Educators increasingly look for signs of potential violence

In the post-Columbine world, many Washington state school districts have added a fourth "R" to the traditional staples of "reading, 'riting and 'rithmetic." The ability to recognize a potential violent threat posed by an angry or disgruntled student has become a major priority in campus security.

That was underscored again this week when Pierce County sheriff's deputies arrested a 16-year-old Puyallup boy who they say had crafted an elaborate plot to open fire on his classmates today before taking his own life. The boy, who has been charged with attempted first-degree assault, had made detailed plans to use his stepfather's .22-caliber rifle, a handgun and a homemade pipe bomb to launch his assault, according to detectives.

As school officials in Washington and elsewhere have learned in recent years, that sort of plot is not isolated.

On Monday, the same day Pierce County authorities announced the arrest of the Puyallup boy, another 16-year-old boy was charged with third-degree malicious explosion of a substance.

Orting police said the boy fashioned a bomb from a glass bottle, tape, bottle rockets and a flaming firework and brought the device to Orting Middle School on April 18 to intimidate another student who had been dating a girl he liked. He set off the device hoping to intimidate the other student, but no one was injured.

Within the past few weeks, a junior-high-school teen in Kitsap County was investigated for allegedly planning to bring weapons to school; and on the Key Peninsula in Pierce County, three middle-school boys were charged last week with plotting to open fire on classmates after prompting a school lockdown.

"These recent incidents just remind us that we have to be constantly vigilant and constantly aware," said Mark Wenzel, communications director of the Bethel School District in Spanaway, Pierce County, where three students were arrested in 2004 for planning a school takeover. "The most important thing we learned is how important it is to maintain close ties with students so that kids will let a trusted adult know when something doesn't feel right."

Since the 1999 shootings at Columbine High School in Colorado and the 1996 slaying of two students and a teacher at a Moses Lake school, Washington state school officials have taken steps to recognize possible threats of violence, including passing an anti-bullying law in 2004.

Identifying problems

King County Deputy Prosecutor Chuck Lind, who is the coordinator of the office's school violence program, said the schools and law-enforcement officers put a high priority on identifying students who are at risk for violent behavior long before threats are made or carried out.

The prosecutor's office was instrumental in starting a group called the King County Safe School Network in 2001 to help schools identify common problems and share information.

The roundtable group created an opportunity for school security officers and counselors from the county's 19 school districts to meet with police and prosecutors to talk about issues and possible solutions, he said.

Participants share ideas about preventing arson and vandalism and talk about what's worked in reaching loner children who national studies have shown are at highest risk for erupting in violence.

The King County group was a launching pad for a similar statewide group, Lind said.

Craig Apperson, school safety and security manager for the Office of the State Superintendent for Public Instruction, said his office has put on symposiums about how to recognize and manage threats, as well as courses on the prevention of bullying, intimidation and harassment.

"Our focus now is identifying those who are at risk and asking ourselves what can we do to offset the risk," said Apperson. "We ask ourselves what can we do to help."

Weeding out idle threats

One of the problems facing school administrators, law- enforcement officers and prosecutors in dealing with alleged plots by students is discerning between legitimate threats and those made idly or in jest.

"One of the problems you run in to is that you've got to figure out whether the threat was serious," said Todd Dowell, a Kitsap County prosecutor with the juvenile division.

In the case of the Puyallup boy, police said he had sent instant messages to a fellow member of the school's Junior ROTC program informing him about the plot. He said he planned to "go out in a blaze of hatred and fury," police said.

The student alerted the ROTC commander, who contacted police.

On May 2 the boy, who is being held at Remann Hall, the Pierce County juvenile detention center, will appear before a judge to determine whether he should be tried as an adult or juvenile.

Attempts to reach the boy's parents Tuesday were unsuccessful.

In addition to the credibility of the threat, prosecutors also weigh whether the teen has taken "substantial steps" to carry out the threat, and whether potential victims feel intimidated or frightened, he said.

Legal outcomes vary

Even when students are charged with a crime, the legal outcomes may vary greatly.

In the 2004 Spanaway incident, one student was given a suspended sentence after pleading guilty to attempted unlawful imprisonment and two students served several months in detention after pleading guilty to attempted kidnapping.

On Key Peninsula, three boys, ages 12, 13 and 14, have been charged with conspiracy to commit assault after police said they plotted to steal guns, force a lockdown at their school, set fire to their building, and kill teachers and "preppy" kids, Pierce County prosecutors said.

In the Kitsap County case, prosecutors said they have not yet decided whether to file charges against the boy who police say plotted to bring a weapon to school.

Christine Clarridge: 206-464-8983 or cclarridge@seattletimes.com