Residents come together after fatal school shooting
SANTA FE, Texas — Congregations in this deeply religious community near Houston gathered Sunday for their first services since a gunman blasted his way into the high school and killed 10 people, with one pastor lamenting the grief “that none of us can comprehend.”
Just two days after the deaths of eight students and two substitute teachers, the pastor of the Dayspring Church acknowledged the pain racking Santa Fe, a town of 13,000.
“They will never be forgotten in this community, these young people, children just going to school,” said Brad Drake, who then read the names of the dead, including a slain student who attended services at Dayspring, Angelique Ramirez.
Church leaders wore green T-shirts with gold lettering —the colors of Santa Fe High School. Inside an outline of the state of Texas, the letters spelled out a verse from 2 Corinthians 4:8-9: “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.”
At Arcadia First Baptist Church, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott hugged parishioners as they arrived. Among them was Monica Bracknell, an 18-year-old senior who survived the shooting. She stopped to tell the governor that the attack should not be turned into a political battle over gun control.
Also Sunday, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick called for a “hardening” of the nation’s school buildings in the wake of the attack.
Patrick, a Republican, blamed a “culture of violence” and said more needs to be done to keep shooters away from students, such as restricting school entrances and arming teachers.
“When you’re facing someone who’s an active shooter, the best way to take that shooter down is with a gun. But even better than that is four to five guns to one,” he told CNN’s “State of the Union.”
On ABC’s “The Week,” Patrick said he supports background checks for gun purchasers but stressed that “gun regulation starts at home.”
Meanwhile, families planned funerals. Services for 17-year-old Pakistani exchange student Sabika Sheikh took place Sunday at a mosque in suburban Houston.
The 17-year-old suspect, Dimitrios Pagourtzis, has been jailed on capital murder charges.
In their first statement since the massacre, Pagourtzis’ family said Saturday that the bloodshed “seems incompatible with the boy we love.”
“We are as shocked and confused as anyone else by these events,” said the statement, which offered prayers and condolences to the victims.
Relatives said they remained “mostly in the dark about the specifics” of the attack and shared “the public’s hunger for answers.”
The suspect’s attorney, Nicholas Poehl, said he was investigating whether his client endured any “teacher-on-student” bullying after reading reports of Pagourtzis being mistreated by football coaches.
In a statement, the school district said it investigated the accusations and “confirmed that these reports were untrue.”