Santa Clarita High School shooting: Teenage suspect's late father was an experienced game hunter who made his own bullets
SANTA CLARITA, CALIFORNIA: The late father of the 16-year-old student who is suspected to have shot his classmates was an avid hunter who owned many weapons. The teenage gunman's father was also arrested on suspicions of domestic violence and beating up his wife.
On Thursday, November 14, morning, Nathaniel Berhow was eventually identified by law enforcement to media as the suspect post the shooting at the Saugus High School in Santa Clarita. According to the authorities, he killed two students and then injured three more before turning the gun on himself. However, he survived and is in a critical condition in the hospital.
As authorities continue to investigate and try to determine a motive, details about the suspect and his family have made their way online. Berhow's father, Mark, had died after suffering from a heart attack in 2017, as per his obituary. According to an online obituary, Mark Berhow had worked for a health care company for 33 years as a field service engineer and “loved big game hunting and fishing of all kinds.” Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, records show that Berhow's father had been arrested in 2015 on suspicion of attempted battery on his wife, Mami Matasuura.
Online records also reveal that Berhow's mother had brought divorce proceedings against her husband in 2016 and was also filing for the custody of the children. The authorities revealed that they were questioning Matasuura in order to try and understand the motive behind the tragic shooting.
As reported by KTLA, a childhood friend of Berhow shared that Mark's death could have been a possible trigger. The friend also shared that Berhow's father drank very heavily and also made his own bullets. When asked whether there were weapons in Berhow's home, the friend shared, "His dad used to make bullets, so I'd assume he had bullets and stuff like that".
The neighbors also shared that Mark had a passion for guns though it is not known whether the teenager had access to the weapons.
We had previously reported that the shooter marched into the school on Thursday, November 14, before classes began at 7.30 am and fired his .45 caliber weapon and killed two students and wounded three others before he shot himself in the head. Berhow is a half-Japanese, half-American student whose family lives in Valencia, California, two miles away from the high school.