Santa Fe high school shooter Dimitrios Pagourtzis joked about school shootings during a fire drill at the school earlier this year, according to a fellow student.
Zach Divin, 17, was in class when shots rang out in his high school on May 18. He did not know Pagourtzis well, but had mutual friends and played football with him last year. He spoke to The Gateway Pundit about the shooter, the media and what it has been like for the students since the shooting.
Divin was in class on the other side of the building when the fire alarm went off on the morning of the shooting. “We were just walking out slowly, my girlfriend and I were the last people to get out before the doors were closed off,” he said.
“I knew who he was. I played football with him last year… he was a normal kid then,” Divin explained. “This year he started with the trench coat, but I never thought he would’ve been capable of doing those things.”
Though it is obviously no excuse for violence, Divin confirmed stories from his classmates that Pagourtzis was not only bullied by students — but also by the adult coaches
“At practice I’d hear them make fun of his last name and the way he stood,” Divin said, explaining that his feet pointed outwards. “It was like a ‘V’, not like a normal person who has a ‘U’ stance.”
“I mean, he was a weird kid, but so was I,” Divin said. “He wasn’t popular, but he wasn’t a loner. He did have friends.”
Divin said that Pagourtzis hung out with other “weird kids,” including people that he is also friends with. He said that they were all “shocked” that he would do something like this.
Though there was bullying, Divin said that the story about Pagourtzis being “humiliated” in class by one of the victims the week before wasn’t true. The story of the Shana Fisher rejecting Pagourtzis has been contested by those who knew her, including Candi Thurman, a relative that she lived with.
My niece Shana Fisher still hasn’t been found. She was in the art room and some classmates have said she was shot in the leg. Still no confirmation on where she is. Please keep praying! pic.twitter.com/9vQzNAmMxP
— Candi (@candithurman) May 18, 2018
I am sad to announce that Shana didn’t survive today’s shooting. Thank you for your prayers https://t.co/apjI7tepCi
— Candi (@candithurman) May 18, 2018
Thurman claims that the mother who spread the story had never been in her daughter’s life and would not have known about happenings at the school.
Shanas mom was not in her life stop believing what she says! My parents raised her!
— Candi (@candithurman) May 20, 2018
“I know that Shana was a good person and wouldn’t ever do that,” Divin lamented.
According to Divin, though he did not seem dangerous, Pagourtzis once joked about school shootings during a fire drill.
“My friend said that during a fire alarm the shooter kept making school shooting jokes,” Divin explained. “I don’t remember the jokes off the top of my head, but they were about Columbine and Parkland.”
As we have previously reported, Pagourtzis appears to have been mimicking the shooters at Columbine. In addition to using the same weapons and wearing a trenchcoat, he also wore several items that are symbolic of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold.
During the massacre at Columbine, Klebold wore a small star-shaped hammer and sickle medallion on his left boot. His mother and others who knew him do not believe he was actually a Communist, but instead wore it simply to get a rise out of people. Pagourtzis was wearing an identical pin.
Pagourtzis’ “Born to Kill” shirt was also in the same style as the “Wrath” and “Natural Selection” shirts worn by Harris and Klebold.
When asked if he thought that Santa Fe was being covered differently than Parkland, Divin said that it was — and he believes it is because the majority of students at his school still support the Second Amendment.
This sentiment was echoed by Melissa Paris, whose daughter was also in class when the massacre took place.
“They’ve stopped covering it because so many students are pro-gun which isn’t the narrative that the media wants to push. The majority of students want change, but they don’t believe that banning guns is the change that we need,” Paris told the Gateway Pundit.
Divin said that the CNN Town Hall with the Parkland students and lack of platform for the Santa Fe students makes it clear that the two shootings are being covered very differently.
“When you looked at Parkland at the CNN Town Hall meeting, you had so many students attacking the NRA. Since we don’t, we won’t get the same attention,” Divin said. “We won’t be pushing an agenda.”
Though Divin has been outspoken about his experiences that tragic day, only two Parkland students have reached out to him, conservative teens Kyle Kashuv and Patrick Petty.
“I had a lot of Emma Gonzalez fans tweeting at her being like ‘hey Emma, y’all should talk’,” Divin said, explaining that she never reached out to him. “It just shows they don’t really care.”
When asked what he would say to the Parkland teens if he had a chance to speak to them, Divin said that he would like to “have a civil conversation with them about how the Second Amendment isn’t going anywhere.”
Divin, along with many of his classmates, is advocating for common sense school safety and for parents and teachers to step up to protect students.
“If we care so much about the future let’s secure the kids first, then we can move on to other discussions,” he said.
Santa Fe students will be returning to classes at the school on Tuesday, but they have not yet been informed of any new safety measures that will be put in place to protect them.
