Reno High School Knife Attack Latest Update: After Officer Shooting, Teen In Critical Condition

A high school student was shot and critically injured by a school district officer in Reno, Nevada, after allegedly threatening his classmate with a knife on Wednesday, according to local reports.

The shooting occurred in the midst of a physical altercation the victim was having with another student at Hug High School, Reno Police Chief Jason Soto said. The officer was prompted to shoot the 14-year-old boy when the student took out a knife during the fight and refused to drop it. The boy also pointed his knife towards the group of more of 40 students who had surrounded the fight.

The student who was shot has not been identified by police and school officials because he is a juvenile. He remained in critical condition at a local hospital Thursday. Justin Clark, the father, said his son's name is Logan, the New York Post reported Thursday.

The boy's family said Thursday the officer did not need to shoot their son and that there must have been less severe ways of quelling the situation. The family’s lawyer David Houston, told local reporters "It is my belief we do not send our children to school to be shot." Houston said he would evaluate the situation further before committing to taking legal action against the officer and the school district.

"There are many questions to be answered as to what happened and what could have been done to avoid the use of lethal force," the student’s family said in a statement released Thursday. "We believe options were available to law enforcement that were not pursued."

Videos of the incident had emerged on social media as some of the students on hand recorded the grisly scene on their mobile devices. In a video posted to Facebook Wednesday, the boy can be seen wearing a navy blue shirt and wielding a blade. Someone off-camera can be heard yelling, “Back up! Back up!”

A gunshot was also heard in the video before the boy is shown falling to the ground. The officer is then shown approaching the student with his gun drawn.

An investigation has been launched by the Reno Police Department, spokesman Tim Broadway told USA Today. The officer has been placed on paid administrative leave.

The superintendent of the Washoe County School District, said the officer in question acted “to protect the safety of our students.” Traci Davis commended him for his tough split second decision.

Class at Hug High School resumed Thursday.

One parent told NBC News she was saddened that a student got shot but said the action was necessary.

"I was very comfortable with the fact that there's police officers there, because the kids like to fight. They are there to protect the kids — which is what he did," the mother said. "I'm glad the situation got handled the way it did. My kid was right there. He could have been stabbed."

There were 43,770 public schools across the county that had been staffed by armed officers at least one day a week in the 2013-14 school year, according to the United States Education Department’s National Center for Education Studies report from May of 2015. Among those were 16,700 public high schools.