Richland High School shooting

Last updated
Richland High School shooting
Part of school shootings in the United States
Location Lynnville, Tennessee, United States
DateNovember 15, 1995 (CST)
Attack type
 School shooting
Weapons .22-caliber Remington Model 522 Viper semi-automatic rifle
Deaths2
Injured1
PerpetratorJames Ellison Rouse
MotiveRevenge for poor grades

The Richland High School shooting was a school shooting that occurred on Wednesday, November 15, 1995, [1] in Lynnville, Tennessee, a small community located in Giles County. Seventeen-year-old James Ellison "Jamie" Rouse, a senior student at the school, killed one teacher and one student, and seriously wounded another teacher. [2]

Contents

Shooting

Rouse used a .22-calibre Remington Viper semi-automatic rifle, [3] which he hid behind bushes before driving to retrieve his friend. His friend Stephen Abbot drove Jamie Rouse the rest of the way to Richland High School. He parked the car outside the school, and Rouse entered through the north entrance hallway. Inside the hallway he confronted teachers Carolyn Yancey and Carolyn Foster. [4]

He then shot both teachers in the head in the view of over fifty students in the hallway. He then aimed his rifle at football coach Ron Shirey; however, he missed and fatally shot freshman Diane Collins in the throat. He was then tackled by a male student and an agriculture teacher, who forcibly took the rifle away from him. Carolyn Foster was killed by a gunshot wound to the head, while Carolyn Yancey survived in serious condition. [2]

Trial

Rouse was convicted as an adult of one count of first-degree murder, one count of second-degree murder, and one count of first-degree attempted murder. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole plus 42 years. [5] Stephen Abbott was convicted of criminal responsibility for second degree murder and criminal response for attempted first and second degree murder as a judge decided Abbott knew what Jamie Rouse was planning because Rouse had told him, "It's going to happen today." Abbott was sentenced to 40 years in prison. [6]

Aftermath

Rouse is currently imprisoned in the South Central Correctional Facility. [7] [8] [9] [10] As of January 2016, he was up for resentencing due to the Supreme Court cases: Miller v. Alabama and Montgomery v. Louisiana which have banned juvenile offenders from getting a mandatory life without parole sentence and required those who were previously sentenced to life to be given a chance for a resentencing. [11] [12]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Giles County, Tennessee</span> County in Tennessee, United States

Giles County is a county located in the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2020 census, its population was 30,346. Its county seat is Pulaski.

Life imprisonment is any sentence of imprisonment for a crime under which convicted criminals are to remain in prison for the rest of their lives or indefinitely until pardoned, paroled, or commuted to a fixed term. Crimes that warrant life imprisonment are usually violent and/or dangerous. Examples of crimes that result in life sentences are murder, torture, terrorism, child abuse resulting in death, rape, espionage, treason, drug trafficking, drug possession, human trafficking, severe fraud and financial crimes, aggravated criminal damage, arson, kidnapping, burglary, and robbery, piracy, aircraft hijacking, and genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, severe cases of child pornography, or any three felonies in case of three-strikes law.

Lee Boyd Malvo, also known as John Lee Malvo, is a convicted murderer who, along with John Allen Muhammad, committed a series of murders dubbed the D.C. sniper attacks over a three-week period in October 2002. Malvo was aged 17 during the span of the shootings. Currently, he is serving multiple life sentences at Red Onion State Prison in Virginia, a supermax prison. Muhammad was executed in 2009.

The Frontier Middle School shooting was a school shooting that occurred on February 2, 1996, at Frontier Middle School in Moses Lake, Washington, United States. The gunman, 14-year-old Barry Dale Loukaitis, killed his algebra teacher and two students, and held his classmates hostage before a gym coach subdued him.

A school shooting occurred on November 8, 2005 at Campbell County Comprehensive High School in Jacksboro, Tennessee, United States, when a 15-year-old freshman student shot the school principal and two assistant principals. One assistant principal, Ken Bruce, died as a result of the shooting.

The W. R. Myers High School shooting was a school shooting that occurred on April 28, 1999, at W. R. Myers High School in Taber, Alberta, Canada. The gunman, 14-year-old school dropout Todd Cameron Smith, walked into his school and began firing at students in a hallway, then went to the central hub of the school in front of the band room, killed one student and wounded another one. It was the first fatal high-school shooting in Canada since the St. Pius X High School shooting, 24 years earlier.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Central High School (Knoxville, Tennessee)</span> Public secondary school in Knoxville, Tennessee , United States

Central High School is a public high school located at 5321 Jacksboro Pike in the Fountain City neighborhood of Knoxville, Tennessee, operated by the Knox County school system.The school's athletic teams are nicknamed the Bobcats, and its colors are red and black.

