Sixth-grade girl leaves 3 wounded in Idaho school shooting

I’m sure by now you’ve heard about the school shooting that happened this past Thursday in Rigby, Idaho. A sixth-grade girl is said to have produced a handgun from her backpack and shot two students and a custodian. None of the injuries sustained by the victims were said to be life-threatening. A female teacher at the school was able to calmly disarm the suspect before any more people could be hurt.

Even though it’s been four days since the shooting, the suspect’s identity has not been released and police have not released a possible motive. However, at least one report has stated that the girl’s home had been searched by police. But again, no findings have been released to my knowledge. Also, no word has been released on how the girl was able to obtain the firearm. There have also been no word on what charges are to be filed, but prosecutors say that the shooter could be facing multiple attempted murder charges. Sixth-graders tend to be 11 to 12 years old, so I don’t imagine she’ll be charged as an adult.

And as is almost required whenever there’s a new school shooting, we have the community saying that ‘it can’t happen here.’

As many parents expressed that day, school shootings are not the kind of thing that happens in Rigby, and they never imagined something like this would ever happen in their community.

Except, Rigby is exactly the type of place where school shootings occur. It’s a small town in a gun-friendly state. That’s where most school shootings tend to happen. Very rarely do you hear about school shootings that happen in Places Like New York or Chicago.

I was actually surprised to find out that the shooter was a girl. In the 21 years I’ve been writing about school shootings, I can only think of one case off the top of my head where there was a female shooter. That was in 2008, and the shooting was in response to a romantic rejection where the victim was the person who rejected the shooter. There have been a number of female school shooting plotters, but hardly ever an actual shooter.

It will be interesting to see what charges the Rigby shooter will receive, what her motive was, and if anybody will be held responsible for allowing a gun to land in the hands of a middle-schooler.

UPDATE: It’s being reported that the suspect posted a threatening TikTok days before the shooting but law enforcement has not confirmed this. This could end up being one of those stories that isn’t true but takes on a life of its own.