In a shocking incident from the Southern Brazilian city of Cambe, at least one student has died and another remains critically injured after an ex-student opened fire in Professora Helena Kolody public school, according to reports. The accused, a former student, allegedly wanted to recover his school documents, as per Cambe spokesperson Thiago Mossini.
The former student, who is in his 20's, was stopped by a school employee after he started the shooting spree. He was later arrested by police officials, Mossini told the media.
While the dead student was reportedly a 15-year-old girl, the critical student is a 14-year-old.
Parana state Governor has declared three days of mourning and has sent his public safety and education secretaries to Cambe, which is home to 108,000 people and is located some 400 kilometers (250 miles) away from the state's capital city of Curitiba.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva also condemned the attack.
"I receive with great sadness and indignation the news of the attack on the Colégio Estadual Professora Helena Kolody, in Cambé, Paraná. Yet another young life taken away by the hatred and violence that we can no longer tolerate within our schools and society. It is urgent that we build together a path to peace in schools. My condolences and prayers to the family and school community," said the tweet by Silva.
Similar to The United States, a country with some of the highest number of mass shootings in the world especially in its schools, Brazil has also been seeing a large number of school attacks since the past few years.
In the past four years, Southern America’s largest nation has seen 18 school attacks. Around 30 people have been killed and dozens wounded.
In the last fourteen months alone, Brazil has recorded violent incidents in its schools when man axed four children to death Southern Brazil, while another thirteen year old student stabbed teacher to death and wounded five others in a Sao Paulo school.
While back in November 2022, a shooter with a semi-automatic pistol and a bulletproof vest shot two teachers and a student dead, and wounded at 13 others, at two different schools in southeastern Brazil.
