Wednesday night, state police try to learn why a man pointed a gun at an Indiana Borough policeman. That action cost the man his life. The drama began shortly after 2pm outside the Indiana Area High School.

Police say Joseph Stank, 51, walked into the high school building and went to the main office, where he asked for a job application. Doctor Kathleen Kelly of the Indiana school District says, He just appeared to be a man that was in need of a job, the secretary's were kind to him, and directed him to Central Administration to receive that application.

But Stank never made it to the Central Administration offices. Although police are still piecing together what happened next, here is what we know. The county 9-1-1 center got a call about a man armed with a gun outside the high school. When police arrived, they confronted the suspect. Suddenly, Stank pointed an air pistol at them. State police commander, Brad Shields says, The individual failed to comply with the officer's commands to drop the weapon and shots were fired by an Indiana Borough police patrolman.

The officer fired 2 shots from a 12-gauge shotgun. The suspect was shot in the chest and neck. He died at a hospital a short time later. The state police are in charge of the investigation, but Indiana Borough Police Chief Bill Sutton says that it appears the shooting was justified.

Channel 6 News spoke to a student who was inside the school when the shooting happened. Dustin Rotosky is a senior at the school. He says he was getting ready to leave for a doctors appointment when he heard a popping noise outside the school. Then his teacher told him to get back in the classroom.

Dustin says, Over the announcements came Code Red. She was screaming pretty loud. The teacher ran to the door, shot the door, turned the lights off, locked the door and told us to get in the corner. We sat there for about five minutes. She (the secretary) came back on the announcements and said it was a Code Blue which means someone is sick or hurt and they needed to get attention to them.

Students werent supposed to use their cell pones, but Dustin wanted his parents to know what was going on so he send his dad a text message.

Mark Rotosky, Dustins dad says, My son said there was a shooting at the school and they arent allowed to leave and my heart just sunk to my feet because he didnt say if he was okay, if he was trapped in a room or what, so I was afraid for him.

Dustin says, It was pretty scary. With these school shooting and things that are going on it was pretty scary just to think something like this could happen at our school.

Dustins parents say they want the school to install metal detectors. They say today is proof the security cameras and locked doors at the school just arent enough.