A heavily armed person opened fire on Monday at an elementary school in Nashville, in the southern United States, killing three children and three adults, before being shot dead by police.
Armed with “at least two assault rifles and a pistol”, she broke into the premises of a private Christian school in the morning, said local police spokesman Don Aaron. during a press conference.
The assailant entered through a secondary door and fired numerous shots as he progressed through the establishment, “The Covenant School” which has around 200 students and around 40 employees.
Read again: “The number of Americans in favor of strict gun control continues to drop”
Suspect killed
“Three children were fatally affected, as well as three adults”, but there are no other victims, added Don Aaron. Officers were quickly dispatched to the scene. After hearing shots upstairs, they “immediately” went there and “killed” the assailant, who was pronounced dead at 10:27 a.m. (4:27 p.m. Swiss time), he continued. His services then clarified on Twitter that the assailant had been identified.
According to local police chief John Drake, the bloodbath was committed by Audrey Hale, a 28-year-old transgender resident of Nashville. He would be a former student of the school.
In numbers: In the United States, deaths from mass shootings have been increasing for a decade
The police carried out a search of his home and discovered a plan showing “access” to the school and “a manifesto with some writings”, detailed John Drake.
“Enough is enough”
The drama rekindled calls from the White House to ban assault rifles, as a proposed law to that effect is blocked by opposition lawmakers. “How many more children will have to be killed before the Republicans in Congress […] adopt a ban on assault rifles?”, reacted the spokeswoman for the presidency Karine Jean-Pierre. “Enough is enough,” she said again.
This violence “rips the very soul of our nation,” said Joe Biden. The elected officials of the State of Tennessee also expressed their emotion on social networks. “I am devastated and heartbroken at the tragic news from the Covenant School,” tweeted Republican Senator Bill Hagerty, without addressing the sensitive subject of gun control.
The United States, where approximately 400 million firearms are in circulation, are frequently bereaved by deadly shootings, including in schools.
A mobilized youth
The most striking tragedy was committed in 2012 in an elementary school in Connecticut, during which 20 children aged 6 and 7 were killed. Such a traumatic event repeated itself in May 2022 when an 18-year-old man shot and killed 19 students and two teachers at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas.
Between these two tragedies, a massacre committed in a high school in Florida, on February 14, 2018 in Parkland, triggered a vast national movement, spearheaded by young people, to demand stricter supervision of individual weapons in the United States.
To read: Why mass shootings will continue to plague the United States
Despite the mobilization of more than a million demonstrators, the United States Congress has not adopted ambitious legislation, many elected officials being under the influence of the powerful National Rifle Association (NRA), the first American lobby weapons.
In a country where carrying a gun is considered by millions of Americans to be a constitutional right, the only recent legislative advances remain marginal, such as the generalization of criminal and psychiatric background checks before any gun purchase.
On this point: Too young to buy booze, but not to acquire assault rifles
