On Thursday, January 26, four people were non-fatally shot at the McDonald’s just next to McCaskey campus. 

“I didn’t really believe it at first,” said McCaskey sophomore Mini Brigatti, who was in a car in the McDonald’s drive-through when the shooting happened. “The whole thing felt like a movie… I was super scared, and when I heard the first shot my heart dropped so fast. I instantly got this adrenaline rush and I was also super worried about my brother who was inside.”

Video footage from the incident shows a physical fight occurring inside the McDonald’s just before the sound of gunshots rings out. 

“I don’t want to say I wasn’t surprised, but I wasn’t surprised,” said Keagen Laureano Roman, a McCaskey freshman. “So many fights go down around here…it was bound to turn into something more.”

No arrests have yet been made in connection with the incident.

“Just like any crime, there’s an investigation that has to take place,” said McCaskey School Resource Officer Josiah King, who worked the McCaskey basketball game the night of the shooting but was not on the scene of the crime. “And you have to get all your ducks lined up in a row, so to speak, in order for you to go forward. Otherwise, if you make a bad arrest too soon, you know, bad guys can go free.”

It has not been confirmed by law enforcement whether or not the victims of the shooting were students at McCaskey. 

“Generally, when there’s victim information for any crime, it’s not released until you get some sort of permission from the people involved,” said Officer King. “As far as juveniles go, juvenile information is never released. Even when you read the newspaper they use initials, because they are not allowed to divulge anything when people are under 18.”

For many students, this incident is not the first time they’ve dealt with or heard about gun violence in their own communities. 

“People just become numb to it,” said Decklan Benson, a ninth grader at McCaskey. Around a month ago, Decklan had just gotten home when a shooting happened about a block away from his house.  It wasn’t hard for him to be at school on Friday, the day after the shooting, because, he said, “almost everybody I knew glossed over it like it was like every Tuesday.”

“When I was younger, I used to try and get my dad to take me hunting with him,” said Decklan. But after a SWAT team stormed a house in his neighborhood, “I never even asked him to go hunting again.”

There are many things that our school administrators do in order to keep us safe, but even with protocols and safety precautions, there can be no guarantee of absolute safety. 

“Unfortunately, there’s nothing you can do to prevent somebody from shooting at somebody,” said Officer King. “I will tell you things I tell my kids: if there’s a fight and it’s happening in front of you and it does not involve you, do not stay there. People are very emotional, you’re not sure what the people are capable of. And sometimes innocent people standing by get hurt. So if you see that, don’t watch your camera, don’t film it. Go away and tell somebody else about it and don’t hang around.”