NBCNews is reporting that two children have been killed and 17 others have been seriously injured according to Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara.
“During the Mass, a gunman approached on the outside, on the side of the building and began firing a rifle through the church windows towards the children sitting in the pews at the Mass,” the chief said.
[The press conference with Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and Police Chief O’Hara starts at 10:15]
64-year-old witness Mike Garrity lives across the street from the school and was walking when the shooting began. He said he saw dozens of terrified children pouring out of the school and at least three of them were covered in blood.
Source: TOM BAKER / Getty
The shooter has yet to be identified but he was found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound and was armed with a rifle, a shotgun, and pistol. None of the weapons have been further classified at this time. Chief O’Hara told reporters that a device that could be classified as a “smoke bomb” was also found on the scene but clarified that the device was not an explosive.
One of Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar’s longtime employees had three children attending Annunciation at the time of the shooting. The employee’s daughter is in seventh grade and thankfully was not physically harmed but is deeply traumatized by watching her friends be gunned down.
“These kids are doing an all-school Mass and had to watch several of her friends get shot — one in the back, one in the neck,” Klobuchar said.”And they all got down under the pews and she — her daughter, of course, was not shot — but her daughter ended up being the one to tell one of the dads of one of the other kids that his daughter had been shot.”
BOSSIP will continually update this story as more details and information is made public.
