Becky Drury says she was shot while trying to shut a classroom door

Police: Another unnamed teacher threw a phone at John and was not injured

Becky Drury, a 54-year-old teacher at Silver Rail Elementary School in Bend, Oregon, said she went to see what was happening outside a special-education classroom on 15 October. After she spotted Griffin J John II, she tried to shut the door, but John shot her before she could help any of the children inside.

Drury made those remarks in a statement shared with US media, her first comments since the shooting. She said she fell to the floor after John shot her and could not help the children in the classroom.

“I did the only thing I could do, which was to pretend to be dead in the hope he would not shoot me again,” Drury said.

“Lying on the floor, I saw that my left hand was almost completely severed from the gunshot, and my other arm was also severely injured,” she said. “I could not get up, defend myself, or protect anyone else.”

Drury suffered serious but not life-threatening injuries.

Reports had emerged that another teacher threw herself on top of a student to protect the child during the shooting, but Drury said she wanted to clear the record about what happened on 15 October.

“I know there has been contradictory reporting about my actions that day, but the truth is I was shot before I had any chance to act,” she said in her statement.

Police gave a separate account of the unnamed teacher’s actions. They said the teacher attempted to disarm John by throwing her mobile phone, and police said she was not injured.

BBC News reported that a father of two other children at the school followed John inside and shot and killed him. A linked item in the BBC News report described a teacher as fighting the attacker before the armed father shot the attacker “multiple times.”

The shooting killed five-year-old Rhoam Summer, two other pupils ages 8 and 11, and 25-year-old teacher Megan Lambert.

Officials identified John as a 16-year-old former student at Silver Rail and as a student with special-education needs. Police had not shared a motive for the attack.

Drury described what happened in the classroom as “unimaginable.” “[L]ike so many in this community, my heart is broken for everyone affected by this tragedy,” she said.

Drury’s account advances MSI’s initial report of the 15 October shooting with her sequence at the classroom door, the injuries that prevented her from helping the children, and her effort to clarify contradictory reporting about her own actions.