Student, 13, shoots self at Oklahoma junior high school

A 13-year-old Oklahoma boy shot himself to death Wednesday in front of classmates after showing up at his junior high school dressed as the super-villain Two Face from the Batman series.

The student, Cade Poulos, used a handgun to commit suicide in a crowded hallway at Stillwater Junior High School, cops said.

“It doesn’t appear that anyone else was in danger or threatened,” said Stillwater Police Capt. Randy Dickerson, adding that the school and a nearby elementary school were put on lockdown as a precaution.

Dickerson said a school resource officer heard the gunshot just before the 8 a.m. school bell sounded and found the red-headed eighth-grader dead in a hallway.

Cops were investigating where the student obtained the gun.

Shocked classmates told KOCO-TV that Wednesday was Superhero Dress-up Day, but could not explain why Poulos came to school as Two Face, the ally-turned-nemesis of Batman in the DC Comics series.

Stillwater Junior High students reacted with shock when 13-year-old Poulos shot and killed himself in a hallway. One student wrote on a Facebook page memorializing him, “I hope people realize now that bullying is NOT acceptable, and it hurts people every way. We know what you experienced.”

Some students suggested Poulos was despondent over being bullied.

On a Facebook page memorializing him, one classmate wrote, “I hope people realize now that bullying is NOT acceptable, and it hurts people every way. We know what you experienced.”

Dickerson said police have yet to confirm that Poulas had been bullied.

The nearby shopping center where students were picked up by their parents following a suicide shooting at a school in Stillwater, Okla. “Everyone thought it was a joke at first,” ninth-grader Ashlyn Lundholm says. “Then I heard people screaming. Then we went to lockdown for 35 to 40 minutes.”

“He was a good student,” said Stillwater Public Schools Superintendent Ann Caine said at a press conference. “There was nothing in (our) computer that a bullying incident had been reported.”

Classes at the 760-pupil school were canceled and grief counselors were made available to students.

Dickerson said many students were in the hallway when the suicide occurred and likely witnessed the incident.

Kenny Monday told The Associated Press that he'd just dropped off his son, Kennedy, when he heard about the incident. Monday said his son heard the gunshot but did not witness the shooting.

 

“It’s so sad that the kid lost his life, but we’re just glad he didn't shoot anyone else,” Monday said.

Stillwater Junior High sent a statement to parents saying there had been a “single shooting incident” at the school and that staff and students — eighth and ninth graders — had been moved to a safe location. Parents were told to pick up their children at a nearby shopping center.

“Everyone thought it was a joke at first,” ninth-grader Ashlyn Lundholm told the Stillwater NewsPress. “Then I heard people screaming. Then we went to lockdown for 35 to 40 minutes.”

Dickerson told the NewsPress that “the hallway was probably full of kids” getting ready to go to class.

“I saw him on the ground,” said eighth-grader Aaron Veselak. “There was blood all around his head.”