Shootout in schoolyard ends with arrest

While fire had residents worked up on the northside, it was gunfire that spread fear to some of our youngest citizens across the river. News 5’s Jacqueline Woods visited the yard of one southside school that was the scene of a mid morning shootout.

Nelma Mortis, Principal, Queen?s Square Anglican Primary School

?After the incident occurred more officers came into the yard with some big guns and I believe the children saw that and they were crying. Nobody wanted to go home. The teachers locked up their windows. The children were locked up. Some of them were under the desk screaming and was from all levels. It wasn?t only from the Infant division. It was Middle and Upper too. They were confused. We were in a state of confusion.?

Jacqueline Woods, Reporting

By this afternoon, it looked like the students at Queen?s Square Anglican Primary School had gotten over their scare, but this morning when a gunman ran into the compound and fired several shots at a policeman, things were not so calm. According to principal Nelma Mortis, at the time of the commotion, the Infants Division was on their break and out in the school yard. Mortis says she was meeting with a social worker inside her office when she heard the distinct sound of gunshots just outside of her window.

Nelma Mortis

?When I first heard the first set of shots which are like three rounds, I asked what happen and then I saw the social worker throwing herself on the ground and a present of mind told me it?s gunshot. So I stopped down behind my desk and I grabbed the phone and I called 911 to say that we were having some confusion in our schoolyard. But in the meantime I was looking through my window and I saw a guy with a white shirt and somebody with a darker coloured shirt like shuffle and running out the yard. I saw the smoke from the remaining gunshot.?

Mortis says as she managed to get up she saw a policeman running back from where she initially saw the gunman. Mortis says although she cannot say if the officer was armed, she remembers hearing what sounded like an exchange of gunfire.

Nelma Mortis

?I am almost sure I heard exchange of fire. It was two different shots. Apparently the criminals fired shots after the police officers and they in exchanges shot back. But if the officers did any shooting, it wasn?t in the direction of where our children could have been hurt.?

G. Michael Reid, Police Press Officer

?That is the big concern that it in fact these people seem to have no regard for the fact that children are around.?

According to police press officer, G. Michael Reid, the police did manage to shoot the suspect in his left foot and seized a Glock nine millimetre pistol which had one round of 9mm ammunition.

G. Michael Reid

?The police were on patrol when they observed an individual who, according to the police, were acting very suspiciously. They attempted to stop the guy to question him and he took off running. The police pursued and caught up with the guy somewhere around Supal Street. The individual pulled a handgun and fired several rounds. The police then returned fire and the individual was hit in the leg.?

Mortis says she is convinced that the first round of shootings occurred in the school yard. The suspect remains under police guard at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital.

Jacqueline Woods for News 5.

Police say because their suspect has not yet been charged they are not releasing his name at this time.