Gunman found dead, 2 children injured in Northern California school shooting, sheriff says

Ishani Desai and Rosalio Ahumada, The Sacramento Bee on Dec 4, 2024

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SACRAMENTO, Calif. — A suspected gunman is dead and two students were hospitalized with gunshots wounds Wednesday after Northern California authorities responded to a reported shooting at a faith-based elementary school in Butte County.

About 1 p.m. Wednesday, deputies responded to 911 calls reporting a suspected gunman who had fired shots at students on the Feather River Adventist School campus on Cox Lane just outside of Oroville.

Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea said deputies, along with other law enforcement officials, arrived at the school campus and found a man believed to be the suspected shooter dead. He said the man found on the ground appeared to have suffered a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

The sheriff said there were two students who suffered gunshot wounds and were taken to hospitals to receive medical treatment; one of them was taken by helicopter.

Honea in an update around 4:30 p.m. said that the two students, both kindergartners, remain in treatment at hospitals.

“The fact that they are still being treated bodes well for their ultimate recovery,” Honea said about three hours after the shooting, but he added that information remains preliminary.

The sheriff said it is believed that the shooting happened after the alleged gunman came to the campus for a meeting with the principal. “Our preliminary investigation indicates that this individual came onto the campus to meet with the principal to discuss the possibility of enrolling a student,” Honea said.

“We haven’t verified that that is a legitimate statement at this point, but it is information that we have at this point.

“Shortly after concluding that meeting, the principal heard shots being fired, heard screams, and that’s when they determined or found that the two students had been shot.”

Honea said authorities believe they know they identity of the gunman but his name has not yet been publicly released.

The remaining students at the campus were sequestered in the gym before being bused to Oroville Church of Nazarene, where they were reunited with parents. Crisis counselors and chaplains were also at the scene.

Honea in the earlier news briefing said the school has been “locked down and the threat has been neutralized. I don’t have concern for anybody’s safety here right now.”

The Feather River Adventist School is a K-8 campus run by the Seventh-day Adventist Church to provide a “spiritually oriented education for children,” according to its website, which said the school had an enrollment of 33 students as of early 2022. The campus is located just off Highway 70, roughly 60 miles north of Sacramento.

Highway 70 is closed in the area, according to the California Highway Patrol.

The National Center for Educational Statistics said the school had 31 students across kindergarten through seventh grade in the 2021-22 school year.

Feather River Adventist is just north of Sutter County. The Sutter County Sheriff’s Office in a statement said it is “aware of the incident” and described it as “an isolated incident that has been contained.”

Schools in the area, such as Las Plumas High School and campuses under the Palmero Unified School District, said in a statements that there were no threats to their sites.

“Our sympathies are with the children and families of Feather River Adventist and we are working with them to provide support however we can,” the Butte County Office of Education said in a statement.

Assemblyman James Gallagher, R-Yuba City, said in a statement his heart breaks for everyone affected by this tragedy and is grateful for law enforcement. He added the community will be “hugging our loved ones closer today as we pray for the victims and try to make sense of something so senseless.”

“We will never understand why or how someone could do a thing like this,” Gallagher said.

Honea said the FBI is assisting in the investigation. The FBI in a post to X confirmed it is “providing support.”

“I hope that people can appreciate how tough this is for the students of the school, the faculty of the school, the members of this community, all the first responders,” Honea told news reporters. “We’re doing everything we can to determine what happened in addition to making sure that everybody is safe.”

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