MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The shooter at a Wisconsin religious school had two handguns with her but used only one in the attack that killed a teacher and student and injured six others, the city’s police chief said in an interview with The Associated Press on Wednesday.
Police were still investigating why the 15-year-old student at Abundant Life Christian School in Madison shot and killed a fellow student and a teacher Monday, before killing himself, Madison Police Chief Shon Barnes said . Two other students who were shot remained in critical condition Wednesday.
“We may never know what she was thinking that day, but we will do our best to try to add or give as much information as possible to our audience,” Barnes said.
The student who was killed was identified in an obituary published Wednesday as Rubi Patricia Vergara, 14, of Madison. She was a freshman at the school and “an avid reader, loved art, sang and played keyboard in the family worship band,” according to the obituary.
The Dane County Medical Examiner on Wednesday evening identified the slain teacher as Erin Michelle West, 42, after initially identifying her as Michelle E. West.
Barnes released the name of the shooter, Natalie “Samantha” Rupnow, hours after Monday’s shooting. Barnes said the medical examiner would release the names of those killed, but the state’s Crime Victims’ Privacy Act would prohibit releasing the names of those injured.
Police, with help from the FBI, were combing through online records and other resources and speaking with his parents and classmates to try to determine a motive for the shooting, Barnes said.
Police do not know if anyone was targeted in the attack or if the attack was planned in advance, the chief said.
“I don’t know if she planned it that day or if she planned it a week before,” Barnes said. “To me, bringing a gun to school to hurt people is planning. So we don’t know what the premeditation is.
Although Rupnow owned two handguns, Barnes said he did not know how she obtained them and he declined to say who purchased them, citing the ongoing investigation.
No decision has been made on whether Rupnow’s parents could be charged in connection with the shooting, but they have been cooperative, Barnes said.
Online court records show no criminal cases against his father, Jeffrey Rupnow, or his mother, Mellissa Rupnow. They are divorced and have joint custody of their daughter, but she lived primarily with her father, according to court documents. Divorce records indicate that Natalie was in therapy in 2022, but do not say why.
Tension over police not releasing information spilled over at a news conference Tuesday, where Barnes left without answering questions. Madison Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway became increasingly terse in her responses as reporters asked questions she couldn’t answer.
“It’s absolutely none of your business who was injured in this incident,” Rhodes-Conway said. “Please have some human decency and respect for people who have lost loved ones or who have been injured themselves or whose children have been injured. Just have a little human decency, folks. Leave them alone. Let them cry. Let them recover. Let them heal. Don’t feed off their pain. We will share what we can when we can and not before.
Barnes on Wednesday defended the way police handled information about the shooting as they moved from a crisis response to the investigation phase.
“We have tried to be as transparent as possible to give as much information as possible during the critical phase of this incident,” Barnes said. “Now we are in the investigation phase. And so the information might not be as available.
Tamrin Olden, a former spokeswoman for the California Police Department whose company provides communications training to law enforcement, said she advises departments to provide regular updates with factual information after incidents criticism and avoid unnecessarily delaying the publication of information. She said miscommunications can cause frustration within the community, undermine public trust and worsen the underlying tragedy.
“Your credibility is tarnished and the incident is sometimes remembered for these things rather than remembering and honoring the victims, which is what the focus should be on,” she said.
The police department has had to correct some key inaccuracies since Monday, including the fact that three people, not five people, had died and that a second-grade teacher, not a second-grader, called 911.
Paul Bucher, the former Waukesha County prosecutor who has been involved in a number of high-profile cases, said the media has unrealistic expectations about how quickly authorities should release information about high-profile incidents. publicized.
“The government has had enough of the media,” he said. “They have no obligation to disclose anything to you. Based on the mayor’s statement, “It’s none of your business,” that’s a pretty good indication that they get it. »
But Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council President Bill Lueders, a longtime Madison journalist, said Wednesday that authorities should be more transparent about the facts.
“It’s a problem that so little information has been released. I do not accept that this is necessary to protect the integrity of the investigation,” he said. “The public has a right to know.”
The school shooting was the latest of dozens in the United States in recent years, including particularly deadly shootings in Newtown, Connecticut; Parkland, Florida; and Uvalde, Texas.
But it stands out because school shootings by teenage girls are extremely rare in the United States, with the majority of them committed by men aged 20 to 30, said David Riedman, founder of the data on shootings in elementary and secondary schools.
Emily Salisbury, associate professor of social work at the University of Utah, studies criminology and gender. She explained that women usually turn their anger on themselves because American culture has taught them that women do not harm others, leading to eating disorders, self-harm and sexual harassment. depression.
It’s difficult to speculate without knowing all the facts in Rupnow’s case, Salisbury said, but for a girl to resort to the level of violence she demonstrated suggests she suffered severe trauma or that she herself suffered violence.
“There needs to be more provocation, more incentive for girls and women to become violent,” Salisbury said. “It is very likely that she experienced some form of violence in her life that could lead to serious mental illness.”
Abundant Life is a nondenominational Christian school – kindergarten through high school – with approximately 420 students.
Salisbury said the public should not assume that the school’s religious teachings mean its students are above bullying and ostracizing each other.
“They’re kids,” Salisbury said. “Even though these (religious) values may be taught or discussed in class in the culture of this school, kids are online all the time. Children create their own culture through social media.
