Investigators say student killed by police outside Mount Horeb school pointed pellet rifle

A student who was killed by police outside a Wisconsin school pointed a pellet rifle at officers and had refused to drop the weapon, authorities said Saturday.

The state Department of Justice released few other details, three days after the shooting at Mount Horeb Middle School in Mount Horeb, 25 miles west of Madison, the Wisconsin capital.

The student, whose name and age still have not been officially released, did not get into the school. No one else was physically injured, but the school was on lockdown for hours during the incident Wednesday.

Police were called around 11 a.m. that day after a caller said someone with a backpack and long gun was moving toward the school.

“Officers directed the subject to drop the weapon, but the subject did not comply,” the Department of Justice said Saturday. “The subject pointed the weapon at the officers, after which law enforcement discharged their firearms, striking the subject. Lifesaving measures were deployed but the subject died on scene.”

The weapon was described as a Ruger .177-caliber pellet rifle. The state said police at the scene were wearing body cameras.

Schools in the Mount Horeb district did not hold classes Thursday or Friday.