HOUSTON – A former student and survivor at Santa Fe High School was the first to take the stand as a witness Thursday morning in the civil trial against the parents of Dimitrios Pagourtzis, the gunman accused of killing 10 people in the 2018 Santa Fe High School shooting.
Isabelle Laymance was described to be emotional during her testimony as she recounted the day she was huddled inside of a closet, hiding from the shooter. She said it felt “like forever” when asked how long she hid inside the art room closet.
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Although Laymance was not seriously injured in the shooting, she said it has had a heavy emotional toll on her life -- as tears flowed while on the stand. Laymance stated that she suffers from PTSD and depression from that day.
During her testimony, Laymance described hearing gunshots but never saw the shooter, stating the “room smelled smokey from the bullets.”
Laymance said she called her mother on her cellphone and told her there was a shooting happening and that she loved her. She then gave her cell phone to other students to call their parents.
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She said she heard cell phones ringing in the room outside, at which point the shooter, Dimitrios, asked if anyone wanted to come out and answer the phones.
While hiding, Laymance said she called the police three times, begging officers to hurry and gave the exact location of where they were in the back of the school.
She stated that she did not know or recognize Dimitrios on that day or even after the shooting. Laymance said she has had no previous interaction with him.
When police officers finally came to her rescue, Laymance stated that when the shooter was in custody, she was walked out by police in a single file line, hands up and saw “chaos” outside. She described seeing more bodies in the school, including her own cousin.
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Laymance also lost a good friend in the shooting, victim Aaron Kyle McLeod, a 15-year-old freshman at Santa Fe High School. McLeod, born in Chico, California, and had been living in Santa Fe since 2011, was among the 10 killed by the gunman.
Kyle “lit up the room every time he entered,” Laymance said.
She said she was checked out for injuries and taken by bus, driven by Rhonda Hart, whose own daughter was killed in the shooting. She said she was not allowed to talk about the conversation she had with Rhonda.
She described how she went home and had messages from several reporters wanting to interview her. Laymance gathered the strength to give an interview after changing her bloody clothes that she had on.