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JUST IN: Shooting at a Cleveland Schools Building; 4 possibly 5 injured





Created: 10/10/2007 1:25:28 PM
Updated:10/10/2007 2:04:10 PM


CLEVELAND -- Numerous police officers, with guns drawn have been seen running into the Successtech Academy High on Lakeside Avenue downtown.
1:58 p.m. There are unconfirmed reports that there may be as many as five people injured. Sources tell Channel 3 News that the security guard was on vacation and that two other full time security guards had been laid off in recent years. The school has business and administrative offices on the ground to 2nd floors and classrooms on the 3rd floor and above.
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1:48 p.m. Authorities are shutting down Lakeside Avenue from East 12th to East 14th Street due to the incident.
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1:41 p.m. Education Reporter Kim Wheeler reporting from the scene says the estimates are now that 4 people have been shot. Two of the victims have been taken to MetroHealth Center. Mayor Frank Jackson has arrived at the scene to find out firsthand what is happening.
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1:34 p.m. There are unconfirmed reports that students and teachers are hiding and taking cover inside the building. According to its website, the SuccessTech Academy believes its students should participate in service learning and rigorous curriculum though the use of state of the art technology.
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1:32 p.m. According to a tip email the shootings reportedly took place on the 3rd and 4th floor. It is unclear at this time whether the gunman is in custody.
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1:25 p.m. There are reports that there are two victims shot.

Witnesses tell Channel 3 that the suspected shooter is a 14-year-old student who was apparently upset about a suspension.

There are unconfirmed reports that the victims are male teachers.

Stay with Channel 3 News and wkyc.com for the latest details.

2 Shot in Ohio School Rampage

'Code Blue' at Cleveland High School CLEVELAND

Share Authorities say at least two people were injured in a shooting at a high school, according to broadcast and newspaper reports.

Ronnell Jackson, 15, said he saw three people come out on stretchers.

He said he saw a shooter running down the hall and ducked out the door.

"He was about to shoot me but I got out just in time," he said. "He was aiming at me I got out just in time."

Doneisha LeVert said she heard the principal say 'Code Blue' over the public address system.

"Kids was just running," she said, and she hid in a closet with some of her friends.

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Worlds going down the crapper real fast.....Prayers out to all

Ridiculous.

Hopefully the kid put a bullet through his own brain and saved the taxpayers the expense of keeping him the rest of his miserable animal existence .

And again....



Shots ring out at Western

Two students injured in parking lot before school starts

By BRIAN HAYNES, DAVID KIHARA and ANTONIO PLANAS
REVIEW-JOURNAL
Western High School sophomores, from left, Ricky Yarber, 16, Desmond Sullivan, 16, and Kenny Ponder, 15, talk Tuesday about a shooting in the parking lot of Western High School. Police said two freshmen were injured when a gunman followed students to the school on Bonanza Road and Decatur Boulevard and fired at them after exchanging words at a convenience market and a nearby traffic light.
Photos by K.M. Cannon.


Surveillance video from a Rebel Oil station shows a man, foreground, suspected by police of opening fire on several students on Tuesday morning at Western High School.


Click image for enlargement.
Graphic by Mike Johnson.


Western High School Principal Pearl Morgan discusses the gunfire that wounded two students in the school's parking lot before school Tuesday.


Clark County School District police monitor the parking lot at Western High School Tuesday afternoon, after two students were hit by gunfire earlier in the day. Classes were conducted as scheduled after police and school officials determined no continuing threat existed.


What began as an argument in a convenience store parking lot spilled onto the campus of Western High School Tuesday morning, bringing gunfire and bloodshed with it.

The shooting in the school parking lot sent students scattering for cover and left two freshmen injured by gunfire. The two injured students, a boy and a girl, were sent home after being treated at University Medical Center.

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The shooting began about 6:30 a.m. as students began arriving at the campus at Decatur Boulevard and Bonanza Road.

Sophomore Celia Gonzalez said she heard the shots as she was about to enter a school building. She turned her head and saw a student lying on the pavement holding his leg, she said.

She and her classmates, many of whom were getting off buses, took off.

"I started running. I wasn't about to get shot," Gonzalez said. "There were a lot of people running. Nobody knew what was going on."

Las Vegas police believe the shooting was related to an off-campus argument at a convenience store a block north of the school.

Three Western students, including one of the shooting victims, were in a car at the intersection of Decatur and Washington Avenue when the gunman sped by and fishtailed into a parking lot planter at a Rebel Oil gasoline station.

