Student Shot Outside Thomas Jefferson High School
A student was shot in a parking lot outside Thomas Jefferson High School March 21 after dismissal, Dallas ISD spokeswoman Robyn Harris said. Harris said the student was shot in the arm and taken to a local hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
Harris said Dallas ISD Police and the Dallas Police Department responded, directed the remaining students on campus back inside while they secured the scene, and once they determined there was no “active threat,” dismissed the remaining students.
Harris said the incident remains under investigation and declined to provide details about what led up to the shooting.
Dallas Fire-Rescue spokesman Jason Evans confirmed DFR responded to a 911 call for a gunshot wound at Thomas Jefferson High School at 4:41 p.m. March 21 and transported a person from the parking lot.
Thomas Jefferson High School and Walnut Hill International Leadership Academy have canceled school for Wednesday, March 22. The campus will still be providing meals for students from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. and on-campus counseling starting at 10 a.m.
Classes are set to resume March 23 with additional police presence on campus through the end of the week.
Thomas Jefferson High School students returned to the newly-renovated Walnut Hill Lane campus at the start of the semester after the campus was destroyed in an October 2019 tornado.
Gov. Greg Abbott sent a letter to Texas School Safety Center Director Dr. Kathy Martinez-Prather in June 2022 directing the center to conduct school safety reviews in the wake of the May 2022 shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde.
Bethany Erickson, senior digital editor at our sister publication D Magazine, contributed to this report.
Editor’s note: This story was updated at 9:15 p.m. March 21 to reflect that Thomas Jefferson High School and Walnut Hill International Leadership Academy will be closed March 22.
