On April 17, 2025, a tragic shooting occurred at Florida State University (FSU) in Tallahassee, Florida, near the student union building around 11:50 a.m. The shooter, identified as 20-year-old FSU student Phoenix Ikner, killed two people and injured six others.
Ikner, the stepson of Leon County Sheriff’s Deputy Jessica Ikner, used his stepmother’s former service weapon, a handgun, in the attack. The two victims killed were not students, while the injured included both students and non-students. Ikner was shot by responding officers, sustaining non-life-threatening injuries, and was taken into custody.
The incident prompted an immediate shelter-in-place alert from FSU, with law enforcement, including FSU police, Tallahassee police, and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, swiftly responding.
Students and staff were evacuated from academic buildings, and some barricaded themselves in classrooms or hid, with reports of panic as students fled the scene. Witnesses described hearing 15 to 20 gunshots, and some students, including survivors of the 2018 Parkland school shooting, faced the trauma of a second school shooting.
A makeshift memorial with flowers and candles grew outside the student union, and a service was held at the Co-Cathedral of St. Thomas More across from campus.
Authorities reported that Ikner acted alone, and the motive remains under investigation. Classmates alleged Ikner harbored white supremacist views, though police have not confirmed this as a factor. Ikner had ties to the Leon County Sheriff’s Office through his stepmother and was part of their Youth Advisory Council in 2021-2022.
FSU canceled classes through Friday and all home athletic events through Sunday. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, Attorney General Pam Bondi, and President Donald Trump expressed condolences, with Bondi noting FBI involvement.
The shooting, the second in FSU’s history after a 2014 library incident, reignited discussions about campus safety and gun violence, with the FSU College Democrats calling it a “preventable act of senseless violence.”