On Tuesday morning a 17-year-old student walked into Great Mills High School in Maryland and opened fire on two students, one male and one female. Immediately, he was engaged by the school resource officer on duty and the violence ended. The two victims were sent to the hospital.
“When the shooting took place, our school resource officer, who was stationed inside the school, was alerted to the event and the shots being fired. He pursued the shooter, engaged the shooter, during that engagement he fired a round at the shooter. Simultaneously, the shooter fired a round as well,” St. Mary’s County Sheriff Tim Cameron said during a press briefing on the incident. “The school resource officer was not struck or harmed by any firearm projectile.”
That good guy with a gun was St. Mary's County Sheriff's Deputy Blaine Gaskill.
This is @firstsheriff Deputy Blaine Gaskill, the hero who stopped the shooting at a MD high school today
— Cameron Gray (@Cameron_Gray) March 20, 2018
Thank you sir pic.twitter.com/OFuSE0qMKn
More details on his background from the Baltimore Sun:
Gaskill has been assigned to Great Mills since the start of the school year, and has been with the sheriff’s office for almost six years. He’s completed SWAT training and previously worked as a correctional officer, Cameron said. Gaskill finished his police training in April 2013, and received an award for “emergency vehicle operations.”
He won praise in 2016 for persuading an armed man who confronted him to surrender, an event caught on a police body camera, Cameron said.
Gaskill was praised by Republican Governor Larry Hogan for his courage, along with fellow deputies and resource officers assigned to schools across the state.
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