FORTH WORTH, Texas — An 18-year-old accused of injuring four people in a shooting at Mansfield Timberview High School in Arlington was indicted Friday on charges including three counts of attempted murder, according to the Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney's Office.
Timothy Simpkins shot a 15-year-old student and a 25-year-old teacher on Oct. 6, according to an arrest warrant. The 15-year-old had started a fight with Simpkins at school, and English teacher Calvin Pettitt intervened to break up the fight, the arrest warrant says.
The 15-year-old and Pettitt were both shot and survived. Another student was grazed by a bullet, and a teacher had minor injuries from a fall.
Simpkins was indicted on three charges of attempted murder, three charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and one charge of unlawful carrying of a weapon in a prohibited place, the district attorney's office said in a news release.
Simpkins was initially charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. Simpkins, a student at Timberview at the time, turned himself in with his attorney on the day of the shooting after fleeing the school, police said.
According to the arrest warrant, Simpkins was inside a classroom on the second floor of the Mansfield district high school when the fight started during second period. The 15-year-old student came into the classroom and started to fight Simpkins. A video of the fight circulating on social media shows Simpkins being hit repeatedly by the other student.
Pettitt and several other teachers and coaches jumped in to break up the fight. The 15-year-old student "ultimately gave up and stopped being combative," the arrest warrant says. Simpkins walked to an orange backpack and grabbed a handgun, witnesses told police. Simpkins pointed the gun at the student he had been fighting with and shot him, the warrant says. Pettitt was shot, as well.
In the aftermath of the shooting, Simpkins' family posted on Facebook that the 18-year-old took the gun to school because he was "beaten, taunted, and harassed on a daily basis."
The family also added that Simpkins' father was "brutally beaten to death," and that it "definitely heightened Timothy's fear for his life."
"Many of you have seen the video of the brutal beating Timothy received — he never even returned a blow — he simply balled up and covered his head," the family's statement said, referencing video of the fight that preceded the shooting. "Not to mention that the young men responsible for beating and harassing him recently made threats to kill him so you see, my son was terrified and believed he would be murdered just like his father."
