A 15-year-old former pupil killed a school caretaker and wounded two staff members during a morning attack at a primary school in Leszczydół-Nowiny, about 70 kilometres northeast of Warsaw, Polish police said on Thursday. Medics could not save the 37-year-old caretaker despite resuscitation attempts at the scene.
The teenager entered the John Paul II Primary School shortly after 9 a.m. carrying three knives, according to the interior ministry. A teacher and the headteacher intervened and restrained the boy; both survived with injuries that officials described as not life-threatening. Police said the assailant had previously attended the school, but investigators have not publicly stated a motive.
How staff confronted the attacker
Headteacher Krzysztof Ochmański told Polish Radio that he saw the teenager near a classroom door before the boy turned toward him. Ochmański said he was cut by a blade and struck with a knife handle but managed to subdue the attacker until officers arrived within minutes of the emergency call.
Interior ministry spokesperson Karolina Gałecka said the caretaker had tried to stop the youth from entering the building. Polish media reported the teenager wore a helmet fitted with a camera; Prime Minister Donald Tusk told ministers later Thursday that authorities were treating the footage as evidence the assailant intended to record the assault.
Second attack in as many days
Thursday's killing followed a separate stabbing on Wednesday at another Polish school in which seven people were wounded and a 19-year-old suspect was arrested. Hours before the Leszczydół-Nowiny assault, police in Sierpc detained a 17-year-old who staff reported had spoken on school grounds about planning to harm someone; officers recovered two knives from him.
Tusk convened an emergency meeting with ministers, the national police commander and the coordinator of special services to discuss what he called a "grim phenomenon of imitation" linked to violent content online. Opposition lawmakers demanded faster security upgrades, while parent groups outside the Wyszków county school waited for word on whether classes would resume.
What changes next for schools
Polish law sharply limits who may carry weapons on campus, and knife attacks in schools remain rare compared with other European countries. Still, the back-to-back incidents prompted Mazovia regional police to announce intensified patrols around primary and secondary buildings and closer monitoring of threats circulating on social platforms.
Prosecutors in Wyszków have opened a homicide investigation against the 15-year-old, who remains in police custody. National education officials said crisis teams would be sent to support pupils and staff, but have not yet published a timeline for reopening the site where a caretaker died trying to keep a former student from crossing the threshold.