Brenda Ann Spencer's Deadly Crimes Inspired a Hit Song — Where Is the School Shooter Now?

Although school shootings feel like a relatively new and tragic addition to the United States, the first documented one occurred back in July 1764. That's when four members of the Delaware Lenape tribe killed 10 students, as well as the schoolmaster, in a Pennsylvania schoolhouse.

Every victim was scalped, including a twelfth one that survived. The incident became known as the Enoch Brown school massacre, and resulted in the four Lenape tribe members being executed by hanging.

In modern times, most people think of the Aprill 1999 Columbine attack as the turning point in school-related mass shootings. The killers brought a certain kind of morbid drama to their crimes.

A school shooting that happened 25 years prior was not as deadly, but it inspired a hit song based on the killer's bizarre motive. Where is Brenda Ann Spencer now? Here's what we know.

In February 2025, Spencer was denied parole for the sixth time. She will remain incarcerated at the California Institution for Women in Chino for at least three years. Spencer's next parole date is scheduled for February 2028, reports ABC 10 in San Diego.

District Attorney Summer Stephan told the parole board, "The shock of this brazen crime rippled through the community in San Diego at the time and it continues to hold a place of infamy in the history of mass shootings in our nation."

DA Stephan referenced a law the Menendez brothers were able to use in order to get a reduced sentence in May 2025. In California, if a perpetrator is under the age of 26 when they committed their crimes, they are eligible for parole immediately.

That wasn't enough for DA Stephan who said the "horrific circumstances" of Spencer's crimes "do not warrant release."

Spencer lived across the street from Grover Cleveland Elementary School in San Diego. On the morning of Jan. 28, 1978, she shot 36 rounds from her home using a semi-automatic .22 caliber rifle with a telescopic sight. Children were waiting outside for the school to open when Spencer fatally shot the principal and the school's custodian.

She injured eight children, as well as a police officer who arrived on the scene to help.

After the shooting, Spencer barricaded herself in the house for several hours. During the standoff, she spoke to a reporter on the phone. "I don't like Mondays," Spencer said. "This livens up the day."

This statement inspired Irish new wave pop group the Boomtown Rats to write a song titled, "I Don't Like Mondays." It was released a year after the shooting.

Spencer was tried as an adult and pled guilty to two counts of first-degree murder and assault with a deadly weapon. She was sentenced to concurrent terms of 25 years to life in prison.

At her February 2025 parole hearing, Spencer said in a victims letter that at the time of the shooting she was suicidal.

She was hoping a cop would kill her. "I never considered you would die or anyone would get hurt," she wrote.