Boy, 14, ‘shoots headmaster and teacher in school shotgun rampage’

By IMOGEN GARFINKEL – SENIOR FOREIGN NEWS REPORTER and PETER ALLEN

Published: 07:51 EDT, 12 October 2026 | Updated: 07:51 EDT, 12 October 2026

A headmaster and teacher were shot in front of terrified pupils during a gun rampage in southern France today.

The principal of the Joseph-Lakanal middle school in Aubagne, east of Marseille, was allegedly shot in the lower body by a 14-year-old pupil.

A teacher, 37, was also hit in the thigh while a third person was grazed in the shooting, which took place amid student protests that have gripped the country.

The boy taken into custody was carrying a gun and is a pupil of the Joseph-Lakanal middle school where the shooting occurred, police said.

Conflicting reports said the weapon was a 12-gauge shotgun or a hunting rifle.

The headteacher, 53, was shot four or five times in front of the school, a police source told Le Figaro.

The suspect fired several shots inside the school, before staff subdued the teenager and law enforcement intervened.

The youth shooter, who was a pupil at the school, arrived at around 10.30am, with the gun hidden in a guitar case.

He told staff he wanted to ‘see the headmaster’ so as ‘to pay tribute to him,’ according to witnesses.

Then he took out the gun and fired lead shot into his victims.

Martine Vassal, president of the Bouches-du-Rhône departmental council, said: ‘There are no security gates or checks of any kind at the school gates. They were not deemed necessary.’

There was no initial clue to the child’s motivation, although his father had ‘requested a meeting with the school’s educational advisor,’ he added. Pupils and teachers who witnessed the attack were undergoing counselling, she said.

Prosecutors have opened a criminal inquiry, and classes at the school have been suspended.

Unlike hundreds of schools across France, it was not being blockaded this morning.

Firefighters have been dispatched to the scene.

The Minister of the Interior Laurent Nuñez, the Minister of National Education Édouard Geffray as well as the Minister Delegate for Vocational Education and Training and Apprenticeship Sabrina Roubache are expected to visit the site on Monday afternoon.

The principal and the teacher have been treated and their lives are not in danger, according to the prime minister’s office.

An investigation has been opened for attempted murder as the Marseille public prosecutor travels to the scene, according to BFMTV.

The prefect of Bouches-du-Rhône, the mayor of Aubagne, and the regional education authority are outside the school, where many parents have gathered after the incident.

‘No students were injured,’ Mayor Jean-Pierre Squillari confirmed to reporters.

France has faced a wave of protests over the state of the country’s schools, with some of the demonstrations hit by violence.

French President Emmanuel Macron said on Monday that he condemned those incidents of violence.

A source close to the investigation told BFMTV that the shootings had ‘no connection’ with the student protests.

Furthermore, the Joseph-Lakanal middle school was apparently not affected by any blockades.

The Bouches-du-Rhône police department, in southern France, said the suspect’s motive was unknown.

It comes as France’s high school students begin a new stage of their campaign for improved conditions, hoping to maintain the momentum with a fresh wave of demonstrations.

The new protests, scheduled for Tuesday, could be a turning point in the movement, launched in mid-September, which the government hopes is already winding down.

On Friday, the government noted a dramatic drop in the number of blockades and meetings outside the country’s lycees, where students – most between 15 and 18 – complete their high school education.

More than 96 per cent were opening Friday, said the education ministry.

The authorities are all the more keen to see the student protests end given that online activists have called for demonstrations next Saturday to protest the cost of living.

For Macron’s administration, that brings back troubling memories of the grassroots Yellow Vest movement.

Their protests, launched in 2018 over a planned fuel tax rise, saw massive demonstrations and clashes between police and protesters that shook the presidency during Macron’s first term in office.

The government is still counting the cost of the high school protests.

A government source told journalists last week that the cost for damage caused by the demonstrations was ‘at least 30 million euros’.

On Friday, the justice ministry said more than 6,800 people had been detained since the demonstrations started, 86 per cent of them minors.

After clashes between some protesters and riot police left some students severely injured, sparking criticism of police tactics, the government suspended the use of stun grenades that cost one student his hand.

Police are investigating 18 alleged cases of misconduct within their ranks.

Last Thursday’s student demonstrations mobilised tens of thousands of people across France – 71,500 according to interior ministry figures.

Nearly 256,000 people took part in last Tuesday’s day of action.

And one poll, carried out by Ipsos-BVA and published on Sunday, said 54 per cent of respondents backed the high school student protests.

They had the most sympathy with student complaints about the excessive size of classes and with the need to renovate the country’s crumbling schools.

A knife rampage at a French school in April last year left one girl dead and multiple children fighting for their lives.

A student armed with a knife launched the attack during a lunch break at the private Notre-Dame-de-Toutes-Aides high school in Doulon area of Nantes, western France, on April 24, 2025.

The attacker, a 15-year-old boy who was named by local media as Justin P., first entered a classroom on the school’s second floor around midday where he stabbed a one student before going back downstairs to knife at least three others.

One of the students, a teenage girl, was killed and the other three were injured in the rampage.

The attacker was pulled to the ground by an information technology manager, before police arrived at the scene.

As armed police approached, Justin P. shouted ‘Shoot me in the head,’ at them.

The attempt to end his life failed, as officers handcuffed him and led him away, having suffered a ‘slight cut to the head and to one hand,’ said one source.

He was dressed in black, and wore a bicycle helmet and a balaclava, according to an investigating source, who added that two blades – including a hunting knife – were found next to the attacker.