From death threats to sexual assaults, nearly 400 incidents brought D.C. police into schools — mostly D.C. Public Schools — in the 2009-2010 school year. Ballou Senior High School and Wilson Senior High School tied for the most crime reports, with 22 police write-ups each between July 2009 and April 2010, according to Metropolitan Police Department records first obtained by TBD.com.
Of roughly 370 incidents, about 70 percent occurred in D.C. Public Schools. The rest were split among public charter schools, which serve 40 percent of the city’s public school students, and private campuses.
More than 60 incidents involved theft, along with 21 more serious burglaries and 20 cases of destruction of property valued under $200. Police most frequently intervened over simple assaults — 137 of the cases.
Some of the reports detailed disturbances far beyond the typical schoolyard scuffle.
Among Ballou’s 22 police reports, three described fires set to the school, and one a student threatening to “shoot the s–t out of” another person. Across the city, 16 felony threats were reported.
Police responded to Wilson after baggies full of crack cocaine were uncovered from three students in a fistfight.
At Bell Multicultural High School in Columbia Heights, witnesses say the dean of students became angry with a student for wearing a hat while playing pingpong. The dean threw the student onto the table, breaking it to the floor, according to the report. Even after the student was restrained, the dean choked and punched the student.
D.C. Public Schools did not respond to requests for comment.
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But problems have persisted. At Wilson, for example, a fire in the school bathroom in October caused an evacuation and more than $150,000 in damages.
Even the city’s top-performing schools had to call the cops. Stolen laptops and a misplaced backpack brought police to Sidwell Friends School, the elite private Quaker school that President Obama’s daughters attend. Thefts were also recorded at Oyster-Adams Bilingual School and Duke Ellington School of the Arts, among DCPS’ top campuses.
At D.C. Prep Public Charter School, ranked the city’s best by the charter school board, authorities were alerted in January 2010 that an 8-year-old male student forced another to perform oral sex on him in a school bathroom.
Emily Lawson, chief executive officer and founder of D.C. Prep, confirmed an incident at the elementary campus in Edgewood, but believed the students involved were younger, in the first grade. A female teacher lined students up for the bathroom, and peeked in when the two boys didn’t come out.
The school contacted the parents and police. The perpetrator was suspended and moved out of the other boy’s class, while both received counseling.
“We obviously take the safety of our students very seriously, and events like this are really rare, so when they do happen we act right away,” Lawson said.
