A teacher at Silver Rail Elementary School in Bend, Oregon, is being praised as a hero after confronting and tackling the gunman during a deadly shooting on the school’s picture day.

Bend Police Chief Mike Krantz said the unidentified teacher first threw her cellphone at 16-year-old Griffin John II before taking him to the ground and struggling to wrest away his firearm.

The teacher escaped without injury. Krantz called her actions “incredible,” saying they almost certainly prevented further loss of life. The attack claimed the lives of three children, ages five, eight and 11, along with 25-year-old teacher Meghan Lambert.

Joe Camarlinghi, whose third-grade child attends Silver Rail Elementary, said the shooting took place Thursday as the school was holding its annual picture day.

Families had sent their children into school smiling and dressed for their photographs. Instead, parents endured hours of uncertainty as they waited to learn whether their children had survived the attack.

When families eventually gathered for reunification, Camarlinghi said some parents understood that the photographs taken that morning could become the final pictures ever captured of their children.

“I would use the word sickening,” Camarlinghi told The Oregonian on Friday. “You are seeing the faces of parents you’ve seen at pickup all feeling the same thing: is my child safe?”

Four people were killed in the shooting. A seven-year-old child who uses a wheelchair and 54-year-old educational assistant Becky Drury were also wounded.

Camarlinghi also honored 36-year-old father Kaylub Giamanco, who rushed into the building in an effort to stop John’s rampage.

“Doing what he did, saving the lives that he did,” Camarlinghi told the outlet, “it is the answer to the prayers of a lot of parents.”

Krantz said Giamanco’s decision to follow the shooter into the school had “undoubtedly saved people,” crediting him with acting quickly in an extremely dangerous situation.

“I don’t think we can underestimate or underappreciate that courage,” Krantz said.

The police chief also praised the teacher for being willing to confront the attacker and fight to protect her students, describing her response as extraordinary.

“We all recognize that is true heroism,” Krantz said. “We don’t see that a lot in society.”

On Friday, Drury’s husband asked the public to respect the family’s privacy as they faced what he described as an “unimaginably difficult time.”

“The kindness and concern shown to our family and everyone affected mean more than we can express,” he said in a statement to NBC News.

Police said John fired up to 15 rounds during the attack and still had 44 rounds remaining when he was shot and killed.

The shooter fired on everyone inside a special education class, where he himself was a student when he attended the school as a young child.

Police said that John was so intent on targeting his former class that he ran around to the back entrance after being fired upon while trying to go in through the front.

John, who was not enrolled in a Bend public school at the time, traveled to Silver Rail Elementary on foot. The route is being investigated.

He threw the Maverick 88 12–gauge pump–action shotgun over the fence before jumping over but found himself blocked from entering.

NEXT UP: Man Accused of Raping Woman He Met at Martha’s Vineyard Bar

He then ran to the back entrance and blasted his way in through a ‘safety vestibule’ system designed to keep children at the school safe from shooters.

Law enforcement remained unsure as to how John obtained his ammunition, saying the investigation was ‘very active.’

Giamanco’s wife Kelsey and brother Kyle, along with several of his friends, confirmed he was the hero who intervened by running inside the school.

He holds a concealed carry permit and is friends with the family of the seven-year-old in the wheelchair who was wounded.

John, who looked gangly with a patchy mustache and goatee, could be seen staring into the camera with a sullen glaze in a haunting photo posted by his mother Shauntai Nickerson last month.

Nickerson told a TV station in 2020 that she was pleased students were going back to the classroom because her son was struggling with distance learning during Covid lockdowns.

‘I think it will be great for Griffin, because I am not certified teaching a special needs student,’ she told KTVZ 21. ‘And I think it will be great for my son to get the help that he needs from the skilled teachers that he needs to get it from.’

The future murderer was in the Nurturing Empathy Safety and Trust program, which helped special education students ‘experiencing intensive behavioral and social skills challenges.’

John used his mother’s shotgun to carry out the massacre, which police said was bought about the time of his 16th birthday.

Nickerson insisted to reporters who confronted her outside her home in Bend that her son was ‘a good boy’ and she would have stopped him if she could. John’s motive is unknown.

Police raided his family’s home on Thursday night, seizing computers and other electronic devices. Family was said to be cooperative.

The first victim of Thursday’s shooting was named as five–year–old Rhoam Summer by his father, Kelik Summer.

Summer wrote on Facebook: ‘Today has been the worst day of my life. My son Rhoam was killed in a school shooting.

‘We are broken and lost, but are surrounded by friends and family who are keeping us safe.’

Lambert, of Bend, was identified by police and family on Friday at a press conference.

Her family remembered her as having a passion for sports and an ambition for teaching. She ‘lit up the room’ and was ‘compassionate’ with a ‘huge heart.’

