| |
|
from the Denver Post: quote: 4 students held after Columbine food fight
Hundreds gather to protest arrests
By Ann Schrader and Michael Booth
Denver Post Staff Writers
Sunday, February 24, 2002 - Four Columbine High School students were arrested Friday after a planned food fight outside the school escalated at lunchtime, with hundreds of chanting students filling the lobby outside the administrative offices.
Columbine students, from left, Kelly Hunter, 17, Austin Rabinoff, 15, and Keith Kinsella, 16, discuss the food fight Friday.
Several students were handcuffed by Jefferson County sheriff's deputies. Those arrested were Scott Streeb, Ryan Morrill and Justin Norman, all 18; and a 17-year-old boy whose name was withheld because he is a juvenile. They face charges from inciting a riot to theft, authorities said.
The three 18-year-olds were taken to the Jefferson County Detention Facility and the 17-year-old was transported to the Mountain View Detention facility.
The incident apparently started with a cream pie. One student was cautioned by the school resource officer not to throw the pie. The student, urged on by classmates, tossed the pie anyway, and hit campus supervisor Tony Antonio in the shoulder.
Eric Walker, a senior, said the officer grabbed the student and threw him to the ground.
When the officer handcuffed the student, "it was total chaos," Walker said.
"They were planning a food fight. I understand most of them were upperclassmen," Jefferson County schools spokeswoman Marilyn Saltzman said. "A kid had a pie and he threw it after being told repeatedly to not throw it.
"A couple hundred kids were near the office and they were acting inappropriately."
Sheriff's spokeswoman Jacki Tallman said the students who resisted arrest and led chants threatened to push the situation out of control. The events happened pretty much the way the students said it did, Tallman said, adding that officers handled the situation correctly.
"This is an institution of learning, this isn't a playground," she said. "It creates a dangerous atmosphere for kids. This was definitely the appropriate response."
Student Eric Sunde said he saw the officer drag the student by an arm down the hall to the office with his pants around his ankles. Other students followed, filling up the lobby near the administration office.
"We were chanting, 'Hell no, we won't go,' and other stuff," said Austin Rabinoff, 15, who said officers handcuffed two or three other students and took them into the office.
Several students who left school after the incident said they're irritated by restrictions imposed since the fatal shootings at Columbine three years ago.
"They search people in the park, they go through the parking lot every day and look in cars," said Keith Kinsella. "They found a baseball bat in my car and told me I'd be facing six months' jail time if I ever brought the bat back."
It sorta reads like an article from The Onion...
Is this justified, or an overreaction? |
|
|
