Student wounded inside South Side high school gym

September 13, 2005 (WLS) -- A student is recovering after being shot at a Chicago high school during classes Tuesday afternoon. The student was wounded in the leg. There are questions about school security and how a gun was able to get into the building.

The shooting happened around 2:30 at John Marshall Harlan High School at 97th and Michigan on the city's South Side.

The official version of this story changed as the afternoon progressed. Originally, police were saying the young man had been shot outside the school. Chicago police later confirmed what students at Harlan High said earlier, that indeed a student was shot inside the school.

A fight broke out between several young men during PE class. It was ninth period, the final hour of school. As students describe it, several young men jumped on one boy. That boy pulled out a gun, started running from the gym into the hall and shot a couple of rounds. A bullet hit the 15-year-old victim in his leg, and then the victim ran from the school to 95th and Wabash where someone called paramedics, and they took him to Christ Hospital in Oak Lawn.

The boy's injuries are reportedly not life threatening.

Many other students ran from the gymnasium when the shooting happened. They say it was chaotic.

"A boy got jumped on by a lot of boys, and then he pulled out the gun and started shooting. He hit somebody in the leg," said Ramon Bell. The shooter fired twice, he said.

"A whole lot of people jumped on him, and he got up and started shooting, shot in the leg. Everybody started running out of the gym. It was kind of like (the) E2 (nightclub incident) again but at high school, everybody just started running," said Jaleelah Houston, Harlan High junior.

Police on the scene said the gunman was arrested, he is in custody, and he is a student at Harlan High.

Chicago Public Schools says Harlan High does have metal detectors, including the walk-through type, plus an x-ray machine for scanning bags. School officials are now trying to determine how the gun managed to slip through security measures. They say they will have extra security on hand at the school Wednesday.

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