Oxford High is seventh major school shooting in Michigan since 1978
Dec. 13: 1978, a teen opened fire at Lansing Everett. It has lessons for Oxford.
Dec. 3: The case against the parents of Oxford shooting suspect: Gun was Xmas present
Tuesday’s mass shooting at Oxford High School in northern Oakland County is the seventh major school shooting in Michigan since 1978.
That year, Roger Needham, a 15-year-old self-proclaimed Nazi, brought a handgun to Lansing Everett High School, killing one and wounding another, apparently upset with having been bullied.
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- Michigan gridlock has blocked action on 50 gun reform bills this year
- 2019: Shooter drills. Anxious teachers. Flying staplers. Michigan schools prepare.
The state’s worst school tragedy remains the worst in the nation: In 1927 the treasurer of the Bath schools in Clinton County, north of Lansing, bombed the elementary school, killing 38 students, six adults and wounding 58 others.
Since 1978, here are the other shootings directed at others in Michigan schools that occurred either inside school property or at school events and caused severe wounds:
- Oct. 18, 1985. A student at a football game between Murray-Wright and Northwestern high schools in Detroit pulls out a shotgun, fires into a crowd and wounds six students.
- Feb. 29, 2000. Six-year-old Kayla Rolland is killed when a fellow 6-year-old brings a gun to Buell Elementary in Mount Morris Township near Flint, firing the gun.
- Oct. 16, 2008. Christopher Walker, 16, is shot and killed outside Henry Ford High School in Detroit during a drive-by shooting as dozens of students are exiting the school.
- April 11, 2014. One person is fatally shot in the school parking lot after an awards event at East English Village Preparatory Academy in Detroit.
- Feb. 9, 2016. Four are wounded, including two students, during a shooting following a basketball game at the Muskegon Heights Public School Academy’s high school.
- June 21, 2019. One 15-year old male was wounded during a shooting outside a basketball game at Carman-Ainsworth High School just west of Flint.
Nationwide, according to data compiled by Everytown for Gun Safety Support Fund, there have been 140 shooting attacks nationwide in which at least one person was killed or wounded at K-12 schools since 2013.
The group lists an additional shooting in Michigan that wounded seven. The shooting wasn’t listed in Bridge’s tally because it occurred in the early morning hours when school wasn’t in session.
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