Texas capturing suspect exchanged ‘a lot’ of fire with police

SANTA FE, Texas (AP) — The suspect accused of attacking a Texas high college exchanged « a kind of firepower » with authorities forward of he surrendered, a top county superior said Saturday, a day after the capturing in an art work lecture room that killed 10 folks.

Besides to a shotgun and a handgun, Dmitrios Pagourtzis also had quite quite a bit of forms of homemade explosive devices, however they were no longer marvelous of detonating, said Trace Henry, the Galveston County plan shut, who’s the county’s chief administrator.

Investigators chanced on a group of carbon dioxide canisters taped collectively, and a stress cooker with an fear clock and nails internal. Nonetheless the canisters had no detonation instrument, and the stress cooker had no explosive discipline cloth, Henry said.

Authorities equipped no motive, however they said in a probable-motive affidavit that the suspect had admitted to undertaking the capturing.

The gunman informed police that once he opened fire, he evaded capturing college students he loved « so he might maybe well luxuriate in his story informed, » the affidavit said.

Pagourtzis, who perceived to luxuriate in no prior arrests or confrontations with law enforcement, made his preliminary courtroom look on cancel costs Friday by video hyperlink from the Galveston County Prison. A plan shut denied bond and took his application for a courtroom-appointed authorized superior.

The capturing unfolded in Santa Fe, a metropolis of about thirteen,000 folks roughly 30 miles (Forty eight kilometers) southeast of Houston.

It became once the nation’s deadliest such attack for the reason that Florida bloodbath that killed 17 and energized the teen-led gun-administration movement. It became once also the deadliest assault in Texas since a particular person with a semi-automated rifle attacked a rural church unimaginative ultimate year, killing more than two dozen folks.

Within the period in-between, college students were being let inspire internal Santa Fe High College to win assets they abandoned when the gunfire started.

The college’s roughly 1,four hundred college students will likely be allowed internal in teams of now not more than 10 and will likely be accompanied by officers, said Walter Braun, the college district’s chief of police. Braun and other officials declined to answer to questions about the investigation.

Though many of the ineffective had no longer been publicly known, relatives and acquaintances said the fatalities integrated a substitute trainer and a abroad alternate pupil from Pakistan.

One more 10 folks were wounded. The wounded integrated a college police officer who became once the main to confront the suspect and obtained shot in the arm. Hospitals reported treating a complete of 14 folks for injuries linked to the capturing. Two were listed in severe condition Saturday at the University of Texas Medical Division, the clinic tweeted.

The gunman yelled « Surprise » forward of he started capturing, in accordance to Texas Get. Michael McCaul, the chairman of the Dwelling Fatherland Security Committee.

McCaul, a frail federal prosecutor, said he expects the Justice Division to pursue additional costs, most certainly spirited weapons of mass destruction.

Pagourtzis performed on the junior varsity football crew and became once a member of a dance squad with a local Greek Orthodox church. Acquaintances described him as composed and unassuming, an avid video game player who robotically wore a unlit trench coat and unlit boots to class.

The suspect got the guns from his father, who owned them legally, Gov. Greg Abbott said. It became once undecided whether or no longer the father knew his son had taken them.

___

Apply AP’s protection of the Santa Fe High College capturing here: https://apnews.com/label/Schoolshootings .