I gave the Garfield High School victim CPR. Now I’m pulling my son from school

Christle Young, a Garfield High School mom and former cop, rushed to perform first aid on the shooting victim on Thursday. She shared her account with KUOW's Liz Jones:

I was waiting on my son to come out and get some gift cards from me for the track banquet.

When I was waiting on him, and I was filling out the gift cards, and I noticed that there were a lot of kids in the parking lot -- probably like 40 or 50 kids walking up the stairs to go back into school during lunchtime, and there were like five or six gunshots that rang out.

The kids started scattering. I'm a former police officer, so I ran towards the gunshots.

I saw a kid on the ground. He had a gunshot wound to his left upper chest and one to the left side of his abdomen. I started doing CPR.

Seattle Police and the fire department arrived pretty quickly and they took over.

The police gave me some sanitary wipes to wipe the blood off my hands. I still have blood on my phone. I went home to shower and change. And I've just been in contact with my son.

My adrenaline was really heightened during the incident. And now I just feel I've crashed, and I'm just ready to get my kid and get him home.

I'm just not comfortable sending my son here. It doesn't seem like they're equipped to handle situations like this. This is like the third or fourth shooting they've had this year. My son has had to go inside from track practice because of a shooting. During the day he's been pulled inside from PE because of a shooting.

One of his bandmates got shot, a little girl that was in his section, got shot over at the gas station. If this isn't my last sign that I have to do something about this right now, I don't know what it is. I've already talked to my wife, and we're already calling other schools today. We moved here from New Orleans to have him in a safer environment and give him a better life. So I'm just going to do whatever I can to protect him.

My son loves his friends here. He's got supportive teachers. He's going out for football. He's excited about that. And I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but his safety is going to have to be prioritized above any of that.

I was really sorry to see his bandmate on crutches at one of the performances after being shot at the gas station. I'm sorry to have to intervene with someone being shot during lunchtime today. And I just can't let that be him.

We're not coming to school tomorrow. We're transferring. This is his last day at Garfield.

Editor's note: This story was updated after publication to reflect the account of a Garfield staff member who was also present at the scene.