Victims Identified in Nashville School Shooting

Six victims and the shooter have been identified following a shooting at an elementary school in Nashville, as total deaths of gun violence in the country reached 9,894 in 2023.

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The three students who were shot and killed Monday at the Covenant School were all nine years old. Three adult staff members of the school also died in the mass shooting. They are 61-year-old Cynthia Peak, 60-year-old Katherine Koonce, and 61-year-old Mike Hill.

The shooter, identified as 28-year-old transgender woman Audrey Hale, was also killed in a shootout with police responding to the incident. Hale, believed to be a former student of the school, was armed with at least two assault-style rifles and a handgun.

Nashville Police Department Chief John Drake told reporters they found a manifesto and maps associated with the attack at the Covenant School.

"There were maps drawn of the school, in detail of surveillance, entry points. We know and believe that entry was gained through shooting through one of the doors," he said, adding that investigators are looking at a possible theory for a motive but did not disclose any details.

So far this year, there have been 130 mass shootings in the U.S., according to the Gun Violence Archive. Meanwhile, 9,894 people, including hundreds of children and teens, have lost their lives to gun violence in the past three months.

Shannon Watts, founder of "Moms Demand Action," a grassroots movement that calls for an end to gun violence, tweeted, "gun violence is political in America because gun makers pay our politicians for their inaction."

"Schools shootings are not acts of nature. They are senseless, preventable acts of man enabled by weak gun laws and lawmakers," Watts said.

"This doesn't have to be our new normal. Our children don't have to be sacrificed in exchange for gun industry profits," she added.