Mother of Teen Behind Oregon School Shooting Breaks Down in Tears — As New Details Emerge About the Father Who Stopped Him

“I miss my boy. I’m so sorry.” Those were the words Shauntai Nickerson managed to say as she cried while speaking to a CNN reporter days after her sixteen-year-old son carried out a deadly shooting at an elementary school in Bend, Oregon. Her grief unfolded against a tragedy that had left three children and a young teacher dead, two others seriously wounded, and an entire community struggling to understand how an ordinary school day could end in such devastation. On Thursday, October 15, 2026, gunfire shattered the routine at Silver Rail Elementary School, sending children and teachers scrambling for safety as emergency calls reached police. The attacker, identified as Griffin J. John II, had once attended the same school and returned armed with a shotgun, entering a classroom where children with special educational needs were learning. His mother, speaking through tears from her balcony, apologized directly to the victims’ families and said she wished she could have prevented what happened. Investigators were still examining the teenager’s history, electronic devices, and access to the weapon, while the families of those ki.lled faced a loss no explanation could undo. Yet another family’s account was emerging alongside her apology: the story of a father who ran toward the gunfire because his own children were inside the school, and the heartbreaking words he later spoke to his mother.

The violence at Silver Rail Elementary began shortly before 1 p.m. when Griffin arrived near the school carrying a shotgun. According to Bend Police Chief Mike Krantz, a driver in a red pickup confronted the teenager outside, and Griffin fired toward the vehicle before moving onto the school grounds. He then shot through the glass of a locked entrance and entered a special education classroom near the front of the building. The classroom served children of different ages, and the attack ki.lled three boys, ages five, eight, and eleven, along with twenty-five-year-old teacher Megan Lambert. One of the children was identified as five-year-old Rhoam Summer, while officials respected the wishes of the other two boys’ families not to release their names. Seven-year-old Saylor Graham and fifty-four-year-old teacher Becky Drury were also wounded and hospitalized. Police identified Griffin as a former Silver Rail student who was no longer enrolled in Bend-La Pine Schools. Years earlier, he had participated in the school’s NEST program, an educational setting designed to support students with intensive behavioral and social-development needs. During the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, his mother had spoken publicly about the difficulties he experienced with remote learning and her relief that trained educators could provide in-person instruction again. That earlier interview took on painful significance after police said the teenager appeared to have targeted the special education classroom. However, authorities had not established a motive, and his educational history alone could not explain his actions or justify assumptions about other children receiving similar support. Investigators interviewed Griffin’s parents, who were cooperating, and examined devices recovered from his home. They also sought to determine how he gained access to the shotgun, which law enforcement sources reported had been purchased by his mother. Chief Krantz acknowledged that understanding the reason behind the attack would be among the investigation’s most difficult tasks and that some questions might never be fully answered. Meanwhile, Nickerson’s brief conversation with CNN revealed a mother overwhelmed by the knowledge of what her son had done. She expressed sorrow for the families who had lost loved ones but did not provide an explanation for his actions. She also declined to discuss how he had obtained the gun. Her apology came as the Bend community gathered at memorials outside the school, placing candles, flowers, stuffed animals, and handwritten messages in remembrance of the victims. For parents throughout the city, the tragedy had turned a familiar place of learning into a scene associated with fear and profound uncertainty.

Among the people near Silver Rail when the attack began was thirty-six-year-old contractor Kaylub Giamanco, whose two daughters attended the school. He had been heading home for lunch when he saw the armed teenager and heard gunfire near the entrance. With his children somewhere inside the building, Kaylub stopped his vehicle, retrieved a legally stored .40-caliber pistol, and pursued the attacker. Police said Griffin had already fired into the school and entered the classroom by the time Kaylub reached the building. The broken glass at the entrance provided a way inside, and Kaylub followed the teenager toward the sound of the gunshots. In the classroom, a teacher had thrown her cellphone toward the gunman and physically confronted him, struggling to prevent further harm. Kaylub encountered that confrontation and fired several shots, ki.lling Griffin and ending the attack. Chief Krantz publicly praised the teacher, the father, and the driver who initially confronted the attacker, recognizing that their actions had placed them in danger while helping protect others. Kaylub’s two daughters survived, but the experience left him deeply shaken. His mother, Kenda Freeman, later described receiving a telephone call she never could have imagined. Her son told her he had shot and ki.lled someone, then explained that an armed teenager had entered his daughter’s school and attacked children. For Kenda, the person speaking was not a figure in a news report but the son she knew as a devoted father who cared deeply about his family and neighbors. She told him she was proud of him and grateful that he had survived. Yet Kaylub was struggling to accept the praise surrounding his actions. According to Kenda, he kept thinking about the children and teacher who had died before he could intervene, questioning whether he might have reached them sooner. His words to her were devastatingly simple: “Mom, I couldn’t save them all.” Even as authorities credited him with stopping the attack and preventing further deaths, he was haunted by the lives already lost. Kenda understood that her grandchildren had come home alive while other families would never again see their children walk through the front door. She urged people to hold their loved ones close and care for their neighbors, recognizing that the emotional consequences of the shooting would extend far beyond the afternoon it occurred.