That was exemplified when Lambert turned down pay for her first season as a volleyball coach so that families ‘who couldn’t afford to participate could have the chance to play the sport she loved,’ according to her family’s statement.

Lambert’s family emphasized that she was funny, opinionated, ‘fought for the underdog’ and ‘those with special needs.’

‘Meghan loved those children,’ the family said.

Lambert’s goal was to be an educator and teach in the school district she ‘loved growing up in,’ her family said.

Her first job as a teacher was at Silver Rail Elementary, according to her family, though she had been a substitute teacher there ‘for many years.’

‘She loved Silver Rail,’ the statement from Lambert’s family continued. ‘This was her dream job.’

A Boston Public Schools security official accused of raping a woman he met at a Martha’s Vineyard bar had previously been the subject of disturbing complaints from former girlfriends, according to reports.

Edward J. Brown, 27, the school district’s assistant director of security, was arrested last Friday. Prosecutors allege he assaulted a woman after bringing her from a bar to a Massachusetts State Police barracks on the island on August 15.

During Brown’s arraignment, Cape and Islands Assistant District Attorney Courtney Scalice told the Edgartown District Court that he forced himself on the woman at the barracks, grabbing her by the neck and raping her as she “kicked and screamed,” the Boston Globe reported.

Scalice said the woman managed to escape by running down two flights of stairs, telling the court that she “ran for her life as fast as she could.”

She was later discovered naked beside the road, crying out for assistance. Brown entered a not-guilty plea, and a judge set bail at $10,000 in cash.

Brown’s attorney, Anthony R. Ellison, said relatives provided the bail money. Brown was released later that same day.

The rape charge follows earlier accusations involving two former girlfriends. Both women reportedly said Brown continued contacting them repeatedly, even after they blocked his phone number.

The women sought restraining orders in Dorchester Municipal Court, telling officials they were afraid for their safety. As part of those civil cases, Brown was also required to surrender his firearms.

According to Scalice, the woman told police she had been at the Ritz Cafe in Oak Bluffs when a man wearing a white cap tapped her on the backside and purchased a drink for her.

Prosecutors said she remembered little afterward, other than waking up naked and lying facedown on a bed she did not recognize.

The woman allegedly created an opportunity to get away by asking Brown for a glass of water, then fled the room.

Ellison characterized the encounter as a “private matter,” according to the Boston Globe.

The attorney also said the woman, who is currently in Ireland, had not expressed an intention to seek criminal charges.

Brown was staying on Martha’s Vineyard while visiting his friend, State Police trooper Ryan Costello, when the alleged assault occurred.

Costello told investigators that Brown appeared unusually subdued at about 1:30 a.m. on August 15.

He also said Brown gave conflicting accounts about his interaction with the woman at the bar.

In a police interview, Costello reportedly said Brown first insisted that the woman had never accompanied him to the barracks.

Brown later allegedly changed his account, acknowledging that she had gone back with him but claiming she stayed only a short time.

Finally, prosecutors claimed Costello said Brown told him that he left the woman in the Uber because she was too drunk.

The first restraining order against Brown was filed in May, with the woman claiming she began casually dating Brown after they met late last year.

She became worried that Brown ‘showed signs of having a problem with alcohol and would become confrontational when he would consume it,’ per an affidavit cited by the Globe.

Brown allegedly became aggressive after drinking at a bar in South Boston, according to the woman.

He allegedly held on to her arm when she attempted to walk away and tried to ‘physically move [her] body in a forceful way,’ per the reported legal documents.

One day later, the woman found a Facebook post and comments suggesting that Brown ‘displayed aggressive and stalker like behavior to other women in the past.’

She told Brown she wanted to stop talking and blocked his number, but he allegedly continued going to the same places she did.

That allegedly included driving by her gym, according to the reported affidavit.

On June 2, the woman testified that Brown would call her ‘over and over and over again in the middle of the night,’ which she called a ‘scare tactic.’

Brown’s lawyer argued that the run-ins were only coincidental because the two socialized in similar circles.

The order eventually expired after the judge said he was confident Brown was ‘aware of the consequences that could befall him if further incidents occur.’

The second restraining order was filed on August 3 by a separate ex-girlfriend, who said she and Brown broke up about three years prior.

She claimed Brown was using a ‘no-caller ID phone number’ to call her ‘excessively.’

‘Usually like every weekend when he’s drinking,’ she said, per the reported filing.

The woman also told the court during a hearing that she was scared because she knew Brown had a ‘firearm.’

She told the court Brown had strangled her once before, on top of being physically and verbally abusive while they were dating.

Dan O’Connell, who represented Brown in that case, argued that the calls were not threatening.

He added that Brown did not plan to keep reaching out to his ex-girlfriend ‘in the near or distant future.’

Brown is scheduled to return to court on December 3 for a pretrial hearing.

The Daily Mail has reached out to Brown’s lawyer, Ellison, for comment.