Two men were arrested after shooting bullets through the windows of Ann Richards STEAM Academy, where 13 students and two teachers were inside a classroom.
The incident occurred on Tuesday at about 4:43 p.m. when police received reports of gunfire at the school. Stray bullets from across Military Parkway struck several windows, according to court records.
Witnesses identified the shooters, leading to the arrests of Jayden Benett, 22, and Deondrez Brown, 20, who now face charges of deadly conduct.
Police found shell casings in the backyard of a nearby home, and Brown admitted that he and Benett fired the shots that hit the school, with both acknowledging they knew the bullets struck the building.
No injuries were reported, but the incident left parents shaken and frustrated, particularly over the school’s communication delays and the state’s new cellphone ban, which began in August.
Rosemary, a parent who requested her last name be withheld, was waiting outside the school for her daughter when she noticed multiple police units arriving. She described the chaos to Fox 4 KDF, saying, “Everyone was just frantic cause nobody knew what was going on.”
Rosemary expressed frustration over not being able to contact her daughter for about 30 minutes due to the cellphone ban: “I couldn’t reach her for, what, 30 minutes? And then you’re just pulling your hair out. You don’t know what to do.”
She also criticized the school’s delayed communication, noting, “And then we don’t get that alert until … this morning. That needs to go out immediately.”
The lack of immediate information compounded parents’ anxiety.
“The principal stated ‘everybody go back to the car,’ and we just kind of took off running because we didn’t know what was going on,” Rosemary recounted, per Fox 4. She expressed strong opposition to the cellphone policy, stating, “I just really don’t like the No Cellphone policy. I don’t like it. Not one bit.”