2 faculty members shot at Denver’s East High School, police seek public’s help in finding suspect

A student at Denver’s East High School shot and wounded two administrators Wednesday while the teen was undergoing a required daily search for weapons, then fled the building, authorities said.

Denver police identified the suspect as 17-year-old Austin Lyle. The teenager was still at large Wednesday evening and is wanted for attempted homicide. Just before 6 p.m., police said Lyle’s vehicle had been found in Park County and the search was ongoing.

The latest incident of gun violence at East in recent weeks inflamed frustration about safety at the school, where students have this year endured the shooting death of a classmate, threats of violence and lockdowns.

East hasn’t had Denver police assigned to the school since Denver Public Schools’ Board of Education removed all school resource officers following the national reckoning over the murder of George Floyd in 2020.

But DPS Superintendent Alex Marrero suggested Wednesday that could change in the wake of the attack. He announced two armed officers will be at East for the rest of the school year, and said he was “committing” to have an armed officer at each high school in the district — despite the fact that it “likely violates” school board policy.

Students and parents identified the victims of Wednesday’s shooting as Dean of Culture Eric Sinclair and Jerald Mason, a restorative practice coordinator in the dean’s office.

Denver Health confirmed that both men were patients at the hospital Wednesday. Mason was listed in good condition and Sinclair in serious condition, hospital spokesperson Amber D’Angelo said.

The shooting Wednesday happened at about 9:50 a.m. in an office area away from students, officials said. Lyle was undergoing a search for weapons when a gun was discovered. The student then fired shots and “was able to get out of the school,” Denver police Chief Ron Thomas said.

Lyle, who previously was “removed” from Overland High School in Aurora over discipline issues, is required to be searched when he arrives at school every morning as part of what DPS officials described as a pre-existing safety plan because of his past behavior. But administrators had never before found a gun on him, police and school officials said.

Police said they took the unusual step of publicly identifying the juvenile after the attack “due to the public safety concern.”

“We don’t have any sense of where he is. We know where he lives,” Thomas said at a morning news briefing, lamenting “a very troubling situation” at East High School.

“The screaming was so horrible”

Senior Eliza Romero was in the school nurse’s office when she heard four bangs come from the room next door.

At first, she wasn’t sure whether they were gunshots. The 18-year-old had been wearing headphones and the noise was so much quieter than the bangs she heard last month when a 16-year-old student was shot outside of the school.

Romero looked to another student who was also in the room to see whether they also heard the noise. That student had a panicked look on their face. They’d both heard gunshots.

“Right as we had that realization, I saw people flooding out of the dean’s office,” Romero said. “I saw people screaming.”

A security officer sprinted into the nurse’s office and locked the door. Romero and the other student ran into a bathroom connected to the office and hid in a stall.

From their hiding spots, the students could hear screaming, police sirens and noise from walkie-talkies, Romero said.

“We were both just in there panicking, trying to help each other out,” she said.

After about 30 minutes, police officers came into the nurse’s office yelling, asking if anyone was in the room. They escorted the two students to the auditorium, where they stayed briefly before being moved to a classroom, Romero said.

“Hearing it happen and hearing the screaming was so horrible,” she added. “I haven’t really processed it at this point but it was so horrible.”

“We are all East High Angels”

Students said the two wounded administrators were both well-liked at school. Janaiya Hopper, an 18-year-old senior, saw them before a school assembly Wednesday. They wanted to hear about her 18th birthday, which she had celebrated on Friday.

“They were telling me they were so proud of me and they can’t wait to see me graduate,” Hopper said.

One administrator was in critical condition undergoing surgery when initially hospitalized Wednesday, Thomas said.

Paramedics were already in the school when the shooting happened because a student was suffering an allergic reaction, Mayor Michael Hancock said. Those paramedics were able to treat the shooting victims immediately, he said. The mayor called that “lucky” and said the quick medical treatment might have saved a life.

Gov. Jared Polis wished the administrators speedy recoveries while speaking at a news conference about new legislation at the Capitol.

“Today, we are all East High Angels,” Polis said.

School officials placed East on lockdown following the shooting, and students later were let out during a controlled release. Classes at East were canceled for the remainder of the week, Marrero said during a news briefing.

Parents waited outside yellow police tape at the school Wednesday to collect students, craning their necks to spot their children.

“I’m sad, frustrated, upset, alarmed,” said Julie Siekmeier, a parent of an East High School senior. “Although the kids are almost numb to it.”

