Three students shot at school as anti-violence rally took place nearby, CO cops say
.png "Parents and students gathered outside Hinkley High School in Aurora, Colorado after three students were injured in a shooting in the parking lot.")
Three people were shot in a high school parking lot in Aurora, Colorado on Nov. 19, media outlets reported.
Two of the people shot were students at Hinkley High School, where the shooting occurred. The third person was a student at APS Avenues, another school about 2 miles away, KDVR reported.
Multiple shooters were involved, police said, and they are investigating a white pickup truck that might be connected to the shooting, CBS Denver reported.
No one had been arrested as of Friday evening.
Aurora Police Chief Vanessa Wilson said in a news conference that the three people were transported to a nearby hospital, according to a video of the conference shared by ABC 7.
“There was a fight that started in this parking lot and then it went to a shooting,” Wilson said, adding that a school security officer returned fire and applied a tourniquet to one of the students.
Wilson also said that she and others are “tired of this.”
“We have no concern for life whatsoever,” Wilson said at the conference. “I need the parents to get involved, I need you checking phones, I need you checking rooms, I need you checking cars and taking these guns away from these kids.”
The shooting unfolded as an anti-violence rally, planned in response to another shooting in Aurora earlier in the week, was taking place just blocks away, Colorado Public Radio reported.
On Nov. 15, six children between 14 and 18 years old were injured in a drive-by shooting at Nome Park near Aurora Central High School, just under 4 miles from Hinkley, CPR reported. All of the children are expected to recover, though one required emergency surgery.
Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman was at the rally during the shooting at Hinkley High School, CPR reported.
“There is just an escalation of youth violence,” Coffman told CPR. “There are so many questions. How do they get those handguns? What can we do to get them away from them and off the street?”
District Attorney John Kellner said in a Twitter statement that the shootings have impacted students’ ability to feel safe at school.
“No child or teenager should be fearful just going to class — a normal activity we can all relate to,” Kellner said. “Our community rightly is demanding an end to this violence, and we will stand with them in using every tool we have to prosecute aggressively anyone connected to these attacks on students.”