Scout Schultz: Slain LGBT Georgia Tech Student Reportedly Attempted Suicide Two Years Ago, According To Family

The family of Scout Schultz spoke out nearly a day after the 21-year-old LGBT Georgia Tech student was killed by campus police late Saturday. CBS News reported on Monday morning that Schultz’s mother, Lynne Schultz, as well as an attorney for the Schultz family, spoke about Scout’s killing in an interview with the Atlanta Journal-Constitution late Sunday afternoon. According to Lynne Schultz, Scout had apparently tried to commit suicide two years ago, and the family’s attorney, Chris Stewart, reportedly said that Scout was having a mental breakdown on Saturday night when a campus police officer fired a fatal shot.

A disturbing cellphone video surfaced on the Washington Post and other online media outlets after a “knife-wielding” Georgia Tech student refused to drop his weapon on Saturday night, resulting in a campus police officer opening fire on the campus pride leader, Scout Schultz. The Georgia Tech police officer reportedly shot Scout Schultz in the heart after repeatedly telling the “fourth-year engineering student,” as noted by People Magazine, to drop the knife as Schultz continues to walk forward. Four campus officers were on scene and two officers can be heard telling Schultz more than once to drop the knife. However, Scout Schultz can be heard in the one-minute video saying to “shoot me” shortly before a male officer opened fire.

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Schultz, who was the president of Georgia Tech’s Pride Alliance organization and who didn’t identify as either a male or a female, reportedly was not wielding a knife blade on Saturday night when he was shot. According to CBS News, Schultz had been displaying a multi-purpose tool with the knife blade still folded inside. Schultz also was not carrying a gun, as first thought by a 911 caller who initially reported “a person with a knife and a gun” in a parking lot outside the Georgia Tech dorms shortly before midnight. Police reportedly thought Scout Schultz was carrying a pocket knife, but Scout’s mother, Lynne Schultz, is questioning why officers “didn’t use pepper spray or Tasers,” rather than deadly force.

A Sunday report on the Atlanta Journal-Constitution quotes Lynne Schultz as saying, “Why didn’t they use some non-lethal force, like pepper spray or Tasers?” Lynne’s son, Scout Schultz, who was reportedly active in protest rallies and was “politically active in progressive causes,” suffered from several medical issues, including depression, and also reportedly attempted suicide two years ago by hanging, according to Lynne Schultz. The Schultz family attorney, Chris Stewart, believes that Scout Schultz was suffering from a mental breakdown on Saturday night and “didn’t know what to do.” Stewart added that Georgia Tech campus police officer, whose identity has not yet been released, “overreacted” by fatally shooting Scout.

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Thirty minutes after the shooting, Scout Schultz was reportedly pronounced dead at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta, Georgia, located less than three miles from the Georgia Institute of Technology, where Scout had been a student “who took master’s degree courses” to design biomedical devices and who had been the president of the Georgia Tech Pride Alliance Group for the last two years. Pride Alliance issued a statement on Saturday on the Georgia Tech website, saying “As you might have heard, last night we lost our President, Scout Schultz. We are all deeply saddened by what has occurred.”

The statement goes on to say that “they,” referring to Scout, who identified as intersex, according to the Atlanta Patch, had been the “driving force” behind Pride Alliance, a group that stands for People Recognizing Identities and Differences for Equality. OrgSync shares that the Pride Alliance group supports students as they “integrate their sexual orientation and gender identity into their personhood.” Pride Alliance is reportedly a club that is devoted to the LGBTQ community, as well as its “straight allies.” Just two months ago, Scout Schultz had posted on the Georgia Tech Pride Alliance Facebook page about having a “great time” working the Pride Alliance table at the first-year FASET event, an orientation event to help new summer and fall students make a successful transition to Georgia Tech, as described by the Georgia Tech Division of Student Life.

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Scout Schultz was reportedly born Scott Schultz and attended Georgia Tech as a computer engineering student from the city of Lilburn, Georgia, roughly 30 miles northeast of Atlanta. The Atlanta Patch reports that an independent investigation into the shooting death of Scout Schultz has been opened by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. Scout Schultz is being remembered by friends and family as a “scary smart” student who had “a lot of empathy” for other people. According to Lynne Schultz, “Scout was always a perfectionist,” and “Most of Scout’s stress was related to school.”

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