Yet again, students in the US have come under fire from a fellow student. The school shooter, identified as Natalie Rupnow, was a 15-year-old girl, in mental distress and in possession of a weapon. She killed both a student and a teacher during her breakdown, before turning the weapon on herself.
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The young woman opened fire on a classroom full of students. She injured a few and killed one teacher and a student with her handgun. Natalie Rupnow then turned the gun on herself, failing to die on the spot, but losing her life on the way to the hospital afterward.
Natalie Rupnow has now been under intense scrutiny by both the press and the police. The inevitable fascination with the life and background of the disturbed school shooter has unearthed a few truths. While digging through her past, some similarities to the famous Columbine gunmen have been discovered.
In a picture scrounged up from her father's Facebook profile, Natalie Rupnow can be seen at a firing range, wearing a KMFDM t-shirt. This is the same as the ones worn by the Columbine killers. There are speculations that school shooter Natalie Rupnow was paying respects to the infamous killers by wearing it.
Early Warning Signs Of School Shooting In Natalie Rupnow
I feel it must be difficult to not spot signs of homicidal tendencies in a child. But, I am not a parent, and I am not from the US. In a society where weapons are readily accessible to children, extra attention needs to be paid to those who are showing signs of declining mental health.
For a child like Natalie Rupnow to go from being a normal teenager to deciding to shoot people in her class to death must have some signs. Her parents are being investigated, but Barnes, the mayor says they're looking into "if the parents may have been negligent." But, he said that "does not appear to be the case."
Although the investigation into the case continues, I think the issue is much broader. The mental health of Rupnow was clearly in a sorry state. She was also able to get her hands on a weapon. The two things combined resulted in the school shooting. Serious reform is needed to prevent these situations from happening constantly.
