On February 1, 1993, Randel Artis, a 16-year-old male student, walked the familiar corridors of Amityville High School in Amityville, New York, not knowing the day would end in violence. Near the guidance counselor’s office, a confrontation erupted and a handgun was produced. Artis was shot in the stomach, and the school—built for routines, bells, and ordinary teenage dramas—suddenly became a place of screams, sprinting footsteps, and stunned silence in the wake of gunfire.
Accounts tied to later litigation describe the moments around the shooting in more detail, tracing the day through a meeting at the school and a stop in the cafeteria before the encounter turned deadly. After leaving the cafeteria area, Artis and others crossed paths with Shem McCoy, a student, and the gun was fired at close range. One other teen, John Billinger, was struck by a bullet and survived his wound, while Artis did not.
The conflict was not portrayed as random; it was described as the culmination of an ongoing dispute, with the violence striking within the tight circle of people who knew one another well. Compilations of school attacks note that McCoy shot two people—both described as his cousins—and that Artis later died of his injuries.
Police quickly focused on McCoy as the suspect. Reports from the time describe Shem McCoy, 17, of North Amityville being arraigned in First District Court in Central Islip and ordered held without bail, marking the start of the criminal case that followed the shooting. Years later, a local news report stated that McCoy served prison time and was convicted of manslaughter for the death in the 1993 incident.
In the aftermath, the shooting’s shockwaves reached beyond the criminal courtroom. Civil lawsuits were brought against the school district alleging negligent supervision, arguing that what happened should have been prevented. The appellate court ultimately upheld dismissal of those claims, concluding the district lacked sufficiently specific notice of the kind of dangerous conduct that led to the shooting, and that the school was not legally responsible for the tragedy that unfolded that winter day.
