NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- The shooter who killed three students and three staff members at a Christian school in Nashville legally bought seven weapons in recent years and hid the guns from her parents before carrying out the attack by firing indiscriminately at victims and spraying gunfire through doors and windows, police said Tuesday.
The violence Monday at The Covenant School was the latest school shooting to roil the nation and was planned carefully. The shooter had drawn a detailed map of the school, including potential entry points, and conducted surveillance of the building before carrying out the massacre, authorities said.
The suspect, Audrey Hale, 28, was a former student at the school. Hale did not target specific victims -- among them three 9-year-olds and the head of the school -- but did target "this school, this church building," police spokesperson Don Aaron said at a news conference Tuesday.
Hale was under a doctor's care for an undisclosed emotional disorder and was not known to police before the attack, Metropolitan Nashville Police Chief John Drake said at the news conference.
If police had been told that Hale was suicidal or homicidal, "then we would have tried to get those weapons," Drake said. "But as it stands, we had absolutely no idea who this person was or if [Hale] even existed."
Hale sent alarming messages to a former middle-school basketball teammate shortly before Monday's deadly massacre, the ex-classmate said.
Hale wrote she planned to commit suicide and that she'd likely be covered on the news in a series of direct messages to Averianna Patton over Instagram at 9:57 a.m. Monday, Patton told the Nashville news station WTVF.
"One day this will make more sense," Hale wrote, according to the messages published by the TV outlet. "I've left behind more than enough evidence behind. But something bad is about to happen."
Police say they received an active-shooter call at the Covenant School, where Hale was a former student, at 10:13 a.m. The shooting left three 9-year-old students and three adults dead, and Hale was fatally shot by police, officials said.
Patton says she tried to help Hale after receiving her messages.
"I tried to comfort and encourage her and subsequently reached out to the Suicide Prevention Help Line after being instructed to by my father at 10:08 a.m. Audrey has shared with others that she had been suicidal in the past and I knew to take this serious," Patton told WTVF late Monday.
"I called Nashville's non-emergency line at 10:14 a.m. and was on hold for nearly seven minutes before speaking with someone who said that they would send an officer to my home," Patton said. "An officer did not come to my home until 3:29 p.m."
Patton found out Hale was the school shooter after her name was released by authorities, she said.
Tennessee does not currently have a "red flag" law, which lets police step in and take firearms away from people who threaten to kill.
Hale legally bought seven firearms from five local gun stores, Drake said. Three of them were used in Monday's shooting. Police spokesperson Brooke Reese said Hale bought the guns between October 2020 and June 2022.
Hale's parents believed their child had sold one gun and did not own any others, Drake said, adding that Hale "had been hiding several weapons within the house."
Hale's motive is unknown, Drake said. In an interview with NBC News on Monday, Drake said investigators don't know what drove Hale but believe the shooter had "some resentment for having to go to that school."
Drake said law enforcement officials had recovered a "manifesto" and maps that appeared to include entry points for the school. On Tuesday, Drake told CBS This Morning that recovered materials suggested Hale had also considered an attack on a Nashville area shopping mall and other sites.
Asked at a Senate hearing whether the Justice Department would open an investigation into whether the shooting was a hate crime targeting Christians, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said federal officials were working with local police to identify a motive.
Police have released videos of the shooting, including edited surveillance footage that shows the shooter's car driving up to the school, glass doors being shot out and the shooter ducking through one of them.
Surveillance video released by the police late Monday showed Hale firing through a glass door and entering the school. The heavily armed shooter is shown stalking through the hallways of the school, peering into offices while aiming an assault rifle. Police also released photos, including a police car with shattered glass. They said Hale fired on responding officers from a second-story window.
Police said Hale was armed with two semiautomatic weapons -- an AR-15-style rifle, an "AR-style pistol" and a handgun. At least two of the weapons were purchased legally, according to Drake, who did not give the status of the third. He said Hale had "multiple rounds of ammunition prepared for confrontation with law enforcement" and was "prepared to do more harm."
Additional video, from officer Rex Engelbert's bodycam, shows a woman meeting police outside as they arrive and telling them that all the children were locked down, "but we have two kids that we don't know where they are."
The harrowing six-minute video captures a team of officers from the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department arriving on scene at the Covenant School and rushing into the building as an alarm blares and gunshots are heard.
The woman then directs officers to Fellowship Hall and says people inside had just heard gunshots. Three officers, including Engelbert, search rooms one by one, holding rifles and announcing themselves as police.
