Target rifle in car without ammo equals expulsion
Vt. student may face expulsion over rifle found in car
A senior at Essex High School was suspended and will be expelled for possession of a firearm. The student cooperated with school officials who had been tipped off by two anonymous students.
Lieutenant Brad LaRose said the student told police he did not intend to bring the rifle into school or use it during school hours. No ammunition was found in the student’s vehicle.
“The student was extremely cooperative right from the start,” LaRose said. “He said he uses it after school for target practicing out in the woods.”
Under Vermont law, possession of a weapon inside a school building is a crime, but bringing a weapon onto school property outside a building is a crime only if there is intent to injure others.
Although he will be facing an expulsion “hearing” the results are essentially decided already.
Mike Deweese, Chittenden Central Supervisory Union school superintendent, said the student would probably face a hearing before the union school board, with the possibility of expulsion.
“The school district intends to vigilantly enforce the Gun Free Schools Act,” Deweese said, referring to state and federal laws that require school districts to expel students who bring a gun into schools. “There’s no distinction between in a building or on property.”
The Gun Free Schools Act mandates a year expulsion for having a firearm but gives Superintendents some ability to moderate that on an individual basis. “Vigilant enforcement” indicates the superintendent will not be taking advantage of that ability to moderate the punishment.
While it may have been innocent, guns are pretty serious business. IF HE KNEW it was in the vechile then he knew he was bringing a gun on campus - innocence lost. Ammo is easy to hide and a confederate could have had that in their pocket. I would feel differently if the vehicle was parked on a public street.
I think it unfortunate that the Supervisor will fail to use the any of his ability to vary “sentencing” based on facts.
I own nine firearms (multi-generational hand me downs plus a few of my own) and I support right-to-carry laws so I’m not anti-gun. But even when I was in school 1960-1972, while pocket knives were common and tolerated, guns weren’t. The’s just some things you don’t do.
Odd my mother and her brothers and sisters where in high school in the 60, s and 70’s and my uncles often brought their riffles to school. they made hunting bows in wood shop, were on the Riffleing team. Quite frankly the gunfree school law is stupid to begin with. it takes away all circumstance from the equasion. I see no reason that people who are allowed to carry fire arms by law cant carry them inside a school.
Are you serious, Travis?
People don’t want their kids around guns, that’s why. How many mothers would take their kids to playgounds where there were gun-toting people around?
In this day and age, don’t bring your gun to school. It really is black and white. This isn’t a case of him borrowing his dad’s car with his dad’s glock under the seat. He brought his gun to school. The rule is simple - bring your gun to school, face possible expulsion.
I could equate this with my bringing C4 to the airport and looking innocent while getting arrested and saying, “There’s no detonator!”
There are some things you just don’t do. This is one of them.
I have friends who attended high school in late 70’s/early 80’s who kept rifles in their school lockers during hunting season, and in the 60’s, kids carried cased rifles on the NYC subways for use on school shooting teams.
The Gun Free Schools Act was originally ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, and was re-written as a regulation requiring schools to implement its functions in order to receive federal funding. Such blackmail is an end run around the 10th Amendment.
“People don’t want their kids around guns, that’s why. How many mothers would take their kids to playgounds where there were gun-toting people around?”
I think - no, I know - my kids would be safer with a few law-abiding gun-toting people around than where everyone has been disarmed but the criminals. Laws against guns at school have no effect on people that are planning to shoot up the school - except to make sure no one will be shooting back. If the kid did intend to shoot someone at school, he wouldn’t have left the gun in the car. He’d have carried it in, and shot anyone who tried to take it away. Rather like the recent Minnesota incident, where the unarmed security guard was the first one shot.
But the fundamental problem here comes in the phrase, “public schools”. It means parents cannot choose (except by paying twice for their kids education) whether to put their kids into a “gunfree” school, or one where the principal makes sure they’ve got some real security. It means parents cannot choose whether to subject their kids to cockamamie rules enforced by petty fascists. And it also means parents cannot choose whether or not the school their kid is going to is trying to teach the three R’s, or “diversity and tolerance”.
When your kids go to the park, who’s to say that the strange men that are walking about with guns are ‘law-abiding’. You take your chances there, buster.
I (as well as like minded folks that I know) are fine with guns around in an environment where the people are known and the people know gun saftey, but waking about in public parks in the city with strange dudes packing heat is another story.
The strange men walking around with guns? What kind of park do you go to? In the real world, you don’t know who has a gun because they’re concealed. I occasionaly carry a gun when I take my kids to the park, and know one else can tell. While I can carry legally, not everyone who does can. If you’re at the park someday and some jerk’s pitbull comes charging at your kids you can sit back on your liberal behind and say “Don’t worry kids, the government will protect you.”, but if that happens to me, that dog’s dead.
If 100% of the people at the park are packing, my kids are much safer. When everyone’s armed, the bad guys are outgunned by a long shot, but if good people rely on the police to protect them, the bad guys can do their deeds and move on before anyone can stop them. Sure they may get caught later, but that doesn’t help much does it?
I can tell you that my children all the time play at a playground frequented by gun carrying people. Many times that would be me. If not me then one of my coworkers or friends.
Why do people continue to blame inanimate objects for crimes and try to regulate the rights of law abiding citizens? Banning guns at schools has failed to save the lives of an awful lot of kids. It’s high time that we realize passing more laws is not the way to prevent crime.