Students Released From Lockdown At Magruder High School

Updated at 6:10 p.m.

ROCKVILLE, MD — Students were allowed to leave Magruder High School starting at 5 p.m. Friday following hours of lockdown after a male student was shot early Friday afternoon.

A 911 call about a student who was seriously injured was made at 12:57 p.m. and the lockdown started at 1:05 p.m., authorities said.

The school said it would start to dismiss students from the building at 5 p.m. and dismissal would continue through 6 p.m. Students getting on buses were to be dismissed first, and parents waiting to pick up their children were told to do so at the stadium parking lot, according to a letter from the district.

"Dismissal must proceed in an orderly manner to ensure safety as we reunite families with our students," the letter said. "Our goal is to facilitate students’ exiting the building as quickly as possible, but we ask families to be patient as we coordinate with our police partners who remain onsite."

The student who was shot was found seriously injured in a bathroom and was taken to a hospital Friday afternoon, NBC and Montgomery County police reported. The teen was in surgery and was in serious condition, police Chief Marcus Jones said at a news conference Friday evening.

Police officers searched the building for the suspected shooter, Jones said. "We believed at the time the student was not a danger to other students,” he added.

The suspect was found in a classroom about 3 p.m. with a gun nearby, WTOP reported.

Officials said the suspect — who is also a student at the school — was in custody. Jones said he did not know the grade level of the arrested student or the shooting victim. Neither was identified.

Jones said investigators were working to determine if the student was shot inside the bathroom or elsewhere inside the school building.

Superintendent Monifa McKnight said the incident was traumatic for students, staff and their families.

Guns and gun violence are a scourge in the county and nationwide, she said.

“We need to keep guns out of our school, but also out of the hands of young people in the community,” McKnight said, WTOP reported.

A crisis management team will be available at the school for anyone who needs it over the weekend and next week.

A worried parent told The Washington Post earlier in the afternoon that her daughter "said she’s OK, and I’m lockdown in a class,” Marina Joya said. "The school has given no information except that something happened. Nothing.”