Jamela Brown hugs her 18-year-old daughter, Janaiya, outside East High School. “I don’t want to come back to school,” Janaiya said as tears streamed. pic.twitter.com/rR3M8hVRIX

— Noelle Phillips (@Noelle_Phillips) March 22, 2023

Recent shootings, threats at East

Students at East have spoken out in recent weeks about no longer feeling safe on campus after their classmate was fatally shot about a month ago. Luis Garcia, a junior, was sitting in his car near East when he was shot on Feb. 13. The 16-year-old died from his injuries more than two weeks later, on March 1.

After the February shooting, the school experienced multiple lockdowns and other alerts, students said. A weapon was found on campus the day after students returned to class.

Students have called on Denver Public Schools to respond more aggressively to the threat of violence. Earlier this month, they also walked out of their classrooms and to the Colorado State Capitol to advocate for gun legislation and safer schools.

“I feel like it’s something that everybody has to worry about here a lot,” said student Anae Hernandez, 15. “Because this is not like something that just happens once in a while. This is a recurring theme and it’s not something that should be going on.”

She was outside the school and walked up to see an ambulance and one of the wounded faculty members on a stretcher Wednesday. Someone told her there had been a shooting, so she ran to a nearby 7-Eleven convenience store to hide.

“It’s scary,” she said.

Marrero said two armed guards will be stationed at the high school when classes resume after spring break, and those guards will stay through the end of the school year.

“We’re looking forward to expanding that conversation to see how we can reestablish a relationship (with Denver police),” he said.

Denver’s elected school board voted in 2020 to remove police school resource officers from the district’s schools, arguing that having police in schools harmed students of color and perpetuated the school-to-prison pipeline.

The board issued a statement Wednesday evening saying it supported Marrero’s decision “to work in partnership with local law enforcement to create safer learning spaces across Denver Public Schools for the remainder of this school year.”

The statement did not address the future of school resource officers in DPS, and board President Xóchitl “Sochi” Gaytán did not respond to questions on the issue. The board is expected to hold a news conference Thursday.

UPDATE: Your #Denver Police Department continues working in conjunction with local, state and federal law enforcement partners to locate the suspect from today’s shooting at Denver East High School. Due to the public safety concern that he poses, the Department is identifying… pic.twitter.com/RmwO940Qug

— Denver Police Dept. (@DenverPolice) March 22, 2023

Prior discipline, removal from Overland

Lyle, the suspect in Wednesday’s shooting, had transferred to East from another district, Marrero said. Officials did not reveal why the student was being searched daily.

He previously attended Overland High in Aurora.

“He was disciplined for violation of board policies and was removed” from the school last academic year, Cherry Creek Schools spokesperson Lauren Snell said. She declined to say which policies were violated.

Marrero said safety plans for students are enacted in response to “past educational and also behavioral experiences,” adding that it’s a common practice throughout Colorado’s public schools.

But daily pat-downs are rare, said Matthew McClain with the Colorado School Counselor Association, and Franci Crepeau-Hobson, a University of Colorado Denver professor specializing in school violence prevention.

“Clearly they were concerned,” said Crepeau-Hobson. “I can’t imagine they’d do that if there wasn’t a history of the kid carrying a weapon for whatever reason.”

School safety plans are often imposed after students exhibit threatening or suicidal behavior, said Christine Harms, director of the Colorado School Safety Resource Center. A team that can include counselors, administrators and police officers assesses the possible threat and develops a safety plan, which can include mental health support, more supervision and searches, she said.

Pretty chaotic scene at 17th and Esplanade, where students are reuniting with their parents pic.twitter.com/ofUrtHf87C

— Shelly Bradbury (@ShellyBradbury) March 22, 2023

Rising teen violence in Denver

Denver teens have increasingly become both perpetrators and victims of gun violence over the last five years.

In 2022, five juveniles were arrested in connection to homicides and 11 others were arrested in connection to non-fatal shootings. Twelve juveniles were killed in homicides last year and 42 were injured in non-fatal shootings.

Gun possession by a minor has become the most common charge in Denver’s juvenile pre-trial services in recent years.The Denver District Attorney’s Office has filed an increasing number of charges for juveniles in possession of handguns. In 2022, the office filed 115 cases — up 47% from the 78 cases filed in 2017 and up 150% from the 46 filed in 2016.

Experts have said that teens often arm themselves out of fear for their safety.

Ben Roy, father to a senior, said this year has been “relentless” for East students.

“It feels like every other week there’s been a perimeter lockdown. It’s just constant,” he said outside the police line on Wednesday.

“I think what scares them, for my son, is how little he reacts now,” he said. “He’s grown numb to it and at other times anxious. I hate this is the world we’ve made for them.”

Denver Post reporter Sam Tabachnik and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

Sign up to get crime news sent straight to your inbox each day.