A 16-year-old man opened fire on two schools on Friday in the southeastern state of Espírito Santo, killing at least three people and wounding 11 others.
The shooting took place in the city of Aracruz, with a population of 100,000, 600 kilometers northeast of Rio de Janeiro. The authorities said that three teachers and a student, whose age was not specified, were in serious condition.
Investigators said the attacker, whose face was covered, broke into the Primo Pitti school, which he had left in June.
The authorities stated that the attacker stormed the back gate of the school, entered the teachers’ room and opened fire on many teachers, killing two people and wounding nine others.
Television footage published by the media showed the young man entering the school with a weapon in his hand, while several people rushed to flee in the aftermath.
Then he went to a place not far away, to the Praia de Coqueral Education Center, which is a private school, where he killed a teenager and injured two people, before the police arrested him.
Civil Police Commissioner Joao Francisco Filho told a press conference that he “did not have a specific target” when he opened fire, but that he had been planning the attack “two years ago”.
The authorities said that the two weapons he used belonged to his father, who works as a policeman, and one of them is a service weapon. It stated that it was investigating whether the young man, who was undergoing “psychological treatment”, had links to one or more terrorist groups.
The young man was arrested at his home a few hours after the incident, and he surrendered, in cooperation with his parents, without showing any resistance. The mayor of Aracruz, Luis Carlos Coutinho, told CBN radio that there were two attackers.
The governor of the state of Espírito Santo, Renato Casagrande, declared three days of mourning.
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