Santa Fe High School Shooting

Submission 23,060

Overview

The Santa Fe High School Shooting refers to a mass shooting that occurred at a high school in Santa Fe, Texas in late May 2018, during which at least ten people were killed and another 12 were injured.

Background

On May 18th, 2018, shots were fired into a classroom at the Santa Fe High School. That day, Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez announced that 10 people had been killed in the attack, two of which were police officers.

Developments

Online Reaction

That day, posts about the shooting reached the front page of the /r/news,^[2] /r/The_Donald, /r/houston^[4] and /r/politics^[5]subreddits. Meanwhile, a Twitter Moments^[1] page titled "As many as 10 dead in Texas school shooting, officials say" was created, highlighting various tweets addressing the attack.

President Donald Trump's Reaction

That day, the White House released a statement in which United States President Donald Trump condemned the attack as "horrific" and added that his administration was "determined to do everything in our power to protect our students, secure our schools and keep weapons out of the hands that pose a threat to themselves and others" (shown below).

Suspect's Identity

The suspect was identified as Dimitrios ‘Dimitri’ Pagourtzis. Prior to the removal of his Facebook page, screenshots of his posts began circulating online. That day, the news site Metro published an article highlighting many of his posts (shown below). Among the posts included a photograph of a shirt with "Born To Kill" printed on the front and a picture of a jacket with various pins, including a hammer and sickle, iron cross and a cephalopod creature.

In the caption for the jacket photograph, he wrote:

"Duster Hammer and Sickle = Rebellion Rising Sun = Kamikaze Tactics Iron Cross = Bravery Baphomet = Evil Cthulhu = Power.

Meanwhile, in an interview with the local news station KPRC, 17-year-old student Dustin Severin claimed that Pagourtzis was the victim of bullying by students and coaches at the school.^[3]

Sadie Rodriguez Interview

On May 20th, the Los Angeles Times^[6] published an interview with Sadie Rodriguez, the mother of Shana Fisher who died in the attack, who claimed that Pagourtzis "kept making advances" on her daughter "and she repeatedly told him no." According to Rodriguez, her daughter embarrassed him in class by rejecting him and "a week later he opens fire on everyone he didn't like," claiming her daughter was "the first one." That day, Los Angeles Times reporter Matt Pearce tweeted that family friend of Fisher had "raised questions about the reliability of her claims" and could not "corroborate her accounts about the shooter's behavior toward her daughter" (shown below).^[7]

Hillary 2016 Hat Hoax

On May 18th, 2018, Snopes editor Brooke Binkowski tweeted screenshots of Facebook profiles featuring photoshopped images of Pagourtzis wearing at "Hillary 2016" hat along with the message "Someone's trying really hard to make this happen" (shown below).^[8]