Madison School Shooter

Photo Credit: Istandforfreedom.com

We all saw the horrific headlines two days ago about a shooter getting into a Madison, WI school and shooting staff and students. It was an awful way to start the week. It was apparently school shooting #322 of 2024.

Predictably, lame duck President Biden called for more gun control….two weeks after he pardoned his drug addict son post conviction for illegally purchasing and possessing a handgun.

Media reporting was awful with highly paid “reporters” and “commentator/ guessers” all had stabs at explaining the shooting or reasons why it happened. The reporting as usual was chock full of misinformation.

It was so bad, by lunch time that morning even the police put out the fact five people were killed that morning- when only three died. A teacher and student were killed and the shooter killed themself before police arrived. The shooter also injured 6 more people in the building.

How good is your police department which publicly releases the wrong number of dead victims in the first 4 hours post shooting?

Now 48 hours have passed, and as expected the matter is much clearer as exposed by in depth media reporting and very little police input.

Police have named the juvenile shooter by name, a 15 year old local female. Female shooters are extremely rare, with one 11 year study of mass shootings (3 or more victims) listed female suspects as less than 5%. The most recent “famous” female school shooter occurred last year in Memphis with a female who claimed they were a male got into the school and was killed by the police. That case dropped off the radar quickly when it was found the shooter was transgender, and of course a manifesto was found but is still being kept from public exhibition by a local judge who this week said it was too likely to inspire others to similar shootings.

The papers today have an extensive life and family history of the Madison shooter documenting a kid who grew up in an apparently tumultuous life split between parents who divorced and remarried at least twice, and a large and critical part of her 15 years on the planet would have been during the social distancing COVID years.

Also today, a source put up a supposed manifesto from the shooter on the X media outlet (formerly twitter). The poster claims they got the manifesto from the shooter’s boyfriend.

Some of the posted information included the shooter hating all men and stating they should all be exterminated. She also said she wanted to commit suicide but would shoot others first so it wouldn’t be a “stupid boring suicide.” (It would still be a tragedy if she killed herself, but if you are going to murder/suicide can’t you do the suicide part first?)

Current info has it the shooter used a 9mm pistol. Unfortunately today, I have heard commentators say it was a “3-D printed gun.” Doubtful. Same was said about the NYC CEO shooter’s gun and suppressor. First up, you can 3-D print up pistol frames, but much more likely it is a polymer build it frame kit or “ghost gun” than it was a 3-D printed piece. Second you can’t print an all plastic gun or suppressor which doesn’t explode- you need metal barrels and parts to function. High likelihood the shooter’s father had a home built polymer frame completed pistol stolen by his daughter. The radio news said she had been to the range to shoot with her father.

More info will no doubt be found in the next couple of days, and even though the shooter is a female, some profile pieces will continue to be found comparing her to other school shooters. One of which parallels other shooters who  study other previous shooters prior to their own  attacks. News today says the Madison shooter was wearing a t-shirt with a band logo-the same shirt worn by one of the Columbine CO shooters. She obviously emulated them to some degree, and most likely it will come out eventually she studied up on “famous” school shooters.

The school where the murders took place seems to have a regular active shooter program and drills the students and staff quarterly. Their responses probably limited the lethality which could have inflicted in the crowded classrooms. It was a horrific day- but could have been worse.

One stunning hero in the story, was the first person to call 911 to report the active shooter- it was a girl in the second grade! She knew what to do. Well done.

What should you do if caught up in an active shooter situation? It is the same training being taught to teachers and school kids. Run. Hide. Fight.

Run if you can- get away any way you can. Break out windows to get out of buildings if necessary. Then run beyond rifle and pistol distance or to hard cover. How far can a rifle shoot? Yes, get that far away. (Remember of course cover can stop bullets. Mere concealment only keeps you out of sight. Find hard cover and distance.)

Hide. If stuck in a building lock doors. Tie them shut. Barricade. Shut off lights and make the area look empty. Shooters don’t want to take time to force doors or search empty rooms- they are looking to run up the high score in their personal video game.

Fight. Brother fight like you are the third monkey getting to Noah’s Ark and it’s starting to rain. This is tooth, fang and claw time. Assemble items to throw. Direct others to fight and throw things. Again, the shooters don’t want resistance, they pick these areas to be unopposed, and people fighting back can disrupt their plan.