Trinity Valley Community College in Athens, Texas, on Thursday afternoon, was placed under lockdown, as the police hunted for an armed suspect, KRLD reported. 

As per the police, the Henderson County Sheriff’s Office deputies tried to retrieve a stolen vehicle on West College Street, during which time the suspect fled from the officers. 

The police claim their manhunt gave rise to the rumour that an active shooter is at large, though chief John Densmore, has confirmed that this is not the case. 

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“This is an armed suspect incident that is ongoing but not an active shooter situation”, the police chief said of the matter, but no description of the armed suspect was provided. 

Athens is around 350 miles north of Uvalde, which was recently rocked by the Robb Elementary School shooting, which claimed the lives of 19 children and two adults. Since then, Texas and all of the US have become wary again of shooters. 

There was an arrest in Uvalde where other school students had been threatened, while New York’s Barclays Center saw a stampede over an active shooter alert. All this goes to show the fear gripping the people as 2022 has already witnessed another mass shooting in Buffalo, sometime before Uvalde, though this was racially motivated. 

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After Uvalde too, there was a slew of arrests across the country over threats of gun violence, and many – including Uvalde native Matthew McConaughey, the actor – called for gun control and stricter ownership laws as a solution to the situation. 

Instead, the Supreme Court has now expanded gun rights, and Texas was also home to the annual NRA meeting this year, which took place in the aftermath of the shooting.