A deputy sheriff’s son killed two people and injured four others at Florida State University on Thursday before being shot by officers and taken to the hospital, authorities said.
Police believe the gunman, the son of a Leon County sheriff’s deputy, acted alone, and the motive is unknown. The suspect had access to his mother’s handgun, which was previously her service weapon. According to them, she purchased it from the department and now uses it as a personal firearm.
“Unfortunately, her son had access to one of her weapons that was found at the scene,” Leon County Sheriff Walter McNeil said at the press conference.
The 20-year-old suspect, Phoenix Ikner, was believed to be a student at Florida State University in Tallahassee, according to Jason Trumbower, the university’s police chief. The two individuals who were killed were not students. Trumbower did not provide information about the four other people who were shot and injured.
When the gunman refused to surrender, responding officers shot him and arrested him, according to authorities. The four wounded victims, along with the gunman, were transported to the hospital with gunshot wounds.
Mass shootings on American school campuses have become a recurring tragedy in recent years. Thursday’s incident marked the second shooting on the FSU campus in 11 years. In 2014, a graduate opened fire early in the school’s main library, injuring two students and an employee while hundreds were studying for exams.
The shooting began around 11:50 a.m. local time (1550 GMT) near the student union building on the FSU campus. Students and faculty were instructed to shelter in place while police responded. More than 42,000 students attend classes on the main campus.
Student Max Jenkins described the shooter exiting the student union and firing four or five shots outside.
“He saw the maintenance guy who was waving everybody and probably heard him, so he turned and shot that way,” Jenkins said in a video posted on the Tallahassee Democrat newspaper website. “There’s a golf cart over here with a bullet hole in it.”
Chris Pento was on a tour of the university with his children and eating lunch in the student union building when shots rang out.
“It was surreal; people began running. “She just got trampled,” Pento told WCTV, referring to his daughter.
In addition to the handgun, authorities believe the suspect brought a shotgun onto campus, though it is unclear whether that weapon was used in the shooting.
Notable mass shootings at colleges or universities in recent years include the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre in Blacksburg, Virginia, which left 32 people dead and 23 injured.
In 2023, there were two college mass shootings, one at Michigan State University, which killed three students and injured at least five more. The other incident took place at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, where three faculty members were killed before a suspect died in a shootout with police.
