High School Student Disarms Gunman…Gets Suspended

ABC-7.com WZVN News for Fort Myers, Cape Coral

Pat Dollard

The student grappled the gun away from the 15-year-old suspect on the bus ride home Tuesday after witnesses say he aimed the weapon point blank at another student and threatened to shoot him.

The student, who Fox 4 has agreed not to identify because he fears for his safety, says there’s “no doubt” he saved a life by disarming the gunman. And for that he was suspended for three days.

“I think he was really going to shoot him right then and there,” the student said. “Not taking no pity.”

The student says he wrestled the .22 caliber RG-14 Revolver away from the suspect, a football player, who witnesses say threatened to shoot a teammate because he had been arguing with his friend.

“No doubt,” the student said, “he was going to shoot him point blank.”

The teen we spoke to and authorities both confirm the Revolver was loaded. According to the arrest report the suspect, who Fox 4 is not naming because he is a minor, was “pointing the gun directly” at another student and “threatening to shoot him.”

That’s when the student we spoke with says he and two others tackled the teen and wrestled away the gun. The next day the school slapped him with a three day suspension.

“It’s dumb,” he said. “How they going to suspend me for doing the right thing?”

According to the referral, he was suspended for being part of an “incident” where a weapon was present and given an “emergency suspension.”

“If they wouldn’t of did what they had to do on that bus,” the teen’s mother said, “I think there would have been a lot of fatalities.”

The mother agreed to talk with us in disguise. She can’t understand why her son, and two other students who disarmed the gunman, were all suspended.

“Those kids had to fight for their lives,” she said. “All the kids that was involved in this they should have a pat on their backs because they did the right thing to save someone from burying their child.”

According to the mother, the school suspended her son because he refused to cooperate in the investigation. She says he was scared.

Fox 4 asked the Lee County School District about the suspension.

“We cannot discuss specifics involving students,” said district spokesman Alberto Rodriguez in a statement. “Florida law allows the principal to suspend a student immediately pending a hearing.”

On Thursday Fox 4 tried to get answers from Tracey Perkins, the principal of Cypress Lake High School.

“Were those students suspended?,” asked Fox 4 reporter Matt Grant, before she drove off.

“Ya’ll should be ashamed of yourselves,” the teen’s mother said referring to the school’s administration, adding that the suspended students “need their education.”

The teen who wrestled the gun away can go back to school Monday, his mother said.

Despite the fact the suspect pointed a load gun at another student and threatened to shoot authorities charged him with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon “without intent” to kill.

We asked the sheriff’s office about that.

“The investigation is ongoing,” said Sgt. David Valez in a statement. “The charges presented to [the suspect] are based on our findings at this time.”

Authorities were unable to watch the school bus surveillance video because the cameras weren’t working.

The 15-year-old suspect was arrested and charged with posession of a firearm on school property and assault with a deadly weapon without intent to kill.

He was taken to the juvenile justice center.

Last month, a 14-year-old Mariner Middle School was arrested for bringing a .22 caliber gun and a Panther brand stungun to class.

http://patdollard.com/2013/03/high-school-student-disarms-gunman-gets-suspended/

13 thoughts on “High School Student Disarms Gunman…Gets Suspended

  1. *fingers* tap….tap…tap….tap…..
    *mumbling incoherent obscenities*

    Failing to cooperate with the investigation? Thats their reason?
    Um…I think he contributed enough to the incident.

    Thats probably why they don’t charge the little thug sob with a bigger crime, as they would certainly do to you or me. Hell, they’d tie terroristic charges to it.
    Police don’t charge him heavily, so they can scare and coerce the American citizen that stopped a further incident, to ‘cooperate’ with the investigation.
    The dude saved a lot of people(potentially). I’m sure when the cops(idiots) showed up, the story was told to them.
    THATS ALL THEY NEED TO KNOW!
    What is this ‘not cooperating’ bullshit??

    And IF…IF he’s not cooperating with the investigation…wouldn’t the cops be the one’s to ‘charge’ him? NOT the effin school gestapo idiots.

    It’s obvious thats it’s known what happened……it’s right here in a news article.
    Asshole wannabe superman gangster thug girly-boy punk pulls a gun on a bus….citizen(s) disarms him to the point where no harm was done to anyone, and the cops get the asshole.

    Just where didn’t he(they) cooperate?

    If you people that are in the area this happened, or are the family member or loved one of anyone on that bus does not call for the immediate suspension of anyone involved with suspending this student, by force(I didn’t say ‘violence’)….you deserve everything the courts do from here-on-out.

    Regardless of that….KUDO’S and HIGH-FIVES to the student(s) that stopped this from going any further. And even though I am not part of your community or area, I thank you…if noone else will.

    The dumbing down of the people, and the conformity/brainwashing of the people is the tragedy in this incident. Period.

    ~Blessed Be to all~

  2. Yep. The correct procedure is to let perp empty his gun, call 911 to alert police they need to make sure to bring yellow tape and chalk.

  3. Keep in mind that the only college major whose students have a lower average SAT score than education majors are those who are education administration majors. Principals are the dumbest of the dumb. I had one in my family and intellectually, he was a knuckle-dragger in a nice suit.

  4. The answer is obvious; a suspension is indeed in order. A permanent suspension for
    those that made the decision to punish the heroic parties is the only logical next step..
    The suspension and subsequent condemnation should be administered so that these folks never work in the field of education again. Perhaps they should just become lawyers.

    I am pretty certain that this is not what is going to happen next though. People in our society never are willing to correct these problems. Reading this story reinforces my undesired belief that our society really is doomed.

  5. “…but they say the camera wasn’t working properly.”

    How convenient! That seems to happen a lot these days doesn’t it?

  6. Of course the kid is suspended. Same way an employee is fired for trying to stop a thief in the mall. It’s LIABILITY ISSUE FOR CORPORATIONS AND BUSINESSES!!! They don’t want have to pay the bill and care more about themselves and their company than moral laws and the lives of others. It’s a sick world.

  7. The school should be held liable.

    Obviously, they didn’t do a proper job of indoctrinating this lad.

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