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Colorado police say suspect dead after one injured in high school shooting Colorado high school gunman shot two students before killing himself
(35 minutes later)
At least one student was seriously injured on Friday when another student opened fire inside a Colorado high school on Friday. A student carried a shotgun into his Colorado high school on Friday, asked for a teacher by name and then shot two students before killing himself, law enforcement officers said.
Police said the suspect at Arapahoe high school, outside Denver, was found dead, apparently from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. They said he was trying to find a particular teacher. One student, a teenage girl, was transported in serious condition to hospital, from the scene at Arapahoe High School, south of Denver. A second student suffered a minor gunshot wound and was expected to be released from hospital later on Friday.
Law enforcement officers immediately converged on Arapahoe high school in Littleton when they received reports of shots fired inside the school, shortly before 1pm local time. “The shooter is dead as a result of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, so there are no immediate threats at this time,” Arahapoe county sheriff Grayson Robinson said, outside the school. “Unfortunately we have one student who was injured.”
Police said that a victim, a teenage girl, was in critical condition at Littleton hospital with a gunshot wound. Another student had a minor injury.  In a news conference on Friday afternoon, Colorado governor John Hickenlooper condemned "this all-too-familiar sequence, where you have gunshots, and parents racing to the school and this unspeakable horror in a place of learning".
“The shooter is dead as a result of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, so there are no immediate threats at this time,” Arahapoe county sheriff Grayson Robinson said outside the school. “Unfortunately we have one student who was injured.” The high school is about 15 minutes from Columbine High School, the site of a 1999 shooting in which two gunmen killed 12 pupils, a teacher and themselves. The incident took place a day before the one-year anniversary of a shooting incident at Sandy Hook elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, in which 20 children, six staff, the shooter and his mother died.
One student was transported in serious condition with a gunshot wound to nearby Littleton hospital, Robinson said. During a police sweep of the school, a second student with a “minor” wound was discovered. Police said the wound may not have been caused by a gun.  Police described a chilling sequence of events at Arapahoe after the shooter, who police said they had identified but whose name they did not release, entered the school by a West entrance.
Only one weapon appeared to be used in the shooting and it had been recovered, Robinson said. There was no evidence of any more suspects, but that possibility remained a line of inquiry. The suspect and confirmed gunshot victim had been identified, he said, but did not disclose their names. "The student that was armed with a shotgun as he entered the west side of Arapahoe, immediately asked for the location of this specific teacher, and asked for that teacher by name," Robinson said. "The student that entered the high school was armed with a shotgun. He made no effort to hide it or conceal it.
Police entered the school shortly after initial reports of shots fired at 12.33pm local time, Robinson said. Dozens of law enforcement vehicles converged outside the school shortly after the first reports Response protocols for an active shooting were put into effect immediately, Robinson said. These called for students to stay inside classrooms even after the danger had passed. "Word got around immediately that he was looking for the teacher." 
“They were safer in their locked classrooms than they would have been outside,” he said. “That’s part of our protocol.” When he heard he was the target, the teacher left the school, the sheriff said. "He took himself away from the school, with an effort to try to take the shooter with him," Robinson said.
After the shooting, officers searched students exiting the school, took their names and were in the process of loading them on buses to be taken to a nearby church, where they would be united with their families, Robinson said. The student in serious condition was probably not targeted by the shooter, the sheriff said. "The student was simply in the area with the shooter, and was shot at the time the shooter came through the school," he said.
The Arapahoe sheriff said there were reports that during the shooting, the shooter had declared the name of a teacher the shooter wished to confront. “That teacher was informed of the situation and exited the school quickly,” Robinson said. Police entered the school shortly after initial reports of shots fired were made at 12.33pm local time. Dozens of law enforcement vehicles converged outside the school shortly after the first reports.
He said Arapahoe high school had not seen “issues of concern...this week or in the immediate past future.” Robinson said officers had found the shooter’s body in a classroom “quite a ways into the school”, within 20 minutes of the report of the shooting.
Journalists at the scene described chaos as hundreds of students filed out of the school and parents began to arrive and try to reach their children by phone. Arapahoe High School is part of the Littleton school district, in the Denver suburb of Centennial. It has approximately 2,100 students.
The high school is about 15 minutes from Columbine high school, the site of an infamous 1999 shooting in which two gunman killed 13 and themselves. The incident took place a day before the one-year anniversary of a shooting incident at Sandy Hook elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, in which 20 children, six staff, the shooter and his mother died.  "Those [active shooter] protocols, unfortunately, have had to be used far, far, far too many times in the state of Colorado, and across the United States,” Robinson said.
Arapahoe high school is part of the Littleton school district, in the Denver suburb of Centennial. The high school has roughly 2,100 students.
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