Teens with rifle arrested in Farmington Hills-n school roof

[taurus92]

http://www.freep.com/news/latestnews/pm16532_20031001.htm

Wednesday, October 1, 2003

BY BILL LAITNER
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER

Three teenagers with a high-powered rifle were arrested early this morning after they were seen on the roof of a Farmington Hills elementary school.


``This could've escalated into a very serious, even deadly situation,'' said Farmington Hills Police Chief William Dwyer.


``Our concern was they could've sniped someone from the roof of this school. Fortunately, we were able to arrest them long before people starting coming to school,'' Dwyer said.


The incident began at 2:15 a.m. when a resident called police, saying her husband had seen the three teens with a rifle on the roof of William Grace Elementary School. Police cordoned off the area, then at 2:30 a.m. arrested two 18-year-old males and a 19-year-old male - all Farmington Hills residents, Dwyer said.


Police seized a .30-caliber high-powered rifle with a bullet in its chamber, as well as bottles of bourbon and malt whisky they had, he said. Breath tests showed that all were well over Michigan's old and new thresholds for drunkenness, with blood alcohol levels from .12 to .23. The state threshold for drunkenness had been .10 for decades until it dropped at midnight Tuesday to .08.

[Jim Simmons]

Obscenity. Obscenity. :x

Hang the SOBs high.

[goldwing2000]

Yep... they're all adults. Prosecute to the fullest...

[sprink]

Sad, but not nearly as bad as it could have been.

I know 18 and 19 are "teen" numbers, but I hate to see felons referred to in the media as "teens". :evil:

[gruvinbass]

If they're legally an adult, they're not a teen anymore. Period.

[sprink]

I think we agree. Too bad it's not a quorum. Hang 'em high (or drunk)!

[Glock23]

just heard on WWJ that one had a prior felony conviction. hopefully a prime contender for "Michigan Exile"...

[Gary Morris]

I agree that these people have to be prosecuted to the fullest but, what bothers me is the WHY in all this. What has changed in this country and world in the last 25 years or so that would put thoughts like this in the minds of young adults or anyone for that matter.

I think about this a lot. When I was a boy in the late 50's we never would have thought to take a weapon and use it against someone else. It just was not in our thought process's back then. I was wild and did some crazy things but, I never would have considered anything like what we see and read about in our schools and neighborhoods.

None of this will ever end until we can figure out what is fueling the minds and hearts of our young. I feel responsible somehow because it is the generations of kids that we raised that are the parents of the young doing this kind of stuff. I just don't know where or when we dropped the ball but, we have to pick it back up and do what ever it takes to end this madness.

It's not guns or the thought of guns in the homes or carried by law abiding people that is fueling this. The anti gun folks need to get their collective heads out of their butts and help us solve these problems instead of blaming them on the most law abiding part of our society. Concealed weapons holders have proven we are trust worthy and no danger to anyone and if all the resources being used to take away our rights were put into the pot to help fix this society just maybe we could reach some answers.

Gary

[goldwing2000]

I agree that these people have to be prosecuted to the fullest but, what bothers me is the WHY in all this.

The "why" is easy. Continuous erosion of morals and personal resposibility, brought on by the increase of socialism and institutionalized coddling.

How to change it is the hard part.

[taurus92]

I would add to Kane's points.

- Both parents working
- Constant exposure to realistic violence
- Drugs
- Coddling- when are they allowed to settle the differnces with fists anymore

[sprink]

Wow! Great minds think alike.

when are they allowed to settle the differnces with fists anymore

I was just talking to my boss about this.

I got pretty ugly looks from a soccer dad when I suggested that if we let the boys fight, at least one of them would learn a lesson.

Didn't go over too well with the socialist, I mean social, worker either when I suggested the same.

Darn shame.

[Jim Simmons]

Just precisely how does allowing them to duke it out accomplish anything?

That was unacceptable behavior when and where I was a kid, and it should be unacceptable now.

[OneShot]

Just precisely how does allowing them to duke it out accomplish anything?

That was unacceptable behavior when and where I was a kid, and it should be unacceptable now.


Jim,

When I came to Michigan ( more years ago than I care to remember) and entered elementary school in Detroit. I was bullied by this one kid for about three days. He would shove me in the hallway and call me names. One day we accidently met after school. He shoved me, I decided I had had enough of this. I waded into him hitting him in the stomach doubling him over then an uppercut to the face bloodying his nose. He stopped fighting and ran home never to bother me again.

