Skip to content
Search AI Powered

Latest Stories

Austin Wyatt Rollins: The Great Mills School Shooter: What We Know So Far

Make us preferred on Google

An armed student named Austin Wyatt Rollins, 17, walked in to Great Mills High School in Maryland on March 20 and shot two fellow students. A female student, 16, and a male student, 14, were both wounded by Rollins. In turn, Rollins was shot dead in a hallway of the school by the school's resource officer, Blaine Gaskill, according to St. Mary's County Sheriff Tim Cameron. The town of Great Mills is located about 60 miles south east of Washington D.C.

During a press conference, officials said that a relationship may have existed between Rollins and one of the victims. On his Facebook page, Rollins said in December 2016 that he was dating a girl. Rollins says on that social media page that he lives in Lexington Park, Maryland. Rollins' aunt in Nebraska, Paula Jean Rollins, apparently didn't know that her nephew was the shooting suspect in Great Mills. Paula Rollins wrote on Facebook, "Prayers going out for my brother in law Rocky Rollins and his family, his son, Austin's, school was involved in an active shooter situation. We have still not heard if Austin Rollins is okay or not."


Austin ROllins' aunt facebookRollins' aunt's Facebook post.

Paula Rollins followed up that posting with two posts from two discredited conservative news outlets that heralded the school's resource officer as a hero.

Austin Rollins Great Mills MarylandRollins pictured in 2014 on his Facebook page.

CNN reports that Rollins was armed with a handgun and that he was killed by one round. The officer was uninjured. Sheriff Cameron told the media, "This is what we train for, this what we prepare for, and this what we pray that we never have to do. On this day, we realized our worst nightmare. The notion of 'it can't happen here' is no longer a notion."

During the lockdown that followed Rollins's attack, Great Mills student Jonathan Freese gave a chilling interview to CNN. Freese told the network, "I'm still a little shaken up... I didn't really except for this to happen. I do always feel safe, though, because they have police at the school." Freese also said that students at the school had trained for active shooting drills.

In a statement, via WJLA's Kellye Lynn, MedStar St. Mary's said, "We are currently treating one patient, a 14-year-old male, following a shooting at Great Mills High School. We first received two patients, one of whom, a 16-year-old female, we stabilized and transferred to UM Prince George's Hospital Center."

According to WJLA, a group of churches in Maryland are co-hosting a prayer meeting on the evening at 6 p.m. of March 20 for those affected by the shooting. Some of the churches involved, WJLA reports, are "Lexington Park United Methodist Church, Good Samaritan Lutheran Church, Lexington Park Baptist Church, Trinity Lutheran Church in Lexington Park, God's House Church in Lexington Park, and St. George's Episcopal Church in Valley Lee" as well as the Church of the Ascension in Lexington Park.

Go to the Next Page to Learn About Austin Rollins' Parents

Frankie Rollins Facebook page Lexington Park MarylandA meme posted on Frankie Rollins' Facebook page.

The Great Mills shooter is the son of Frankie "Rocky" Rollins and Angela Rollins. According to his father's LinkedIn page, Frankie Rollins is a boom operator with the U.S. Air Force Reserve. A boom operator works on a tanker aircraft and supplies refueling to other aircrafts. The official title for the role is In-Flight Refueling Operator. Frankie Rollins first joined the U.S. Air Force in 1987 and joined the Reserve in 2003. He is based at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland.

On his Facebook page, Frankie Rollins says that he is a native of Henderson, Nebraska, and has lived across the country in Virginia, Oklahoma, Washington and Tennessee.

School resource officer Blaine Gaskill is being heralded as a hero for his role in stopping Rollins. The Washington Post reports that Gaskill is the second resource officer to have stopped a school shooting attack. The last was during 1999's Columbine High School massacre.

The FBI's field office in Baltimore has issued a plea via Twitter asking for anyone with any video or photos of the Great Mills shooting to come forward.

More from News

Screenshots from TikToker @user4934997299767's video
@user4934997299767/TikTok

TikToker Confronts Stranger Who Allegedly Stopped His Car To Follow Her—And Women Are Nodding Hard

Though skeptics might argue that women can safely walk around and enjoy life without a care in the world, one woman shared a video of how often that isn't true.

Originally posted on TikToker @user4934997299767's account, the woman recorded herself walking outside on a sidewalk in a wide open area, allegedly right after a man had driven past her and noticed her. He'd then made a U-turn and pulled his car over so that he could get out and follow her.

Keep ReadingShow less
Anne Hathaway
Cindy Ord/SiriusXM/Getty Images

Anne Hathaway Just Revealed That She Was Having A Panic Attack In One Of Her Most Memed Moments—And Fans Are Floored

Anne Hathaway has been involved in a lot of memes throughout her career, from looking disappointedly at an ice cream cone to her transformation as Mia Thermopolis in The Princess Diaries becoming one of the most frequently trending sounds on TikTok.

Fortunately, not only is Hathaway aware of many of these mentions, but based on her Esquire interview opposite Star Wars star Ewan McGregor, she finds many of them quite funny.

Keep ReadingShow less
Screenshots from @a_daywillcome's video
@a_daywillcome/Instagram

Woman Who Lives In High-Rise Sparks Debate After Forcing Hispanic Window Cleaner To Get Off Her Balcony in Viral Video

A woman who lives in a high-rise building called out an employee for walking on her balcony to clean her windows, and she did not get the validation she was looking for when she shared the video.

The woman started recording as she walked into her main living space, and an employee was unstrapped from the equipment used to scale the building as he cleaned her balcony windows.

Keep ReadingShow less
Tom Holland & Zendaya; Chrissy Teigen
Eamonn M. McCormack/Getty Images; MEGA/GC Images

Resurfaced Clip Of Zendaya's Panicked Expression After She Thought Chrissy Teigen Was About To Kiss Tom Holland Has Fans Cackling

By now, pretty much anyone who spends any time on the internet is intimately familiar with Tom Holland's iconic 2017 performance on Lip Sync Battle, emulating Rihanna and doing a barn-storming performance of "Umbrella."

For one, it's just an incredible performance. But what really makes the moment shine is Zendaya's reaction to it as she watches—many believe it's the exact moment she fell for the actor.

Keep ReadingShow less
Sam Altman
Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

OpenAI CEO Ripped After Suggesting Tip For Using ChatGPT To Help Parent Your Kids—And It's So Bleak

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is desperate to push his highly unpopular product, going on talk shows to gush about its benefits and making suggestions online for how everyone can use ChatGPT in their daily lives. The tech billionaire tries hard to sell the public on AI, but his recent assertion that parents should use it to avoid speaking with their kids didn't land well.

On Friday, Altman tried to convince parents that his app, ChatGPT Work, was the answer to their parenting needs. But it read more like a cheat code for people who don't know how to interact with other humans, including their own children.

Keep ReadingShow less