Jenefer3
04-10-2009, 02:57 PM
DEARBORN, Mich. — Two students were killed Friday in an apparent murder-suicide that prompted a lockdown at a community college west of Detroit, police said.
The bodies of 28-year-old man and 20 year-old woman were discovered in a room at a Henry Ford Community College building after police responded to an emergency call of a gunshot on campus, said Dearborn Deputy Police Chief Gregg Brighton.
As officers entered the MacKenzie Fine Arts Center, they heard another gunshot, Brighton said.
The man used a shotgun to kill the woman and then turned the gun on himself, he said.
Brighton declined to release their names but said they took at least one class together, which had met earlier in the day.
The 17,000-student commuter school sent alerts through an e-mail and cell phone system and locked down the campus, said Marjorie Swan, Henry Ford's vice president/controller.
"Nothing like this has ever occurred on campus," Swan said.
She said the campus wasn't as busy as usual, based on how full the parking lots appeared. The shooting occurred on Good Friday.
Swan said officials would decide later Friday if classes would be held Saturday morning.
"Our hearts go out to the family and the friends of the young woman who lost her life today," Swan said.
Christian Plonka, a 12-year-old who attends a theater program in the building, said he heard "one gunshot, and I saw someone getting pulled back into the room they were in."
Plonka and other students in the program ran into a parking lot at the adjacent University of Michigan-Dearborn campus, where they waited until police allowed them to leave.
Earlier Friday, a 19-year-old gunman wounded three people at a vocational training college in Athens, Greece, before killing himself, authorities said.
The shootings came a week after a man walked into the American Civic Association center in Binghamton, N.Y., and killed 14 people before turning the gun on himself.
The bodies of 28-year-old man and 20 year-old woman were discovered in a room at a Henry Ford Community College building after police responded to an emergency call of a gunshot on campus, said Dearborn Deputy Police Chief Gregg Brighton.
As officers entered the MacKenzie Fine Arts Center, they heard another gunshot, Brighton said.
The man used a shotgun to kill the woman and then turned the gun on himself, he said.
Brighton declined to release their names but said they took at least one class together, which had met earlier in the day.
The 17,000-student commuter school sent alerts through an e-mail and cell phone system and locked down the campus, said Marjorie Swan, Henry Ford's vice president/controller.
"Nothing like this has ever occurred on campus," Swan said.
She said the campus wasn't as busy as usual, based on how full the parking lots appeared. The shooting occurred on Good Friday.
Swan said officials would decide later Friday if classes would be held Saturday morning.
"Our hearts go out to the family and the friends of the young woman who lost her life today," Swan said.
Christian Plonka, a 12-year-old who attends a theater program in the building, said he heard "one gunshot, and I saw someone getting pulled back into the room they were in."
Plonka and other students in the program ran into a parking lot at the adjacent University of Michigan-Dearborn campus, where they waited until police allowed them to leave.
Earlier Friday, a 19-year-old gunman wounded three people at a vocational training college in Athens, Greece, before killing himself, authorities said.
The shootings came a week after a man walked into the American Civic Association center in Binghamton, N.Y., and killed 14 people before turning the gun on himself.