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Title: Santa Fe High School shooting: Suspect identified as Dimitrios Pagourtzis
Source:
CBS News
URL Source: http://dbsnews
Published: May 19, 2018
Author: Crimesider Staff
Post Date: 2018-05-19 07:42:20 by IbJensen
Keywords: None
Views: 6301
Comments: 31
SANTA FE, Texas -- The suspect in a deadly shooting rampage at a Texas high school Friday morning has been identified as 17-year-old Dimitrios Pagourtzis, officials say. Ten people were killed and 10 others wounded in the shooting Friday morning at Santa Fe High School south of Houston, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said. The suspected shooter, who was in custody, also had explosive devices, including a molotov cocktail, that were found in the school and nearby, said Gov. Greg Abbott, who called the assault "one of the most heinous attacks that we've ever seen in the history of Texas schools." Police found pressure cookers and pipe bombs around the school, one law enforcement source told CBS News. Pagourtzis has been booked into the Galveston County jail and is being held with no bond on charges of capital murder and aggravated assault of a peace officer. Additional charges may follow, according to the Galveston County Sheriff's Office. A substitute teacher and several students were among the dead, law enforcement sources tell CBS News senior investigative producer Pat Milton. Students described Pagourtzis as quiet and "weird" because a long trench coat was part of his wardrobe, even on days when the temperature neared 90 degrees, CBS News' Omar Villafranca reports. His motive is still unclear. A federal law enforcement source said there was still an active search for explosives, CBS News justice and homeland security correspondent Jeff Pegues reports. Several law enforcement agencies are searching a mobile home less than three miles away from the school where records show the teen lived, CBS affiliate KHOU reports.'' Investigators were in the process of serving search warrants at two residences and the suspect's car, but they were using extreme caution because of the potential for more explosive devices to be uncovered, said Abbott. Abbott said the suspect had information in journals, on his computer and on cell phones that indicated he wanted to commit the shooting and take his own life afterward. Abbott said the suspect "gave himself up" and told authorities that he did not have the courage to take his own life. Pagourtzis posted the phrase "Dangerous Days" on social media before the rampage along with a pentagram symbol. Two weapons were used in the attack, Abbott said -- a shotgun and a .38 revolver, both of which were legally owned by the suspect's father. Abbott said he didn't know whether the father was aware the suspect had taken the guns. Abbott said federal and state prosecutors would jointly handled the case. Two other people were being questioned, he said, one person who was acting suspiciously at the scene and another who he said may have information and needed to be "fully interviewed." A school resource officer was shot and injured in the shooting, CBS News has learned. Another law enforcement officer was also reported injured but was not shot. Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez said a male suspect, who he didn't identify, was in custody and a person of interest was detained and questioned. Both were believed to be students at the school. Pagourtzis played on the junior varsity football team and was a member of a dance squad with a local Greek Orthodox church. His social media pages showed multiple images of guns. He recently posted a photo wearing a t-shirt reading "Born to Kill" and there were also photos of a long green jacket with Nazi regalia. Student Damon Rabon told CBSN he was one classroom away from where the shooting happened in the art hall during first period. Rabon said the substitute teacher went out and looked and saw the shooter, who he described as a short male wearing a black trench coat carrying a backpack and armed with a sawed-off shotgun. Rabon didn't name the shooter but said he believed him to be a former student, either a sophomore or a junior. He described him as a quiet and "weird" type of guy who stood out because he wore a trench coat every day. Valerie Martin, who teaches at the junior high school in Santa Fe, told the New York Times she had Pagourtzis in her pre-A.P. language arts class last year and saw no warning signs. She described him as bright and said he had participated in the school's competition for a national history contest. "He was quiet, but he wasn't quiet in a creepy way," Martin told the paper. She said she has her students write in journals, and never noticed him writing or drawing anything disturbing. CBSN security analyst Paul Viollis said one major question investigators will look into is why Pagourtzis allegedly opened fire in the art room and whether the class was specifically targeted. Viollis said investigators will also likely seek to determine what websites Pagourtzis visited in the days leading up to the shooting. Neighbors of the suspect told KHOU that Pagourtzis lived at the mobile home with his family, who usually kept to themselves. A woman who answered the phone at a number associated with the Pagourtzis family declined to speak with the AP. "Give us our time right now, thank you," she said. Speaking at a press conference Friday, Sen. Ted Cruz said more would be learned about the suspect in coming days and "what red flags, what warning signs there may have been or may not have been." "I'm sure we'll have a robust conversation about what more could have been done to prevent this horrible tragedy," Cruz said. Abbott said any warning signs that did exist were "non-existent or very imperceptible" and said the suspect had no criminal history. Abbott said that "unlike Parkland, unlike Sutherland Springs, there were not those types of warning signs." He was referring to the Feb. 14 school shooting in Florida and one in November inside a church in a town near San Antonio.
