Police released surveillance video late Monday, hours after shots were fired through the doors of a Christian elementary school in Nashville, where former students and Killed three children and three adults. Police shot and killed the gunman at The Covenant School in the city’s Green Hills neighborhood, authorities said.
Police released approximately two minutes of edited video showing the shooter’s car driving to the school from multiple angles, one of which shows children playing on a swing in the background. An interior scene then shows the school’s glass doors being shot out and the shooter ducking through a broken door.
Metropolitan Nashville Police Department
More footage from inside shows the shooter walking down a school corridor with a long-barreled gun and walking into a room labeled “Church Office,” then returning.
The last part of the footage shows the shooter walking down another long corridor with a gun. The shooter is not seen interacting with anyone in the video, who has no voice.
Authorities have identified the victims as 9-year-olds Evelyn Dickhouse, Haley Scruggs and William Kinney, 61-year-old Cynthia Peek, 60-year-old Katherine Koons and 61-year-old Mike Hill. All three adults worked at the school.
Police identified the shooter as 28-year-old Audrey Hale of Nashville, who officials said was armed with at least two assault weapons and a handgun. CBS News is trying to confirm Hale’s gender identity.
Nashville Police Chief John Drake said a preliminary investigation indicated the shots were fired at a target.
“We have a manifesto, we have some writings that we’re going to deal with on this date, actual events,” he told reporters. “We have a map of how that’s going to happen.”
Police also released an image of the car the shooter drove to the school.
Active shooter Audrey Elizabeth Hale, 28, drove the Honda Fit to the Covenant Church/School campus this morning and parked it. MNPD detectives searched it and found additional material written by Hale. pic.twitter.com/ftGX74ecKr
— Metro Nashville PD (@MNPDNashville) March 28, 2023
Rachel Dibble, who was at a nearby church where the children were taken to be reunited with their parents, described the scene as everyone was “absolutely shocked”.
“People were shaking involuntarily,” he said. “The kids … started their morning in their cute little uniforms, they probably had some Fruit Loops and now their whole lives have changed today.”
Avery Myrick said her mother, a pre-kindergarten teacher at Covenant, hid when shots were fired at the school.
“He said he was hiding in the closet, and there were shots going on and they tried to potentially break into his room, and just that he loved us,” Myrick told WSMV.
On Monday night, as the country digested another mass shooting that claimed the lives of children, people left flowers and stuffed toys at a growing makeshift memorial outside the school. Some kneel in prayer.
Stacy Wilford, a nurse, said the shooting so close to home was “so terrifying.” She lives nearby and has an eight-year-old who attends a school just two miles from the deal.
“Whenever you hear about a school shooting in another state, yes, you feel it, but when it’s at your back door, it sets it apart,” Wilford told AFP.
Chad Baker, 44, said he felt “terrified and very sad” and added that while he supports gun rights, there should be more regulation.
“Not enough to protect children,” he told AFP.
“I carry a gun with me most days, but I don’t need an assault rifle,” he added. “And I don’t think it should be as simple as buying flowers as a gun.”
AFP contributed to this report.