Five Years After Marshall County High School Shooting
Five years ago today, a 15-year-old student killed 2 and wounded 18 at Marshall County High in Benton, KY. His planned attack occurred before classes started at 7:57 AM in a large hallway near the cafeteria.
Five years later, this school shooting highlights multiple shortfalls that still exist for school security.
Planning for Wrong Scenario
Most lockdown drills, active shooter trainings for police, and new equipment (e.g., fortified classroom doors, automatic locks, bulletproof chalkboards) assume a school shooting will occur while students are inside a classroom. Planned attacks often target the transition periods before school starts, while classes change, lunch, and dismissal.
Creating New Vulnerabilities
Many schools are installing metal detectors, which means that students need to line up near the front doors to the school. This screening process creates a situation where a large group of students congregate in the same area, and at the same time every day. This is exactly the scenario the Marshall County shooter planned for.
Banning Backpacks
After the shooting, Marshall County schools banned backpacks. Many schools have switched to clear backpacks. The shooter played a large musical instrument and even without a backpack, he could have easily carried a weapon into the school inside the instrument case. In 2019, a student hid 3 guns inside a guitar case at the STEM School in Highlands Ranch, CO.
The shooter exited the school with other students and then surrendered to police. Most school shooters flee or surrender. It is very rare for a school shooting to end in a barricade or shootout with police even though most trainings assume this scenario.
Using data instead of assumptions
The K-12 School Shooting Database offers more than 50 years of data on more than 2,200 shootings at schools. Training, planning, and procedures should be based on the abundance data reflecting the true reality of these situations, not assumptions of what might happen.
This attack happened 3 weeks before Parkland and since then, this problem has only gotten worse with 302 shootings on school property last year. Another five years of misguided planning and ineffective security efforts is unacceptable.
David Riedman is the founder of the K-12 School Shooting Database and a Ph.D. student at the University of Central Florida. To support the K-12 School Shooting Database and The Violence Project, please donate.
