Substitute teacher with ‘lust for life’ Texas victims

SANTA FE, Texas — A substitute teacher who relatives say had a “lust for life” is among the first confirmed victims of Friday’s mass shooting at a Texas high school.

Among those injured include a school resource officer and a sophomore baseball player.

Seventeen-year-old Dimitrios Pagourtzis was being held on a capital murder charge after authorities say he fatally shot 10 people and wounded at least 10 others at his high school in Santa Fe, about 30 miles southeast of Houston.

Here are some of their stories:

CYNTHIA TISDALE

Family members confirmed that substitute teacher Cynthia Tisdale was among the victims killed in the shooting.

Tisdale’s niece, Leia Olinde, said Tisdale was like a mother to her and helped her shop for wedding dresses last year.

“She helped me put it on, she helped fix my hair,” Olinde said through tears.

“She was wonderful. She was just so loving,” said Olinde, 25. “I’ve never met a woman who loved her family so much.”

She said Tisdale was married to her husband for close to 40 years and that the two had three children and eight grandchildren.

Tisdale’s house was the center for family gatherings, and she loved cooking Thanksgiving dinner and decorating her house, Olinde said.

Olinde’s fiance, Eric Sanders, said of Tisdale that “words don’t explain her lust for life and the joy she got from helping people.”

JOHN BARNES

School police officer John Barnes was shot in the arm when he confronted the gunman.

A bullet damaged the bone and a major blood vessel around Barnes’ elbow, which required surgery to repair, said David Marshall, chief nursing officer at the University of Texas Medical Branch. He said Barnes was in stable condition.

Barnes was the first to engage Pagourtzis, according to Marshall.

ROME SHUBERT

Sophomore baseball player Rome Shubert says the gunman walked into his classroom and tossed something onto desks.

Shubert told the Houston Chronicle that he then heard “three loud pops” before the attacker fled into the hall. Shubert says he realized he’d been wounded as he was running out the back door.

Shubert says he was hit in the back of his head with what he says was a bullet, but that it “missed everything vital.” He also tweeted that he was OK and stable.