Journo on job learns ‘shooter is her son’
THE alleged Kentucky school shooter is reported to be the son of a local newspaper editor who ran to the school to cover the story only to find out her son was a suspect.
The Courier-Journal has named Gabe Parker, 15, as the suspect in the rampage at Marshall County High School that left two teenagers dead and a dozen more wounded.
His mother, Mary Garrison Minyard, the editor of the Marshall County Online, raced to the school on Tuesday morning to cover the incident when she realised her son was the primary suspect.
Bailey Holt, 15, called her mum as she lay dying at the scene, while Preston Cope, 15, was declared dead at hospital.
Authorities have not officially named the suspect or released a motive for the shooting.
Ashley Collie told the Courier-Journal that she was surprised that he was a suspect. She said they took maths together and that he was "a really good kid".
She said some of his friends had described him as snappy since returning to school after Christmas holidays.
Ashley said his friends told her that the 15-year-old told them he wanted to join the mafia.
She said he was "definitely shooting to kill," but didn't think he was targeting any students in particular.
The suspect was arrested and charged with two counts of murder and 12 counts of assault.
Gabe Parker's father Austin Parker and his mum split up in 2007 and both remarried. Mr Parker divorced his second wife, Jennifer Lynn Parker last year.
One of Gabe Parker's neighbours said he was "grandma's boy".
"Anything Grandma needed, he would get," said Allyn Hornick. "His grandma was his best friend."
Kentucky Governor Matt Bevin said Americans needed to "wake up" and recognise that school shootings are a "cultural problem."
"We have become desensitised to death, we have become desensitised to killing, we have become desensitised to empathy for our fellow man and it's coming at an extraordinary price and we have got to look at the root causes of this," Gov. Bevin told The Associated Press.
"We can't celebrate death in video games, celebrate death in TV shows, celebrate death in movies, celebrate death in musical lyrics and remove any sense of morality and sense of higher authority and then expect that things like this are not going to happen."
