Surrounded by officials, Sheriff Tony Spurlock of Douglas County identified the suspects in the shooting at STEM School Highlands Ranch, which killed an 18-year-old senior who was just three days from graduation Tuesday and injured eight other students. Earlier, he said, officers had mistakenly identified the juvenile as a young man.
The suspects carried two handguns and at least one of them was restrained by a school security officer by the time law enforcement arrived, the sheriff said. During the attack, he added, there was at least one encounter between a student and a suspect.
“We are going to hear about very heroic things that have taken place,” he said.
While details of the shooting remained sparse, the sheriff said the attackers got “deep inside the school,” and one parent said Tuesday that students had tried to stop the attack.
Brad Bialy said his oldest son, Brendan, a senior, told him that he was in class when gunfire erupted. Bialy said his son told him that two students entered the classroom and one pulled a gun out of a guitar case.
He said his son and two friends tried to tackle the gunman, but one of the boys was shot in the chest. Other students tried to stanch the bleeding by putting pressure on his chest, Bialy said.
The sheriff’s office identified one of the suspects, the adult male, as Devon Erickson, 18. He was to have his first court hearing Wednesday afternoon, said District Attorney George Brauchler. He added that he would consider trying the juvenile suspect as an adult.
On Tuesday evening, police tape was strung up outside the prim brick suburban home where neighbors said Erickson’s family has lived since the late 1990s. A next-door neighbor who declined to be named described him as a quiet young man who sometimes deflected eye contact.
Spurlock said neither suspect had been on law enforcement’s radar before the shooting and that the motive was unknown.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.