in the getaway car, but the two escaped
as officers tried to stop them. The driver and two other suspects were
found in a nearby home, while a police dog sniffed out the fourth suspect's
hiding place behind another house.
A local television station, WDSU-TV, reported that the arrested suspects
were all wearing identical white T-shirts and jeans and had dreadlocks.
The school was locked down while police officers searched the neighborhood
surrounding the building, which is located about two miles north of the
city's French Quarter.
Outside the school, hundreds of parents and family members of the victims
and students at the school gathered, clamoring for information from police
and school officials. Some jeered at school officials and asked why security
had not stopped the attackers from getting inside.
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