A sixth-grade student was killed and five others were wounded in a shooting at a school in Iowa on Thursday.
The wounded included four students at Perry Middle School and High School, as well as a school administrator.
Responding officers reportedly located the shooter lying on the ground with an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
SEE MORE: 6th-grade student killed, 5 others wounded in Iowa school shooting
Scripps News spoke with Xavier Hibbert, a student who was present in the building at the time of the shooting.
Hibbert describes how he and his friends realized the shooting had started, and hid in a classroom as students have been trained to do.
"He looked at me through the crack he opened his duffel bag and hooked it up. And right away I stood there for a couple more minutes and my body just told me you're not supposed to be here. Leave," said Hibbert.
He was able to escape the building through a second exit in the classroom, helping other students as he went."Life is fleeting," Hibbert said. "You kind of grasp that when you're twenty feet, at best, away from someone who could potentially put a bullet in you. So life is fleeting, and don't take anything for granted, because anything can happen."
The suspect's friends say he shouldn't have done what he did, but they say he was bullied relentlessly.
"There were times at the bus stop where they just pick on him all the time and he'd just leave them alone. He wouldn't do anything. He wouldn't say anything. He'd leave them alone. And then it started getting bad when they started picking on his sister, his baby sister," said Khamya Hall, a student.
Trending stories at Scrippsnews.com