Believing his car had been struck by the gunman's vehicle, the student pulled into the store parking lot, yelled at the other driver and drove toward school, Las Vegas police spokesman Jose Montoya said.

The gunman followed, and the two parties exchanged more words at a stoplight just outside campus.

The gunman trailed the students into the school parking lot and opened fire on them as they exited their car, Montoya said.

A 14-year-old boy was shot in the ankle and a 14-year-old girl, who was in the parking lot and not with the intended targets, was hit by bullet shrapnel, police said.

Sophomore Kenny Ponder, 15, said he saw the gunman's blue Ford Mustang creep into the parking lot and stop as a hand holding a gun extended from a window and fired about six shots.

Ponder ran, fearing the gunman would return.

He didn't, and within a minute, several police cars pulled into the parking lot.

After Ponder returned to Western, school officials ordered all students to stay in the cafeteria, he said.

"I wanted to go home," he said.

Senior Michael Evers, 17, who transferred to Western four days before the incident, said he saw the 14-year-old boy "get a hole blown in his leg."

For at least one parent, the shooting conjured up images of the deadliest school shooting in U.S. history.

"My stomach was in my throat. ... I was thinking this is Columbine all over again," said Margie Rearich, who fielded a call from her husband at about 7 a.m. informing her of the shooting.

Rearich, who was at Western Tuesday afternoon to pick up her son Nick, a freshman, said she calmed down after she learned details of the incident. She said the school is generally safe and she typically sees Las Vegas police patrolling nearby streets in the morning.

She said the incident was more about street violence spilling over into the school's parking lot than an issue directly related to school safety.

That sentiment was echoed by Principal Pearl Morgan, who oversees the school of about 2,300 students.

"This is an isolated situation," Morgan said. "Regardless of where the students went, if an individual wanted to accost them, he would have."

Morgan said her school is safe. In addition to the two police officers, the school has five campus monitors and seven administrators who roam the campus throughout the day.

Morgan sent a letter home to parents Tuesday informing them of the incident.

The letter said there was no "subsequent threat to our school and students" because of the immediate response to the shooting by school staff and police.

That is why the school was never placed on lock down and classes, which began about 30 minutes after the shooting, were not canceled, Morgan said.

"We shouldn't have closed the school because the situation was such that it didn't affect the student body," she said. "A lot of students weren't even aware that it happened."

The decision not to cancel classes didn't go over well with some students.

"They made us go to class after this like it was nothing," said sophomore Miranda Crespin, who heard the shots and ran for safety inside the school.

"If there's a drive-by shooting, they should have canceled school," said freshman Josie Morale, 14. "We could have gotten shot."

Las Vegas and school district police will run increased patrols around the Western campus today, Morgan said.

At the time of the shooting, the two police officers assigned to the school were inside, said Lt. Ken Young, a spokesman with Clark County School District police.

Campus police determine when and where to patrol a school, and those decisions vary from school to school, he said.

Young would not speculate whether a police officer patrolling the parking lot could have prevented the shooting.

"I can't tell you that," he said. "We're still investigating."

Patrick Fiel, a school security expert with ADT Security Services in Alexandria, Va., said shootings such as the one at Western can be prevented by stationing security guards or building gated entrances at parking lots to make sure only students and school staff can enter campus.

Officers posted in front of the schools, as well as security cameras, can also act as deterrents, he said.

"A police presence is highly critical at school nowadays," he said.

Clark County School District does not restrict access to its high school parking lots.

The gunman was a black man in his late 20s to early 30s, 5 feet 10 inches tall and 170 pounds. He wore dreadlocks, a black-and-white checkered jacket, blue jeans and blue-and-white tennis shoes. He was driving a 1986 to 1991 blue Ford Mustang LX coupe with five-star rims.

Anyone with information on the shooting can call police at 828-5634 or leave anonymous tips with Crime Stoppers at 385-5555. Crime Stoppers offered up to a $2,000 reward.

Cnn is reporting that they killed the gunman in Cleveland. Way to go police. Got what he deserved.

/sarcasm
This stuff wouldn't happen if we banned guns from the possession of citizens.
/sarcasm off

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The gunman was a black man in his late 20s to early 30s, 5 feet 10 inches tall and 170 pounds. He wore dreadlocks, a black-and-white checkered jacket, blue jeans and blue-and-white tennis shoes. He was driving a 1986 to 1991 blue Ford Mustang LX coupe with five-star rims.

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Well at least he had $1000 rims on his 20 year old car... a man who obviously has his priorities in order.