A few days later after the teacher and most of the other students had left, another bully cornered me in the class room. He was shoveing me and calling me names. I hit him in the nose bloodying it. That stopped the shoving and name calling. After that he and I became friends. He decided that "hillbillies" weren't so bad after all. lol

No parents were envolved, no police were involved and no teachers were involved.
What was accomplished was I made a new friend and had pleasant, peaceful school days after that.

I believe that sometimes kids have to settle disputes between themselves. If I had told the teacher or my parents about these two bullies, I think things would have gotten worse and I still would have had to confront them on my on.

At no time ever did the thought of using a knife, gun, ball bat or any weapon against these two bullies enter my mind. I'm sure they never thought of using a weapon either.

Times have sure changed.

[Jim Simmons]

I had a similar experience when I was in the second grade, except it didn't work out so well. The new guy coming in to the class decided he needed to establish himself, so he needed somebody to beat to a pulp.

Lucky me. The tall, skinny guy who was the weakest in gym class and wore thick glasses.

I came home with a split lip, a bloody nose and a hairline fracture of my wrist. That wasn't so bad, but my glasses were also broken. For that, my dad beat the rest of the crud out of me.

For the next several years, this asshole chose me as his personal punching bag. For it, he was cool, and the word went out it was open season on string bean. (Me.) Running away didn't help. Fighting him didn't help. Telling teachers or the principal didn't help. Teachers didn't -- and as far as I can tell, still don't -- care about bullies' victims. Unless the victims cause a disruption in class. I was once sent to the principal's office for bleeding on my math book.

It didn't end until we moved away. In the middle of the eighth grade.

And yeah, if I could have, I would have blown the motherfucker away a thousand times.

So I'm afraid I don't accept the notion that allowing kids to duke it out amongst themselves is the best way to handle bullies.

I would rather employ thumbscrews and red hot pokers. And in extreme cases, gelding pliers.

[sprink]

No sense trying to explain it Jim, but I can think of three times in my life right off the top where problems were solved by a little punching. I am certainly not condoning "beatings" or "bullying". Solving my problems quickly must be what kept me from reaching a point where

And yeah, if I could have, I would have blown the motherfucker away a thousand times.


came to mind. What I was speaking of on the soccer field could have been solved with one punch, like One Shot's problem. Oh and it would have been my son receiving if that matters.

[Quaamik]

When I was in grade school, I was bullied incessantly. I was shorter than most of the other kids, which made me a likely target. I was also being raised in a house where my father was quite ill and my mother made many of the decisions on how to raise my sister and I. One of those decisions was that fighting was NOT to be tolerated. The school policy was to tell the teacher/lunch mother/principle if you were bullied and not to fight back no matter what, and my mother decided that they were the experts and I should follow that policy.

1st through 4th grades were miserable.

Then my dad (who was in better medical shape) stepped in. He overruled my mother and explained to me that bullies will ONLY stop if you stand up to them. No matter if you get pummled, the trick being to make certain that 1) you get a couple of licks in and 2) they realise that you will NEVER back down, they would have to kill you first. The explanations regarding what to do if there were multiple bullies involved, or a single one that was much larger, bordered on the ridiculous (following the advice would probably have had me sent up for battery at minimum, murder at worst) but were effective at convincing a young child that he did have options. At the center of it was the iron clad statement that my parents would back me to the hilt, so long as I didn't throw the first punch.

The results were 5 years of bloody fights (it takes time to convince a school full of kids that you aren't the target anymore). These culminated in 9th grade, where the first fight I had resulted in the school threatening to expell me (not the one who started the fight). As word of that got around, several bullies decided it was again open season on me, as I wouldn't be able to fight back for fear of being expelled. The second fight that year resulted in a vice principal threatening to have me charged with assault and battery, and my parents threatening to sue the school system. There was not a third fight, nor any in high school. The kids had learned thier lesson, and passed it on to others they met: I was smaller and could be beaten, but they would be bloody at the end of it and could never be sure that I was finished when they thought the fight was over.

Those experiances crystalized my opinion on the subject. Kids HAVE to be allowed to settle things. Whether they do it in scrapes that the teachers pretend to ignore, or in the more organized setting of a boxing ring or martial arts competition (contact) it has to happen. If not, that is to say if parents and teachers try thier damndest to prevent it, they will still settle things physicaly. But it will be in back alleys or out of the way fields, and the kids who follow the adult direction and avoid those conflicts will lead picked on, terrorized, lonely, miserable lives, until one of them snaps and fights back. And then, being older, with more strength and knowledge, and years of bottled up hatred, their fighting back is likely to be much more violent. Add in the desensitation to lethal violence from todays video games and movies, and the results are likely to be deadly.