13-Year-Old Shoots Four Schoolmates

HOUSTON — He wasn’t a loner. Neither was he a scapegoat, a bad student or even, at least to outside appearances, a child in any distress at all.

Though he doesn’t fit the labels appended to other perpetrators of school violence, yet another public school student opened fire Monday on his classmates--this time in Fort Gibson, Okla. It was the seventh school shooting in two years.

Blank-faced and calm, the skinny 13-year-old emptied a 9-millimeter semiautomatic handgun into a crowd of schoolmates Monday morning, hitting four children. Wounded in the arms, legs or face, the four were all reported to be out of danger Monday night, although one underwent surgery. A fifth student reportedly suffered scrapes and bruises.

School Supt. Steve Wilmoth said the boy began shooting outside the school about 7:45 a.m. The child was still trying to shoot when science teacher and school safety officer Ronnie Holuby approached him and pinned him against a wall, witnesses said. Well-trained in school disaster management, Fort Gibson Middle School teachers promptly ushered unhurt students into the cafeteria after the shots. Injured students were whisked to hospitals in Muskogee and Tulsa.

Within hours, a local church had organized a community “healing gathering” for Monday night, and residents were ransacking their memories and experience for insights. Few were forthcoming.

“He doesn’t even know who it was he shot,” Sheriff’s Deputy Terry Cragg said of the boy, whose name was withheld by authorities and who reportedly put up no fight when he was arrested. “There was not a hate thing. I asked him why. He said, ‘I don’t know.’ ”

“He seemed like a really nice person. He was a really friendly person. I don’t know why” he did it, said Justine Hurst, a 13-year-old eighth grader who knows both the suspected shooter and two of his victims.

The boy has taken part in a Christian youth group, has a wide circle of friends and has appeared in a local newspaper for his academic achievement, residents said. He garnered straight A’s in fourth, fifth and sixth grades, according to David Rennie, owner and editor of a local paper, the Three Rivers Sentinel.

A yearbook photo of the child shows a youngster with disarming appeal--apple-cheeked, grinning softly, his brown hair askew. Neighbors said he is the youngest of three and lives with his parents on about 15 acres in the rural, river-laced region.

“Those are good kids. I can’t imagine what was going through his mind, but I just know it wasn’t to murder someone,” said Karen Hobbs, who lives near the youth’s family. “He’s just a baby. I don’t think he had any idea what was going to happen.”

Religious and closely knit, Fort Gibson’s 3,500 residents often speak proudly of their town’s small-town friendliness. Most recently, the community had fixed its collective attention on Saturday’s high school football game in neighboring Weatherford. Residents had been so consumed with the game that Justine said some classmates assumed the popping sounds of the boy’s gun were merely left-over firecrackers.

Like other school districts after April’s massacre at Columbine High School in Colorado, Fort Gibson’s school district had taken extensive measures to protect itself against school violence and had held a recent in-service training session for school personnel.

But there was little to look for. Law enforcement officials said the suspected shooter had no criminal record and showed no signs of impending trouble.

“From what I know at this point, it seems to be a random thing,” an exhausted-looking Wilmoth told reporters. “I’m not sure a school district can ever make it totally safe. These things are going to happen, no matter what you do.”

By Monday afternoon, the boy had gone to court for a brief arraignment and was taken to an isolation cell in the Muskogee County Jail.

In Washington, President Clinton said, “Our prayers are with each of the children and their families.” Investigators from the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms have been sent to the site, he said.

Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating issued a statement saying the shooting “must serve as a call to arms” to address “the root causes of what is happening to our families and young people.”

Later, the governor issued a revised statement, deleting the expression “call to arms.” Instead, he characterized the incident as “a wake-up call.”

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Times researcher Lianne Hart contributed to this story.