Right now Mayor Jackson is stating 5 victims. Two teachers and three students. The three students ae ok with superficial wounds but apparently the teachers are a bit more severe. Nothing was said about the shooter but homicide and the coroner have been at the scene.

What I heard from one of the kids who was interviewed ws this kid was suspended for fighting several days ago and came back to exact revenge. The kid being interviewed did admit thought that a lot of people messed with this kid and when asked why he said " because he was like a goth kid".


KING

j/c

What the hell ever happened to telling the kid you had a problem with to meet you after school somewhere and the two of you going toe-to-toe? I do not condone fighting or violence of any kind, but if you're PO'd at someone, you don't start shooting the place up.

I graduated high school in 1997, and I don't remember anyone ever saying "I'm so mad, I'm going to bring a gun to school and blow people away." Instead, if kid A was mad at kid B, they met after school somewhere, beat the crap out of each other, and, more often than not, that was the end of it. Like I said, I would never condone fighting, but it's a much better alternative than killing people.

What a tragedy for all involved, shooter, victims, everyone. I have no idea what it would be like to be treated so poorly as to think that I need to kill people.

Quote:

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What I heard from one of the kids who was interviewed ws this kid was suspended for fighting several days ago and came back to exact revenge. The kid being interviewed did admit thought that a lot of people messed with this kid and when asked why he said " because he was like a goth kid".

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The article above says the shooter was in his late 20s... I reckon' we'll wait for the inconsistencies to clear up...

Ire's article is about a shooting in Vegas. It's a little confusing having them both in here.

CNN just confirmed that the shooter in Cleveland shot and killed himself.

Apparently he tried that last week, got kicked out. Of course the next logical step was to come back armed and start shooting people and then put one to the breadbasket . Really simple actually.

Sorry, I guess that's what I get for skimming...

Quote:

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What I heard from one of the kids who was interviewed ws this kid was suspended for fighting several days ago and came back to exact revenge. The kid being interviewed did admit thought that a lot of people messed with this kid and when asked why he said " because he was like a goth kid".

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I'm not excusing the shooter... but if this is true I hope the bullies are really proud of themselves...

The bullies are probably enjoying the day off and looking foreward to subsequent days off after today. The school board will address the issue of bullying and said bullies will have to take some classes to get a better understanding of the actions they caused..blah..blah..blah.

Bullied or not, it still does not excuse coming up to school and shooting at random people. I bet that kid did not even shoot the people who were bullying him!

This was right next to my building, I was out on the deck watching.

No it doesn't and I'll bet he didn't... that doesn't change my opinion that the bullies are asses.

I think we all share that opinion. All the lives ruined or damaged because of unstable kids.

Geez, there was also another shooting today outside a school near Pittsburgh....nobody hurt though, thankfully!


Police Investigate After Shots Fired Near Local HS

(KDKA) SHERADEN Police are investigating after shots were fired near Langley High School in Sheraden this afternoon.

City police confirm reports of shots fired by a group of kids at another group of kids.

Officials say it happened behind the school on Sherwood Avenue.

There are no reports of anyone hit.




Link

I still think if less TV was watched and more kids got "whooped" by their parents, there would be less of this.

I'm 55 years old,,, Finished HS in 1970 and all through Grade School, Middle School, Jr, High and Sr, High,,, K thru 12,,, 13 years,,, Two school systems,,

NOT ONE SHOOTING,,,, No one even brought a gun to school that I know of or even ever heard of...

What's the one big difference I see? Lack of parental supervision. I know I know,, it's tougher to make ends meet today,,, used to be that one parent worked, the other tended the kids,, That was the norm,, not the exception.

I've asked my mom how she and dad managed... wanna know her response?

She said, what choice did we have..... LOL that's my mom!

Peens right,, turn the tube off and talk to your kids

I know that bothers some people......but too much quiet time and not enough crying time after getting your butt belt lashed by pop or wood spoon lashed by mom.

The building in the Cleveland shooting is where my hubby attended grades K-5 (back in the Stone Ages... ) No real point to stating that, just did though.

Terrible situation. I guess I just don't get kids, these days. I hope I'm able to understand mine.

I think there are two problems.
One is everybody is so pc nowadays kids aren't scared of their parents anymore. You yell at your child too loud (what's that called nowadays, verbal abuse ) someone wants to call on you.
When I grew up my mom would whack me with a spatula. No big deal.
The big deal was when my dad got home, the belt came off and I got it good.
Put a little bit of fear into me. I didn't want to go down the wrong road and have the wrath of my parents on me.

