PA Armstrong County MAB responds to Franklin High School Multiple Stabbings

“The PA Armstrong County MAB operated by Lower Kiski EMS is still operating at the mass stabbing incident at Franklin Regional High school in Murrysville PA.”

Twenty people were injured — four critically — when a teenager wielding two knives this morning attacked students at Franklin Regional Senior High School in Murrysville. All of the injured were students with the exception of an adult security guard.

Westmoreland County public safety spokesman Dan Stevens said the suspect, a 16-year-old, is in custody and was questioned by Murrysville police and Westmoreland County detectives before being taken to a hospital for treatment of minor injuries to his hands. He was treated and returned to the police station.

Murrysville police Chief Thomas Seefeld said a motive is still unclear.

“We don’t know what led up to this,” he said.

The attacks began before classes started this morning. Amid the chaos, one student pulled a fire alarm and a witness said the suspect was tackled by assistant principal Sam King.

Ian Griffith, an 18-year-old senior at Franklin Regional, said he was inside the school when he walked down the stairs and saw Mr. King talking to the stabbing suspect. He said he saw the student stab a school security guard.

Mr. King jumped on the student and Mr. Griffith said he then he jumped on top of the pair. Mr. Griffith said he tried to hold down the suspect’s hands and arms and Mr. King told him to go find an ambulance.

Mr. Griffith went to find help and said that when he returned other staff members were helping to keep the suspect contained so he went out to the field where students were gathering.

Gov. Tom Corbett is en route to Murrysville, said Lynn Lawson, his communications director, and will join school and police authorities at the school for a 5 p.m. news conference.

Superintendent Gennaro Piraino said the district’s thoughts and prayers are with the injured and those affected by the incident.

“I pray and we pray every day that this doesn’t happen in any school,” he said. “The actions and response of our staff, students and local law enforcement officers saved many lives.”

Four students were flown to hospitals by medical helicopter. Eight victims, all males, were taken to Forbes Regional Hospital in Monroeville. Seven of those injured were between the ages of 15 and 17; one was an adult, according to Forbes trauma surgeon Christoph Kaufman, who described the injuries as ranging from “superficial to some quite serious.”

The security guard was wounded in the stomach, the chief said.

Dr. Timothy Van Fleet, of the department of emergency medicine at UPMC, said six victims were brought to UPMC East and one was transferred to Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh UPMC. Four of the victims — three boys and a girl — were treated and released, and one — a 17-year-old female — was undergoing plastic surgery for facial lacerations and is expected to be treated and released later today.

One student with superficial wounds was treated and released at UPMC Mercy.

Five — including the victim transferred from UPMC East — were at Children’s Hospital, where one, a 14-year-old boy, was in critical condition with a chest wound. Two males were in serious condition, a 17-year-old with a chest wound and a 16-year-old with an injury to his right arm. A 17-year-old male was in fair condition with a stab wound in his left arm and a 17-year-old female was in fair condition with a wound to her right hand.

Joanne Witkowski’s 14-year-old nephew was among the stabbing victims being treated at Children’s Hospital. Outside the facility, she told reporters he thought at first that he had been punched by the attacker, whom he didn’t know.

He looked down at his shirt, saw blood, and collapsed, she said. A friend helped him to safety, and he was later taken by helicopter to the hospital.

The blade missed his liver and colon but punctured his lung, Ms. Witkowski said. He is alert but will be in the hospital for four or five days, she said.

UPMC Presbyterian had one victim, a 17-year-old male in critical condition with chest and abdomen wounds. The boy is on life support and has already undergone one surgery, with more to come, UPMC doctors said. The blade sliced through his liver and diaphragm, missing his heart by millimeters.

“We’re very hopeful he will make it through this,” said Dr. Louis Alarcon, medical director of trauma surgery at UPMC Presbyterian. “He’s the most seriously injured person in the UPMC system.”

One 15-year-old girl, Ariana Schofield of Export, was flown from the school to Allegheny General Hospital, where she was treated and released.

Franklin Regional Senior High School has an enrollment of 1,222.

Just before 7:15 a.m., a school resource officer asked for medical assistance at the school for a stabbing. The students were injured in several first-floor classrooms and in the hallways before the classes started, Mr. Stevens said.

Gracey Evans, a junior from Murrysville, said she arrived at the school around 6:50 a.m. Around 20 minutes later, as she stood in the sophomore hall while her best friend stopped at his locker, she heard another student say something about blood.

“I saw this kid in all black running down the hallway, stabbing,” said Ms. Evans. “He was just stabbing everybody that was in his way.”

Her friend was stabbed in the back, she said, and a nearby student was stabbed in the stomach.

Then somebody pulled a fire alarm as the perpetrator ran off, and a teacher ordered all of the kids into a classroom.

“My friend was on his stomach, and the other kid who was severely injured was told to sit up. I knew that wasn’t right.

“I said to a few students, we need pressure on this wound, and they gave me some paper towels, and I held pressure on that wound for about 10 minutes.”

She was taken with her injured friends to Forbes Regional Hospital, where social workers attended to her. “They told me I was a real hero. I was just freaking out because I was so traumatized.

“I’m still shaking. I was crying. Then the mother of the boy that I helped comes in, and she saw me and she just started crying, and I said to her, ‘I saved your son,’ and she started crying some more.”

Freshman Hope Demont said she heard rumors that the suspect called an upperclassman Tuesday night from a restricted number saying, “I’m going to [expletive] you up.”

Asked about that phone call at the press briefing, Chief Seefeld said: “We’re checking it out.”

School director Roberta Cook said the district has done extensive training for a mass casualty at the schools.

“This is the training that you hope you never have to use. But everyone is doing what they are supposed to do. The administrators and the first-responders are doing what they need to do,” Mrs. Cook said.

Although she had not received any official information as a board members, she said other reports she heard indicating the incident happened before classes started means that it happened at one of the most vulnerable times of day.

“Once the students are in the building and in classes we can go into lockdown. But before school starts it’s hard to completely secure the building,” Mrs. Cook said.

Most of the training done in the district focused on an active shooter, not someone with a knife, she said.

When Ms. Cook heard that someone pulled the fire alarm after the stabbing started, she said that action would have followed the training.

“This is terribly unfortunate. I hope that all of the students are OK,” Mrs. Cook said.

Franklin Regional Senior High School has no metal detectors, but it has a reputation as a relatively safe school. Its most recent state Safe Schools report shows 17 reportable incidents in 2012-13, none of them involving weapons. The report notes that there were no arrests and no incidents involving local police. The most common reportable incident was fights, for which there were eight.

Parents of the injured students are being contacted. Parents of other students were asked to go to Heritage Elementary, also in Murrysville, to pick up their children.

The FBI is on the scene.

Meanwhile, two Murrysville police officers were stationed about 11 a.m. outside the home of the suspect, a two-story house with tan siding and tan brick in a cul de sac. The family has not responded to calls and was not at the house.

Next-door neighbors Sonya and John Kokalis said the neighborhood was built about 13 years ago and they and the suspect’s family moved in around that time.

Ms. Kokalis said she saw the suspect’s parents around 8:30 a.m. and at that point, “They didn’t know anything.”

She described them as a “nice family.”

“It’s surreal,” she said. “You see this and it happens other places. … It’s not sinking in.”

Mr. Piraino said the high school will be closed for the next few days and that counseling will be available.