Friday, September 15, 2006
'This was a Columbine waiting to happen' at GB East
Just goes to show you how that this kind of event can take place anywhere.
Two Green Bay East High School students taken into custody Thursday were depressed, wanted to die at the hands of police officers and allegedly told friends that they might explode bombs at school, witnesses told police.
Information obtained Thursday by a school resource officer at East led police to a cache of bombs and weapons.
Police searched homes in the 300 block of South Van Buren Street and 1000 block of Cherry Street and found sawed-off shotguns, automatic weapons, pistols, ammunition, and several bombs, according to Green Bay Police Chief Craig Van Schyndle. Bomb-making materials, camouflage clothing, helmets and gas masks were also found along with suicide notes left by the 17-year-old boys.
"From statements that we heard it gave us great concern that, yes, it was in the very near future something was going to take place," Van Schyndle said.
None of the weapons were found at school.
...
"This was a Columbine waiting to happen, from the briefing that I've had" Zakowski said. "Only they know how close it was to being reality. That's part of the investigation right now."
..."We found several suicide notes by the students," Van Schyndle said. "I know there are some weapons at the Cherry Street address. I don't believe there were any bombs found at that address. Most of the stuff was found at the Van Buren address."
...Late Thursday afternoon, yellow police tape surrounded the yellow-and-white home on Van Buren Street while orange cones blocked the sidewalks around the home. Police vehicles were parked outside.
Neighbors on Van Buren said they were shocked by the news.
"It can happen in any neighborhood," said Marcy Frayseth, a neighbor who is a teacher at Washington Middle School. "From what we know (of the family), they're very nice people. They're the typical American family."
...Van Schyndle said he was troubled by the amount and types of weapons the kids amassed, but said this issue goes beyond law enforcement and schools.
"This is a whole society problem we're talking about here," he said. "We need to continue preventative programs for students that are having problems like this; prevention is the key here."
I remember when the Columbine disater hit in 1999. I was in my gym class and I believe that we were doing some sort of in-class activity. It was shocking to have the news on and see kids running out of school with their arms behind their heads, with full-scale SWAT teams surrounding the school and the news helicopters in the air. It was quite the disturbing sight.
However, the bigger issue at hand was what these kids were doing with all these weapons and how they came to possess them. One finger to point is the parents of these kids. My first inclination is that the weapons were obtained by the parents. If not, then they should know what are in their kids' rooms.
Societal problems have led to this kind of could-be tragedy. It's sad to see that people are pushed to the fringe of society and the only way to get back in it is through some major catastrophe. However, historically it is human nature to form a hierarchy and those that don't want to conform either get pushed to the fringe of culture or retaliate against it.
But these "counselors" or "psychologists" think that these problems can be fixed. That students can be brought back in.
Although Richard Harris didn't know Shawn Sturtz and William Cornell directly, he had known of them during his stint as a student liaison at Green Bay East High School.
"I knew him loosely ... when I was there," said Harris, executive director of Self Help of Wisconsin Inc. in Green Bay. "They were not popular kids, and they got picked on. My feeling is kids that get picked on have a blueprint for retaliation, and it's called
Columbine."We as adults need to understand ... this is not a small thing ... it is not a phase, and nobody deserves to be picked on," he said. "We need to enforce the zero-tolerance policy we have in these schools."
So as a society we're supposed to take special care with these people? That by nurturing and being nice will all of a sudden make things better? That's hardly a solution.
Labels: Brown County
