What to Know
- A 15-year-old student at a Newark high school was shot during a drive-by after students were forced to evacuate the school due to a gas leak, according to police
- Gunshots rang out just after noon on Monday near Central High School, at the corner of 17th Avenue and Sayre Street, police said
- The evacuation of the school beforehand had not been planned, as two gas leaks forced hundreds of students outside around lunchtime
A 15-year-old student at a Newark high school was shot during a drive-by after students were forced to evacuate the school due to reports of a gas leak, according to police.
Gunshots rang out just after noon on Monday near Central High School, at the corner of 17th Avenue and Sayre Street, Newark Public Safety Director Fritz Fragé said. Officers who responded to the scene found the teenage victim, a male, had been shot in the shoulder.
This cell phone video shows a crowd of students helping the 15-year old, as he lay on the ground after being shot. He was taken to University Hospital and is expected to recover, police said.
One student said about three or four shots were fired in all.
It wasn't clear if the student had been targeted or whether it was a random shooting, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka and schools superintendent Roger Leon said at a press conference. They did say that the evacuation of the school beforehand had not been planned, as two reported gas leaks forced hundreds of students outside.
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Because it was not a planned event, there was not the same robust police and security presence at the school as there is at the start and end of the school day, officials said.
News
"In the middle of the school day when we expect people to be in school, police are not usually outside at that time," Baraka said. "The anxiety level is high, when you hear school and shooting, everyone is going to rush to the school anticipating something horrible happened, and something horrible did happen."
PSE&G said there was a report of a gas leak, but no actual gas leak had been detected.
The student was not shot on school property, but rather across the street as students were waiting during the evacuation, Baraka and Leon clarified. Dozens of parents rushed to the high school to pick up their children after panicked receiving texts from their kids.
Police were searching for the gunman. No other information was immediately available. An investigation is ongoing.