Second, I think is the media. When something like this happens it's all over tv for days on end. I think it kinda influences kids in a way. It's always in their face, and soon enough the rotten ones want to copycat what has happened earlier. I heard of a story some time ago that a kid wanted to go to his school and start shooting the place up but got caught before anything happened. His girlfriend said he wanted to do it Virginia Tech style.

See what I mean.

This has the most to do with the educational system. All these teachers holding up hoops for little Johnny to jump through............next thing you know, Junior is grabbing daddy's widow maker out of a Brown Lunch bag.

Kids are growing up in an environment where the pressure to be perfect is pushing them over the edge.............and then they take it out on the messed up system----by putting a slug in little miss priss' chest.

Its all about how we treat these kids and how out of touch most people are when it comes to their kids.

Tyler, on this one you need to go fly a kite. You blame the school for this? So what, expecting Asa Coon to not fight in school, and when he does, the school expels him (on monday) and then he comes in Wednesday and starts shooting....that's the schools fault?

What was the school suppose to do? Let him fight on monday and then say "asa, you know you aren't supposed to do that. Now, make sure your homework is done for tomorrow."?

Well, go ahead and keep treading your same tired path, and you will continue to see this nonsense.

Bingo, Peen & JC.
My mother used to have a paddle she beat us with.
My brother and I broke it in half playing homerun derby with a golf ball.
She found out when it broke after we glued it , she folded it in half and beat us with it anyway.

The problem is if you smack your kid for doing somthing wrong, the cops threaten to arrest you.
Then when they bring your kid home after doing somthing wrong they call you a lousy parent.

I used to date a girl, her daughter snatched my car and got arrested.
At court the judge asked me if I was going to press charges, I told him yes.
He complained and told us we should take her home and deal with it.
I told him she needed to spend some time in jail to find out what it was going to be like in the future
He said if we didn't take her home he would have us arrested for child neglect.
I told him to give it his best shot.
I won.

Either way the goverment agencys can't run the goverment agencys.
They need to let parent go back to being parents.

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All these teachers holding up hoops for little Johnny to jump through

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You tell me what hoops we are making little Johnny jumpt through.

Good post, and you are only touching upon some of the problems.

Tyler actually has somewhat of a point. Kids these days are being pushed to learn a whole lot more a whole lot quicker. Just a couple decades ago, Kindergarten was the start of school, and there you would learn your ABC and 123's. Today, they have 2-years of pre-school that they highly recommend your kid attend, and they need to know their ABC's before they get to kindergarten. Then as you get older, you've got some kids that are expected to participate in all kinds of sports, hold down a part-time job, etc.

Still ... that's a really weak excuse for flipping out and shooting up schools. You don't think kids 50 years ago were stressed too?

I think the biggest areas to blame are: Parents, Lawyers, Hollywood and Media.

First a lot of parents these days are hardly that. In todays society, both parents work, and many don't spend enough time with their kids after school. A lot of parents are also pretty spineless and give their kids pretty much anything they want, and instill no sense of morals in them. Raising a kid for some has become akin to raising a pet. Then you have a good deal of parents who are divorced, so rather than become the "mean parent", both parents end up letting their kid do whatever they want. The result is a lot of kids with no dicipline, a sense of entitlement, and stressed out when schools force them to do "work" that their parents won't have time to help them out with when they get home.

Which leads to lawyers ... No dicipline is being instilled at the home, so they go to school, and parents expect the teachers to take care of matters. Except, if you raise so much as a harsh word to a kid ... lawyers will pound down the doors of the school and threaten lawsuits. Lawsuits are so out of control in this country, and schools have so little money to fight them off, that school boards reluctantly cave to just about anything to avoid legal ramifications. So now you have parents who don't have time to reprimand kids, and teachers who are afraid to do anything about it.

Then you've got Hollywood. Gregg Easterbrook had a great Tuesday Morning Quarterback column this week about how the movie industry has this huge double standard when it comes to ratings. If there is any smoking in a movie now, it takes a big hit from the ratings panel (Also if there is any sense of nudity in a movie, same thing) ... but you can mutilate and dice up human bodies with blood spraying around like kool-aid, and the worst you are going to get is an R-rating. Which means it's going to be played in just about any theater in America. Same thing with video games. Now this goes back to parenting ... you've got these parents who let their kids do just about anything. Now they're watching movies which are glorifying graphic killing.

And lastly, there's the media. The majority of these kid shooters are doing it FOR ATTENTION. They'd much rather be painfully remembered then never remembered at all. So what does the media do?? They talk about them ad nauseum ... just to make sure that the next guy who shoots up a school knows he's going to get the attention he so craves too.