Though it is a tale of heroism, it also is distressing.
Keanon Lowe, a security officer at Parkrose High School in Portland, last week tackled a student in a class and wrestled a shotgun away from him. The student, according to witnesses and police reports, entered a classroom apparently intending to commit suicide rather than gun down fellow students.
With Parkrose sitting in Northeast Portland just a few miles from Vancouver, the incident hits particularly close to home. Then again, all school shootings and potential shootings hit close to home as reminders that they can happen anywhere.
According to Lowe, he received a call to remove a student from a class. “I walk into a classroom and ask if the student’s there,” he said. “I’m in the classroom for 15 or 20 seconds, and the door opens and there’s a student with a shotgun.
“I lunged for the gun and we both had the gun. We had four hands on the gun and students are running out of the back of the classroom and I’m just trying to make sure that the end of the gun isn’t pointing toward where the students are running but also not pointed at myself. So I end up getting the gun from him, getting the gun with my right hand and holding him off and calling for a teacher to come grab the gun.”
The student was disarmed without a shot being fired. He now is in custody and facing charges of having a gun in a public building and of reckless endangering.
Lowe, the school’s football and track coach, rightly has received national acclaim for his actions. And in addition to applauding him for his bravery and quick thinking, there are some other thoughts that deserve attention in the wake of the incident.
One is the importance of addressing troubled youth before they reach the point of bringing a weapon to school. A friend said later that the would-be shooter had threatened to kill himself a few weeks before and at times seemed preoccupied with death.
These are clear signals that require attention. Gov. Jay Inslee this month signed House Bill 1216 — “Concerning nonfirearm measures to increase school safety and student well-being.” Rep. Vicki Kraft, R-Vancouver, was the only Southwest Washington lawmaker to vote against the bill, which takes several steps to enhance school safety.
The new law will create a state school safety center along with regional centers and will establish policies for preventing school violence. It also calls for standards to identify student behavior that could be threatening and will potentially “develop and implement intervention strategies” for managing student behavior.
Also of note in the Parkrose incident is the fact that the security guard was alerted to possible danger and happened to be in the classroom when the student arrived. Media reports are not clear on who alerted the guard, but it reinforces the importance of speaking up when there are concerns about a student’s behavior. Parents should impress upon their students the need to share information with an adult if a friend is talking about hurting themselves or others.
According to CNN, there have been 15 school shootings in which somebody was killed or injured in the United States this year. It is a shameful commentary on this country’s epidemic of gun violence that shootings and active-shooter drills have become a fact of life for today’s students.
Fortunately, the Parkrose incident ended without a shot being fired. But it should further enhance our resolve to eliminate the scourge of guns in schools.
