Qualla: 2022 University of Virginia shooting

2022 University of Virginia shooting: Introduction

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Aaron Josephson, Public domain. The class had spent the day in Washington watching a play about the murder of Emmett Till. They were returning to the University of Virginia campus on a chartered bus on the night of November 13, 2022, when the bus pulled into a parking garage near the drama building. The clock read about 10:15 p.m. Twenty-two-year-old Christopher Darnell Jones Jr., a former walk-on football player, pulled a Glock handgun from his clothing and opened fire. Three of his former teammates were killed. Two other students were wounded. A community that had spent the day studying a 1955 lynching ended the day mourning its own dead.

Image: Aaron Josephson | Public domain

2022 University of Virginia shooting: The Day Before the Night

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Aaron Josephson, Public domain. The students were enrolled in a class on African American playwrights taught by a UVA professor. Five of them were Virginia Cavaliers football players. Christopher Jones was not in the playwrights class, but the same professor taught a separate social justice course in which Jone...

Image: Aaron Josephson | Public domain

2022 University of Virginia shooting: The Bus

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Aaron Josephson, Public domain. When the gunfire started, some students ran. Some did not. Mike Hollins, another football player, evacuated with two other students - and then turned around and went back into the bus to help his friends when he realized no one else had gotten out. He was wounded when he did. The...

Image: Aaron Josephson | Public domain

2022 University of Virginia shooting: The Manhunt and the Investigation

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Aaron Josephson, Public domain. Jones tried to throw his pistol onto the roof of a library building. The pistol did not stay on the roof. He removed his hoodie and jacket, leaving them behind along with two Glock magazines and 16 rounds of 9mm ammunition. Then he drove away. A Henrico County officer who had bee...

Image: Aaron Josephson | Public domain

2022 University of Virginia shooting: The Aftermath, the Plea, the Sentence

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Aaron Josephson, Public domain. Classes were canceled the Monday and Tuesday after the shooting. Students returned to ungraded coursework on Wednesday. A vigil was held the next day around the campus Homer statue, candles arranged with the players' uniform numbers - 1, 15, 41 - and the words UVA Strong. The Nov...

Image: Aaron Josephson | Public domain