College students stood in prayer circles and piled balloons, candles and teddy bears alongside a sidewalk Friday close to Florida State College’s pupil union, the place two individuals have been shot and killed and 6 others have been wounded throughout a rampage lasting much less 5 minutes.
The gunman, recognized because the son of a sheriff’s deputy, arrived on campus an hour earlier than the capturing Thursday and stayed close to a parking storage earlier than he walked out and in of buildings and inexperienced areas and firing a handgun simply earlier than lunchtime, police mentioned.
In roughly 4 minutes, officers confronted 20-year-old son Phoenix Ikner, a Florida State pupil, and shot and wounded him, Tallahassee police mentioned.
Police have mentioned two males who weren’t college students died within the capturing. 5 different victims additionally have been shot, and one other individual was damage operating away.
Medical workers at Tallahassee Memorial Healthcare mentioned they handled six individuals for gunshots and all have been anticipated to outlive.
They might not give any details about these individuals’s identies or say whether or not the suspect was amongst them. Police mentioned earlier that he was taken to a neighborhood hospital.
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A few of the wounded have been college students, in keeping with college President Richard McCullough. al.
Courses have been canceled Friday, however some college students got here to campus to retrieve backpacks and laptops they left behind after they barricaded classroom doorways and ultimately fled to security.
“I don’t suppose any phrases can do it justice,” mentioned Audrey Rothman, one in every of three members of the Florida State girls’s volleyball crew who introduced flowers and held arms in a short prayer circle.
Police imagine Ikner used a former service weapon that belongs to his mom, an 18-year veteran of the Leon County Sheriff’s Workplace, Sheriff Walt McNeil mentioned. In recent times she has labored as a center faculty useful resource officer and was the division’s worker of the month a 12 months in the past in March.
After the capturing she requested and was granted private go away and likewise reassigned from her put up on the faculty, mentioned Shonda Knight, government director of neighborhood and media relations for the company.
The suspect was a longstanding member of the Leon County Sheriff’s youth advisory council, police mentioned. The group was created to construct communication between younger individuals and native regulation enforcement whereas additionally instructing teenagers management and team-building expertise.
He was a junior at FSU finding out political science after incomes an associates diploma final fall from Tallahassee State Faculty, college spokeswoman Amy Farnum-Patronis confirmed.
Authorities haven’t but revealed a motive.
The capturing erupted just some hours earlier than a discussion board on countering hate on campus was to happen in a classroom constructing close by.
The occasion, titled “United Towards Hate: Constructing a Safer Campus and Neighborhood Collectively,” was a part of a challenge honoring Maura Binkley, a Florida State pupil who was killed in a mass capturing at a yoga studio in 2018.
Just a few miles from campus, the Bethel Missionary Baptist Church started its Good Friday service with prayers for the capturing victims and households.
The Rev. R.B. Holmes mentioned he visited the victims on the hospital with Tallahassee Mayor John Dailey, who additionally attended the service.
“We’re not going to emphasise the tragedy,” Holmes mentioned. “We’re going to emphasise hope and therapeutic. Our religion says we will overcome. I mentioned to the scholars, we might be there for them.”
© 2025 The Canadian Press
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