The Berwyn assistant principal killed in a shooting just outside her suburban school was murdered by her husband, her family says, and her mother was killed too.
The shooting, which took place just after 4 p.m. Tuesday, prompted a school lockdown.
Berwyn police officers heard gunfire shortly near Lincoln Middle School, at 6432 16th St., and responded to the scene, according to the Berwyn Police Department. Upon arrival, officers found a man firing a rifle into another vehicle. The officers came under fire from the suspect as they approached, police said. Officers took cover and did not return fire.
Police identified one of the victims as Assistant Principal Nerissa Lee Wednesday.
“They my family, I mean it’s a horrible thing, you know I have a lot of emotions. I don’t quite know what to feel,” said Shana Everage, Lee’s sister.
Everage says their mother was also killed in the shooting. Lee’s husband, Steven Lee, later died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Police have called the incident a “domestic situation,” and Everage said it “didn’t come out of the blue.”
“It had started ever since I want to say the tail end of June and basically the boiling point would have been yesterday,” Everage said.
Over a dozen gunshots can be heard on security footage from a neighbor obtained by NBC Chicago.
Video captured by NBC Chicago’s helicopter Sky 5 showed two vehicles in the middle of the street and what appeared to be blood on the sidewalk. A number of police officers were working on the scene, which was blocked off with crime scene tape.
A memorial is growing at the school, with balloons, flowers and candles lining the street as students grapple with the loss.
One student told NBC Chicago that she left safe around Lee. Another said she’ll miss Lee’s laugh.
“I saw her laughing with the other people and she would laugh so hard that I didn’t understand the joke but I would also laugh,” the student said.
Students also remembered Lee for her commitment to her work.
“She was always, always about her work, she sound like she did really love her school, really loved her kids,” another student said. “She was all about what she needed to do.”
The Berwyn North School District 98 website’s staff directory page listed Lee as both the Assistant Principal and a Curriculum Specialist.
Superintendent of Berwyn North School District 98 Dr. Michelle Smith said classes would resume Thursday after being canceled Wednesday, adding that counselors scheduled to be on site.