US school bus driver shot dead, child abducted in Alabama

A school bus driver was fatally shot in the US state of Alabama as a man climbed into the bus with children on board, abducted a 6-year-old student passenger and fled the scene.

According to local law enforcement authorities, the shooting suspect shot the driver multiple times Tuesday afternoon after the victim refused to let the pupil off the school bus in southern Alabama’s Midland City, local media reported.

The driver has reportedly succumbed to his wounds hours after the shooting incident.

Police said the suspect has taken the abducted child to an area behind a nearby church and that authorities were negotiating with him as of Tuesday evening.

No details about a possible relationship between the shooter and the child hostage have yet been reported as the ordeal continues.

It is not clear how many children were on the bus at the time of the shooting but several have reportedly witnessed the shooting. No other children on the bus were physically harmed during the incident but some press reports have described them as ‘shocked.’

The shooting incident is yet another episode of the persisting gun violence across the United States as an elementary school shooting massacre of 20 children and six school staff in the state of Connecticut has yet to produce any meaningful federal measures in terms of gun controls.

While gun purchases have reportedly surged across the country in the aftermath of the Connecticut carnage in an apparent anticipation of tougher gun control laws, the powerful pro-gun lobby in the country, National Rifle Association (NRA) has vowed to resist and foil any federal legislation for tougher gun-control laws despite a major address earlier this month by US President Barack Obama urging far-reaching congressional action on gun-control.