The footage, made public less than 24 hours after the deadly shooting, shows officers quickly searching the school room by room, some carrying rifles but without ballistic equipment including shields.
The video shows officers climbing stairs to the second floor and entering a lobby area, followed by a barrage of gunfire and an officer yelling twice: "Get your hands away from the gun." Then the shooter is shown motionless on the floor.
Police identified Engelbert, a four-year member of the force, and Michael Collazo, a nine-year member, as the officers who fatally shot Hale. The White House said President Joe Biden spoke Tuesday with Drake, Engelbert and Callazo to thank them for their bravery.
Police response times to school shootings have come under greater scrutiny after the attack in Uvalde, Texas, in which 70 minutes passed before law enforcement stormed the classroom. In Nashville, police said about eight minutes passed from the initial call to when officers arrived at the scene.
Surveillance video shows a time stamp of just before 10:11 a.m., when the attacker shot out the doors. Police said they got the call about a shooter at 10:13. Aaron said in an email Tuesday that dispatch records show officers arrived on campus shortly before 10:22.
At about 10:24, officers engaged the suspect, the chief said during the news conference. Within two minutes of that, the suspect was down, according to the dispatch records.
"There were police cars that had been hit by gunfire. As officers were approaching the building, there was gunfire going off," Drake said.
"We feel, our response right now, from what I've seen, I don't have a particular problem with it. But we always want to get better. We always want to get there in two or three minutes," he said, adding that traffic was "locked down" at the time.
Traffic was indeed stopped along a nearby two-lane road with a turning lane as police tried to weave their way to the school.
Police have given unclear information on Hale's gender. For hours Monday, police identified the shooter as a woman. Later in the day, the police chief said Hale was transgender. After the news conference, Aaron declined to elaborate on how Hale identified.
In an email Tuesday, police spokesperson Kristin Mumford said Hale "was assigned female at birth. Hale did use male pronouns on a social media profile." Later Tuesday, at the news conference, Drake referred to Hale with female pronouns.
Information for this article was contributed by Jonathan Mattise, Denise Lavoie, John Raby and Stefanie Dazio of The Associated Press, Holly Bailey of The Washington Post and by Peter Sblendorio of the New York Daily News (TNS).
This image provided by Metropolitan Nashville Police Department shows bodycam footage of police responding to an active shooting at The Covenant School in Nashville, Tenn., on Monday, March 27, 2023. The former student who shot through the doors of the Christian elementary school and killed three children and three adults had drawn a detailed map of the school. (Metropolitan Nashville Police Department via AP)
This image provided by Metropolitan Nashville Police Department shows bodycam footage of police responding to an active shooting at The Covenant School in Nashville, Tenn., on Monday, March 27, 2023. The former student who shot through the doors of the Christian elementary school and killed three children and three adults had drawn a detailed map of the school. (Metropolitan Nashville Police Department via AP)
This image provided by Metropolitan Nashville Police Department shows bodycam footage of police responding to an active shooting at The Covenant School in Nashville, Tenn., on Monday, March 27, 2023. The former student who shot through the doors of the Christian elementary school and killed three children and three adults had drawn a detailed map of the school. (Metropolitan Nashville Police Department via AP)
A child weeps while on the bus leaving The Covenant School following a mass shooting at the school in Nashville, Tenn., Monday, March 27, 2023. (Nicole Hester/The Tennessean via AP)
A group prays with a child outside the reunification center at the Woodmont Baptist church after a school shooting, Monday, March 27, 2023, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/John Bazemore)
Parishioners participate in a community vigil at Belmont United Methodist Church in the aftermath of a school shooting in Nashville, Monday, March 27, 2023, in Nashville, Tenn. Nashville police identified the victims in the private Christian school shooting Monday as three 9-year-old students and three adults in their 60s, including the head of the school. (AP Photo/John Bazemore)
A group of chaplains from the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association pray with a Metro police officer standing guard at the entry of The Covenant School, Tuesday, March 28, 2023, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/John Amis)
Lauren Giesler holds a sign with photos of her daughters as she joins other activist mothers at a rally at the state Capitol, Tuesday, March 28, 2023, in Nashville, Tenn., the day after a shooting at a Christian elementary school in the city. (AP Photo/John Amis)
In this screen grab from surveillance video tweeted by the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department, Audrey Elizabeth Hale points an assault-style weapon inside The Covenant School in Nashville, Tenn., Monday, March 27, 2023. The former student shot through the doors of the Christian elementary school and killed several children and adults before being killed by police. (Courtesy of Metropolitan Nashville Police Department via AP)