The prime suspect in the shooting on a campus of the University of Virginia in Charlottesville has been arrested, university law enforcement officials announced Monday (November 14) on Twitter. The alleged culprit is a college student.
Sunday’s attack on a bus of students returning from an off-campus trip killed three members of the soccer team and injured two. It happened around 10:30 p.m., according to university president Jim Ryan’s statement on Twitter. “This is a traumatic incident for everyone in our community and we have canceled classes for today.Access to the scene of the shooting was blocked by police vehicles on Monday morning.
The main campus of the University of Virginia in Charlottesville was cordoned off overnight Sunday through Monday as helicopters and police searched for the suspect, who they said was “armed and dangerous.” After his arrest, the circumstances of which were not specified, the individual was charged with murder.
School shootings are common in the United States and each time they reignite the debate about better regulation of firearms. In April 2007, a similar tragedy had already struck Virginia: a deranged student shot and killed 32 people on the campus of Virginia Tech University in Blacksburg before committing suicide. Last May, a shooting at a school in Uvalde, Texas left 19 children dead.
