Several Hammond High School students expressed concerns Tuesday that the teenager who brought a loaded handgun and extra ammunition to the Howard County school had a hit list with the names of students and faculty.
At least four students, who spoke to The Examiner under the condition that their names would not be used, said they are “100 percent sure” the hit list existed. When pressed if they saw it, one student said, “No, but he definitely had it.”
The students refused to elaborate.
Another student added that the 15-year-old Columbia youth with the gun “looked scared” when he was pulled from an art class and searched Friday.
The boy was arrested on gun charges Friday and transferred to the Alfred D. Noyes Children?s Center in Rockville. His father declined comment. The youth stole the gun from his father?s safe, police said.
Hammond Principal Sterlind Burke said he found the allegation of a hit list hard to believe.
“That?s a difficult one to swallow,” he said. “I have not heard of a hit list, but I will definitely follow up on that.”
The police have no evidence of a hit list and said they are still determining what motivated the student to bring a weapon to school, said Sherry Llewelyn, police spokeswoman.
Students who know the boy said the gun incident was triggered by threats from another classmate who planned to beat up the armed student?s younger brother. He also was upset with another youth, who had started dating his ex-girlfriend, according to the students.
It was just “a case of show and tell, and trying to look tough for his friends,” one student said.
“I knew he had a gun, because he showed it to me,” said another student, who was involved in an unrelated dispute Friday. He said a classmate stole his iPod, and the armed student offered to “handle it” for him, lifting his shirt to reveal a handgun in his waistband.
Students were informed of the incident at the end of the school day Friday, when the principal made an announcement about the “unconscionable, unsafe decision” of a classmate.
“They handled it well and didn?t try to scare us,” a student said. “But I don?t think it?s going to stop this from happening again in the future.”
Dangerous schools
The number of suspension incidents for weapons in Maryland public schools during 2005-2006:
» Howard County: 88
» Harford County: 86
» Carroll County: 45
» Anne Arundel County: 299
» Baltimore City: 469
» Baltimore County: 454
Source: Maryland Department of Education
