BULVERDE, Texas – More than two weeks after a shooting inside a Bulverde classroom left a teacher wounded and a student dead, Comal ISD is facing growing questions about why it has not released basic information \u2014 including the names of the teacher and the student who fired the gun.<\/p>\n
The shooting happened on March 30 at Hill Country College Preparatory School. Authorities have said a 15-year-old boy shot a teacher before taking his own life.<\/p>\n
Comal ISD Superintendent Dr. John Chapman addressed the mounting questions in a video the district released last night, saying federal privacy laws prevent the district from releasing the names of the teacher or the gunman.<\/p>\n
\u201cSpecifically, FERPA, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, provides a privacy protection for students at the elementary and secondary do not expire upon the death of a minor. Those rights rest with the student’s parents,\u201d Chapman said.<\/p>\n
Attorney Joe Hoelscher said that after major tragedies, the public often pushes for more information.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhenever we have a major tragedy like this, people want more information,\u201d Hoelscher said.<\/p>\n
Hoelscher said FERPA \u2014 the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act \u2014 includes exceptions, and he does not believe it would shield the shooter\u2019s identity or broader information about campus safety.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt wouldn’t protect general information about the campus, its security, and it wouldn’t protect the identity of a shooter, somebody who committed a criminal offense,\u201d Hoelscher said.<\/p>\n
He added that while information tied to the teacher\u2019s medical condition would be protected, there is still significant public interest in what the district is doing to address school safety.<\/p>\n
\u201cGeneral information about the campus’s security and what the campus is going to be doing to move forward to enhance security in the wake of a shooting is really important for parents,\u201d Hoelscher said.<\/p>\n
The Comal County Sheriff\u2019s Office was asked whether there is any law preventing it from releasing the shooter\u2019s name, but it has not responded to that request.<\/p>\n
Abel Pena, who spent more than 20 years with the FBI, said discretion can be critical during sensitive criminal investigations.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere’s always things going on behind the scenes. It’s just law enforcement is not going to publicize everything. They’re not going to put out there every step of what they’re doing,\u201d Pena said.<\/p>\n
An update has been confirmed about the teacher who was wounded: She was released from the hospital last week. No additional information was provided about her condition.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BULVERDE, Texas – More than two weeks after a shooting inside a Bulverde classroom left a teacher wounded…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":253373,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[82,84,83],"class_list":{"0":"post-253372","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-antonio","8":"tag-san-antonio","9":"tag-san-antonio-headlines","10":"tag-san-antonio-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253372","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=253372"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253372\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/253373"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=253372"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=253372"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=253372"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}