On January 27, 2001, Dartmouth College professors Half and Susanne Zantop, aged 62 and 55 respectively, were stabbed to death at their home in Etna, New Hampshire. Originally from Germany, the couple had been teaching at Dartmouth since the 1970s. High school classmates James J. Parker, age 16, and Robert W. Tulloch, age 17, were charged with first-degree murder.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Murders of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom</span> 2007 carjacking, rape, and murder of a couple in Knoxville, Tennessee

In the United States, life imprisonment is amongst the most severe punishments provided by law, depending on the state, and second only to the death penalty. Many U.S. states can release a convict on parole after a decade or more has passed, but in California, people sentenced to life imprisonment can normally apply for parole after seven years. The laws in the United States categorize life sentences as "determinate life sentences" or "indeterminate life sentences," the latter indicating the possibility of an abridged sentence, usually through the process of parole. For example, sentences of "15 years to life," "25 years to life," or "life with mercy" are called "indeterminate life sentences", while a sentence of "life without the possibility of parole" or "life with no mercy" is called a "determinate life sentence". The potential for parole is not assured but discretionary, making it an indeterminate sentence. Even if a sentence explicitly denies the possibility of parole, government officials may have the power to grant an amnesty to reprieve, or to commute a sentence to time served.

The Bethel Regional High School shooting was a school shooting that occurred on February 19, 1997, at Bethel Regional High School in Bethel, Alaska. Two people were killed and two people were wounded by 16-year-old student Evan Ramsey. Ramsey is serving two 99-year prison sentences and will be eligible for parole in 2066 when he is 85.

Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48 (2010), was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States holding that juvenile offenders cannot be sentenced to life imprisonment without parole for non-homicide offenses.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Murder of Jason Sweeney</span> 2003 murder in Pennsylvania, United States

Jason Keel Sweeney was a construction worker from Fishtown, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, who at the age of 16 was murdered by four teenagers for his paycheck on May 30, 2003. The perpetrators included a girl he was dating and his best friend since childhood. Due to the manner in which Sweeney was murdered, the ages of the teens involved, and the seeming indifference of the perpetrators, the crime received national media coverage.

The murder of Cassie Jo Stoddart took place in Pocatello, Idaho on September 22, 2006, when Cassie Jo Stoddart, a student at Pocatello High School, was stabbed to death by classmates Brian Lee Draper and Torey Michael Adamcik. Both perpetrators received sentences of life imprisonment without parole on August 21, 2007.

Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460 (2012), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that mandatory sentences of life without the possibility of parole are unconstitutional for juvenile offenders. The ruling applied even to those persons who had committed murder as a juvenile, extending beyond Graham v. Florida (2010), which had ruled juvenile life without parole sentences unconstitutional for crimes excluding murder.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anthony Kirkland</span> American serial killer on death row

Anthony Kirkland is an American serial killer. Between 2006 and 2009, Kirkland murdered two women and two girls in the Cincinnati area, following a 16-year prison term for the 1987 killing of his girlfriend.

Montgomery v. Louisiana, 577 U.S. 190 (2016), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that its previous ruling in Miller v. Alabama (2012), that a mandatory life sentence without parole should not apply to persons convicted of murder committed as juveniles, should be applied retroactively. This decision potentially affects up to 2,300 cases nationwide.

On March 31, 2015, Marie Belcastro, aged 94, was murdered in her Niles, Ohio home by Jacob Larosa, her 15-year-old neighbor. Larosa, who had numerous prior cases in juvenile court, had been released from a juvenile detention facility hours before. He broke into Belcastro’s residence, and, using a MAG flashlight, beat her to death. Larosa also attempted to rape Belcastro. In 2018, Larosa pleaded no contest to charges of aggravated burglary, aggravated robbery, attempted rape, and aggravated murder. Later that year, he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. In 2021, a new Ohio law, Senate Bill 256, retroactively reduced his sentence, making him eligible for parole after 25 years. The change to Larosa’s sentence has led to controversy and calls for changes to Senate Bill 256. As of 2022, Larosa’s parole hearing is scheduled for 2040.

References

  1. ↑ LAURIE GOODSTEIN and WILLIAM GLABERSON (April 10, 2000). "The Well-Marked Roads to Homicidal Rage". New York Times.
  2. 1 2 Meyer, Richrd E. (April 22, 2000). "When The Shooting Stops". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved December 17, 2016.
  3. ↑ "School Killers — The List — Crime Library". March 10, 2014. Archived from the original on March 10, 2014. Retrieved December 4, 2020.
  4. ↑ Rebecca Leung. "The mind of a school killer". 48 Hours. CBS News.
  5. ↑ Violence Goes to School Archived October 21, 2014, at the Wayback Machine
  6. ↑ "When The Shooting Stops". Los Angeles Times. April 22, 2000.
  7. ↑ "U.S. Supreme Court rules on juvenile offenders". Columbia Daily Herald. January 25, 2016. Retrieved July 12, 2021.
  8. ↑ Mass Shootings in America: Understanding the Debates, Causes, and Responses. ABC-CLIO. May 25, 2018. ISBN   9781440856259.
  9. ↑ "Richland High School shooting. The Richland High School shooting was a school shooting that occurred on Wednesday, November 15, 1995, in Lynnville, Tennessee, A".
  10. ↑ "'Relearn school': Discipline amid pandemic dominates concerns at Maury County schools".
  11. ↑ "U.S. Supreme Court rules on juvenile offenders". The Daily Herald. Retrieved December 4, 2020.
  12. ↑ "James Ellison Rouse v. State of Tennessee | Tennessee Administrative Office of the Courts". www.tncourts.gov. Retrieved December 4, 2020.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.