Poster Comment: Another screwup by authorities! He was an odd duck and school, police and parents knew he was a powder leg ready to explode! The rotten little bastard should be hanged post haste and his lazy parents should hang beside him
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#2. To: IbJensen (#0)
Well, I have never commented before on a school shooting because, basically they happened in other states and I was naive enough to think they probably would never happen in Texas and especially not Santa Fe which is my neck of the woods. But this time,I know the shooter and some of the people he shot, so I cannot stay on the sidelines anymore. I have grandchildren in that school, and my son-n-law teaches at that school, so this time it has hit very very close to home. And I was in Santa Fe yesterday trying to check on my family, to see if they were still alive, but I couldn't get to the high school because that area was blocked off by the police. To make a long story short, my son-n-law and grandkids are OK, thank God. But not their friends. My son-n-law knows the school teacher who was killed, and says she was a good school teacher and a very good person. And a close friend of the nephew of my son-n-law was killed. When it happened, the nephew (his name is Jason) was sitting in the theater art class which is next to the art class where the shooting occurred. Now let me share a few things about Jason and the shooter, and also the shooter's parents and also the security at the school. When arrested, the shooter said he didn't shoot anyone that he liked so that his story can be told. He was basically saying that he was bullied at school. Anyhow, he did not shoot up the art class Jason was in because there was kids in there that he liked (including Jason who was not one of the bulliers). Before I go on, let me make it clear that I am not trying to defend what the shooter did, just trying to get in his head. Anyhow, the poster said his parents should be hung alongside their son. I cant say that I agree that statement. I have often attended the Greek Orthodox Church where the whole family attend Church, and I know for a fact that they raised him right, because, for one thing, the shooter was always in Church, and I often talked with both the parents and the shooter (when he was a youngster and he seemed like a very nice kid, in a beautiful Christian family). I suppose, in hindsight, the parents should have locked-up their guns, but I'm sure they are more surprised than anyone that their kid was capable of committing such a heinous act. Maybe they should be punished with maybe a fine or something, but not "hung." Now let's talk about security at the school. Santa Fe high school is a fairly new school that was equipped with metal detectors at every entrance EXCEPT the back door that the shooter entered. It was supposed to, in theory, be kept locked and therefore did not need a metal detector. But almost needless to say, it was not locked when the shooting occurred. And according to several students, it was left unlocked most of the time. And of course the shooter knew that,and knew that he could get in with his guns. Another contributing factor was that the shooter, in response to being bullied, joined the Neo-NAZI's which is a very evil, Satanic organization. That movement needs to be stamped out everywhere, and especially so in our schools. The shooter should have been kicked out of school as soon as he started wearing the Mark of the Beast (i.e, the Swastika).
PS, I want to add here one more contributing factor, and a big one. In recent years, the atheists, the biggest evil of all, have taken any and all mention of God out of our public schools. Hopefully, next year, that will change, at least in Texas because Texas very recently changed its policy.The Texas text book committee recently voted to include the "Intelligent Design" view in all the Texas science textbooks alongside of Darwin's view of things. And because I wrote the book on Intelligent Design, I hope and pray that they use my book (Genesus: Why We Are Here) as the primary textbook, or at least incorporate some of my views. But of course, the atheists are vehemently opposed to it, and also the ACLU, and they plan on fighting it at every step of the way, and it may go all the way to the Supreme Court. It is the atheists, more than anything else, who are responsible for all the school shootings (and most of the evil in the world for that matter).
Obviously we differ on loads of things, but atheism is not at all a problem, and I think far more wars have been started in the name of one religion or another than have been done so in the name of atheism. Many atheists are good, kind & rational people who simply do not see anything more to life than the physical. As for school shootings, I think we should look at our drugged up youth whom have been taking things like Ritalin and other SSRI's for years to make them "better" students.
#14. To: Pinguinite (#6)
As for school shootings, I think we should look at our drugged up youth whom have been taking things like Ritalin and other SSRI's for years to make them "better" students. What a load of BS. Our jails and prisons are way overcrowded with atheists, and they are not the problem? Do you honestly think it is believers in God who are committing the mass shootings, or the burglaries, the armed robberies, and the rapes and drug dealing? Sorry, I'm not buying that. 95 percent of the criminals are either atheists or agnostics, but the vast majority are atheists. That (people like you espousing atheist BS) is the problem, and not guns or anything else. When I was in school there were no atheists, and there were no mass shootings, so I rest my case. The increase in school shootings is directly proportional to the increase in atheism and the fact that now-days our schools are no longer allowed to even mention God. How can you deny such obvious facts? Anyhow, my book proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Bible agrees with all the scientific and historical facts And even Darwin's observations. And it should be taught in all public schools and then the mass shootings will stop.
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#4. To: All (#2)
#6. To: interpreter (#4)
It is the atheists, more than anything else, who are responsible for all the school shootings (and most of the evil in the world for that matter).
Replies to Comment # 6. Obviously we differ on loads of things, but atheism is not at all a problem, and I think far more wars have been started in the name of one religion or another than have been done so in the name of atheism. Many atheists are good, kind & rational people who simply do not see anything more to life than the physical.
End Trace Mode for Comment # 6.
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