The district made the announcement Thursday evening after its board of trustees met to discuss the morning shooting. It is also holding a training for staff on responding to trauma and will hold a parent and community forum Sunday night. A threatening note was found around the same time at a motel about 30 miles away.
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A deputy happened to be driving by and entered the band hall, Dodson said.
Big Bend Regional Medical Center spokeswoman Ruth Hucke said the hospital treated two people from the incident. Dodson says the 14-year-old later died of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound. The name of the victim has not been released. The wounded officer is in stable condition.
Reports indicate that the shooter had only lived in Alpine for six months.
The shooting was reported just before 9 a.m. Alpine is about 220 miles southeast of El Paso. “I wish to extend prayers and sympathy to any victims’ families and their loved ones who have been affected by this senseless act of violence”.
Fellow student Keyshla Vargas was evacuated from her engineering class to a nearby church after she hid in a closet with other students and teachers.
Houston went on to say that a student was shot by another female student.
A motive in the shooting remains unclear.
Alpine is a small high school with about 270 students enrolled.
They got a call about an active shooter situation at Alpine High School. Officers and bomb-sniffing dogs had to search for explosives in each building of the university, Dodson said. No other details were released.
Sheriff Dodson said officers were forced to treat those as credible, though he described them as pranks.
The deceased suspect in a rural high school shooting in Texas this morning did not fit the common profile we’ve come to expect of a young male loner. The student was able to run out of the school, and bystanders took her to the hospital for treatment.
An officer on the scene was also injured by friendly fire from an “accidental discharge” after arriving at the scene of the crime.
The Alpine Police Department said all schools in the city of about 5,900 people were on lockdown, BigBendNow.com reported in a Facebook post about 9 a.m.
While police continue to gather evidence and investigate the scene, many may be curious about who the Alpine High School shooter was.
Dodson knows the shooter’s grandparents, according to KCBD 11.
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Elizabeth Jean Boynes ignored a crossing guard’s commands to turn right at SW Martin Highway in Palm City near Hidden Oaks Middle School Thursday, according to the sheriff’s office.
