Wisconsin school shooter used only one of two handguns, police chief says

The Wisconsin yeshiva shooter had two handguns on her but only used one The attack that killed a teacher and a student The city’s police chief told The Associated Press on Wednesday that the attack wounded six others.

Madison Police Chief Shawn Barnes said police were still investigating what led the 15-year-old student at Abundant Life Christian School in Madison to fatally shoot her fellow student and teacher on Monday, before turning the gun on herself. .

The other two students who were shot remained in critical condition on Wednesday.

“We may never know what she was thinking that day, but we will do our best to try to add or provide as much information to our public as possible,” Barnes said.

The student who was killed was identified in an obituary released Wednesday as Ruby Patricia Vergara, 14, of Madison. She was a freshman and “an avid reader, who loved art, singing and playing keyboard in the family worship band,” according to the obituary.

The name of the dead teacher was not revealed.

Barnes released the name of the shooter, Natalie “Samantha” Robinau, hours after the shooting on Monday.

Barnes said the coroner will release the names of those killed, but state law prohibits revealing the names of those injured.

Police, with assistance from the FBI, are examining online records and other resources and speaking with the attacker’s parents and associates to try to determine a motive, Barnes said.

He added that police do not know whether anyone was targeted or whether the attack was planned in advance.

While Robinau had two handguns, Barnes said he did not know how she obtained them and declined to say who bought them, citing the ongoing investigation.

No decisions have been made on whether Robinau’s parents could be charged in connection with the shooting, but they have been cooperative, Barnes said.

Online court records do not show any criminal cases against her father, Jeffrey Rubino, or her mother, Melissa Rubino. They were divorced and shared custody of their daughter, but she lived primarily with her father, according to court documents. Divorce records indicate Natalie was in therapy in 2022, but don’t say why.

Female shooters are rare

The shooting was the latest of dozens across the United States in recent years, including particularly deadly shootings in Newtown, Connecticut; Parkland, Florida; And Uvalde, Texas.

But the Madison attack is considered exceptional, as studies indicate that only about 3% of all mass shootings in the United States are committed by women.

School shootings have become an almost daily occurrence in the United States, with 322 cases occurring this year, according to the K-12 School Shootings Database. That’s the second-highest total in any year since 1966 — bested only by last year’s 349.

School shootings by teenage girls are extremely rare in the United States, with most being carried out by males in their teens and 20s, said David Redman, founder of the K-12 School Shooting Database.

Emily Salisbury, an associate professor of social work at the University of Utah, studies criminology and gender. She said that females usually take their anger out on themselves because American culture has taught them that women do not hurt people, which leads to eating disorders, self-harm and depression.

Salisbury said it is difficult to speculate without knowing all the facts in Robinau’s case, but that the girl resorting to the level of violence she showed indicates that she has been severely traumatized or has suffered violence herself.

“It requires more provocation, more incitement to girls and women to engage in violence,” Salisbury said. “There is a very high possibility that she has experienced some type of violence in her life that could lead to serious mental illness.”

Abundant Life is a non-denominational Christian school — pre-K through high school — with about 420 students.

Salisbury said the public should not assume that the school’s religious teachings mean its students are above bullying and ostracizing each other.

“They’re kids,” Salisbury said. “As much as these (religious) values ​​are taught or discussed in the classroom in the culture of that school, children are online all the time. Children are creating their own culture through social media.”