San Bernardino holds vigil for school community after deadly shooting

SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. – After two people were killed in a shooting at a classroom in a San Bernardino elementary school on Monday, the city held a prayer service for the victims and the school community at Our Lady of the Assumption.

Police idenitifed the suspected shooter as Cedric Anderson, 53, who fatally shot his 53-year-old estranged wife Karen Smith, a teacher, inside North Park Elementary School before killing himself. Two students inside the classroom where the shooting occured were struck by bullets. One of them is an 8-year-old boy, who died after being airlifted from the school. The other, a 9-year-old boy, is reported in stable condition at the hospital.

The police chief Jarrod Burguan said the incident is suspected to be a “murder-suicide” attempt, the BBC reports.

There have been several shootings at schools in the United States in recent years.

In December 2013 an individual opened fire at Arapahoe High School in the Denver suburb of Centennial, and in December 2012 a gunman killed 20 children and six adult staff members at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., as well as his mother and himself.

San Bernardino is also the site of a December 2015 mass shooting in which a couple killed 14 and wounded 21 others at a social services facility.

(Story from the Catholic News Agency)

Pray Service @ OL of the Assumption after tragic shooting today at NorthPark Elem."Serve, heal & protect them O Lord" pic.twitter.com/Jqi1jIZrPr

— SanBernardinoDiocese (@sbdiocese) April 11, 2017

Our Lady of the Assumption Church filling up for prayer vigil following shooting at North Park Elementary in San Bernardino @VVDailyPress pic.twitter.com/f1lF8quvPi

— Charity Lindsey (@DP_Charity) April 11, 2017