Nine students and one teacher were killed at a Texas high school on Friday when a gunman entered the school armed with two guns and improvised explosives.
Dimitrios Pagourtzis, a 17-year-old student at Santa Fe High School, has been charged with capital murder following the incident, the Galveston County Sheriff’s Office said. He is being held without bond and made his first court appearance on Friday evening.
At least two other people of interest have been detained in the investigation into the attack in Santa Fe, not far outside Houston.
The attacker allegedly used a .38 revolver and a shotgun acquired from his father in the shooting, which sent 10 others to area hospitals with mostly gunshot wounds, according to police.
A search of Pagourtzis’s home and a vehicle nearby conducted by police reportedly turned up further devices, including a molotov cocktail.{mosads}
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R), speaking at a press conference, said that the suspect turned himself over to police after originally planning to commit suicide during the attack.
The attack, the governor said, was “one of the most heinous attacks that we’ve ever seen in the history of Texas schools.”
In a separate statement, the governor offered “prayers of comfort” to the victims’ families and ordered state flags to be flown at half-staff.
Texas Sen. Ted Cruz (R) also released a statement following the shooting, thanking first responders for their efforts to save lives.
“Heidi and I are keeping all the students and faculty at Santa Fe High School in our prayers this morning, along with all first responders on the scene. Please be safe and heed warnings from local officials,” he said.
President Trump commented on the shooting during an event at the White House on Friday shortly after it occurred, calling it “absolutely horrific.”
“This has been going on too long in our country, too many years, too many decades now,” Trump said.
“My administration is determined to do everything in our power to protect our students, secure our schools and to keep weapons out of the hands of those who pose a threat to themselves and to others,” he added.
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos praised the president’s efforts on school safety after the attack, urging Americans to support bipartisan propositions for making schools safer.
The Federal Commission on School Safety is “working to identify proven ways to prevent violence and keep our students safe at school,” DeVos said Friday.
The shooting prompted frustrated reactions from student activists from Parkland, Fla., which suffered a deadly school shooting in February.
David Hogg, one of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School students behind the “March For Our Lives” movement against gun violence, tweeted his low expectations for how lawmakers would respond to the shooting and fellow Stoneman Douglas survivor Cameron Kasky said no real action would follow Trump’s call for solutions.
One Santa Fe High School student, identified by local media only as “Paige,” told reporters that she and many others feared that such a shooting could take place at their school after the Parkland shooting.
“It’s been happening everywhere,” Paige told a local news station. “I’ve always kind of felt eventually it would happen here, too.”
— Updated: 7:29 p.m.