'Best kid in the world': Denver school shooting victim died tackling suspect
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Kendrick Castillo, 18, was the sole person killed at Stem School Highlands Ranch days before he was to graduate high school
Parents gather in a circle to pray at a recreation center where students were reunited with their parents after a shooting at StemTEM School Highlands Ranch on Tuesday. Photograph: David Zalubowski/AP
The 18-year-old student killed in a Colorado school shooting died a hero days before he was to graduate high school, his father and classmates said.
Kendrick Castillo, 18, was the sole person killed in the shooting Tuesday at Stem School Highlands Ranch, a K-12 school outside Denver.
Castillo lunged at a fellow student who pulled a gun, survivor Nui Giasolli told NBC’s Today Show.
“Kendrick lunged at him, and he shot Kendrick,” Giasolli said, “giving all of us enough time to get underneath our desks, to get ourselves safe, and to run across the room to escape.”
Other students helped Castillo tackle the gunman, Giasolli said, adding they “were brave enough to bring him down so that all of us could escape and all of us could be reunited with our families.”
“I can’t thank them enough,” she said.
The victim was described as an avid member of his school’s robotics team who liked fishing, hunting and cars. He had just three days of school left before graduation.
“He was the best kid in the world,” John Castillo told the Denver Post, speaking through tears.
“It doesn’t surprise me,” Castillo told the paper about reports of his son’s heroism. “He cared enough about people that he would do something like that, even though it’s against my better judgment.
“I wish he had gone and hid,” Castillo said, “but that’s not his character. His character is about protecting people, helping people.”
Kendrick, his parents’ only child, was due to enroll in Arapahoe Community College in the fall and hoped to study engineering, his father said.
“My wife and I are in a haze,” Castillo said. “He was everything to us.”
Two students at the school opened fire in two classrooms, authorities have said. Devon Erickson, 18, and an unidentified juvenile female have been taken into custody.
The public charter school south of Denver is just a few miles from Columbine high school, where an infamous 1999 shooting took place.
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