Tom Pappert, lead reporter at The Tennessee Star, said the use of metal detectors inside Antioch High School in Nashville may have prevented the deadly shooting that took place at the school on Wednesday morning.
17-year old Solomon Henderson, an African American male student of Antioch High School, is suspected of opening fire inside the school’s cafeteria on Wednesday morning, striking two students before turning the gun on himself, according to the Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) and reported by The Star.
Two students were struck by the suspected shooter’s gunfire, one who has since been identified as 16-year-old Josselin Correa Escalante, who was pronounced deceased at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, and another who was grazed in the arm.
It has since been confirmed by MNPD that two School Resource Officers (SROs) were present at the school of approximately 2,131 students during the shooting but were not near the cafeteria when it took place.
In the hours following the shooting, a source familiar with Metro Nashville Public Schools (MNPS) told The Star that metal detectors were previously installed at Antioch High School at one point during the COVID-19 pandemic, but that they were removed sometime prior to Wednesday’s shooting.
When asked by reporters if metal detectors were used inside the school, MNPS superintendent Dr. Adrienne Battle replied, “While past research has shown they have had limitations and unintended consequences, we will continue to explore emerging technologies and strategies to strengthen school safety.”
On Thursday’s edition of The Michael Patrick Leahy Show, Pappert, who has been in contact with MNPD and MNPS regarding questions surrounding the shooting, pointed out how the unclear answers from the superintendent in regards to metal detectors comes as the technology has been denounced by social justice groups on the grounds of “racism.”
“I Googled ‘Are metal detectors racist’ and there is a significant strain of left wing, anti police, defund the police groups that say that having metal detectors, and even having school resource officers at public schools, is racist because, for whatever reason, African American people tend to be disproportionately affected by metal detectors picking up prohibited items and by school resource officers making arrests on campus,” Pappert explained.
“So I think it is entirely possible that the nine member radical left-wing school board [of Metro Nashville Schools] could have taken this point of view and maybe that is why we’re not getting a response, because this may have been prevented had they not decided the metal detectors are racist,” Pappert added.
Antioch High School’s minority student enrollment is 85 percent, according to data provided by the Tennessee Department of Education, and the school’s overall letter grade determined by the Department of Education’s State Report Card is a D rating.
Moving forward, Pappert said he will continue to press MNPD and MNPS on questions surrounding school security, specifically to clarify why metal detectors were pulled from the school and why there were only two SROs inside the school at the time of the shooting.
“Were there metal detectors? If they were removed, why? I would also like to know – not to blame these school resource officers, I’m sure they did everything they could with 2,200 some students – but why were they nowhere near the cafeteria during what was apparently lunchtime? These are very, very strange circumstances,” Pappert said.
Pappert said he will also be looking into the suspected shooter’s background when it comes to possible treatment for or history of any mental health disorders.
“I think I want to know exactly what this student’s history was. If they’ve been speaking with guidance counselors, if they were part of any mental health arrangements. I think this is all information that should be released, and it shouldn’t be controversial to release it to us,” Pappert said.
Watch the full interview:
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Kaitlin on X / Twitter.
Photo “High School Metal Detector” by Marshall County Schools.
