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Boy, 12, Charged With Gun at School: Police Say a Sixth-Grader Had a Loaded Pistol at Huntington Middle School on Tuesday.

Posted on: Wednesday, 7 June 2006, 12:00 CDT

By Shawn Day, Daily Press, Newport News, Va.

Jun. 7--NEWPORT NEWS -- A Huntington Middle School student is facing charges that he brought a loaded handgun to school Tuesday, the second instance of police arresting a Huntington student on gun charges in less than a month.

The school's resource officer arrested the sixth-grader at his home Tuesday afternoon, just hours after the boy was suspended for an unrelated offense, Newport News police spokesman Lou Thurston said.

The 12-year-old was charged with possession of a firearm on school property.

About 1:30 p.m. Tuesday, two Huntington students reportedly told Principal Michele Mitchell that they had seen the 12-year-old with the handgun earlier in the school, Thurston said. Michelle Morgan, a spokeswoman for the school district, said Huntington students also told school administrators that the boy hid the weapon nearby.

The students were able to indicate a general area to search for the gun, she said.

Administrators relayed the information to Huntington's school resource officer, who began searching for the weapon.

That police officer and a school security officer found a loaded .38-caliber handgun in the grass next to the C. Waldo Scott Center for H.O.P.E., which is along Wickham Avenue and just south of Huntington Middle, Thurston said.

School officials decided against locking down the building because the students provided a good description of where to find the handgun, Morgan said.

The weapons charge means that the sixth-grader will be recommended for expulsion, Morgan said.

Schools are permitted to expel students accused of bringing weapons to campus, according to state law.

School officials had suspended the 12-year-old boy Tuesday morning for "mouthing off" to a teacher, Morgan said. Investigators weren't sure why the student allegedly brought the gun to school or hid it next to the Scott Center.

Two eighth-graders from Huntington Middle are facing expulsion after police charged them with possession of a gun on school property and possession of stolen property. Those two students were arrested on May 16. Police learned that the weapon, a semiautomatic handgun, had been stolen from Hampton.

Police were investigating whether the gun found Tuesday had been stolen, Thurston said.

Morgan, the school district spokeswoman, said the two recent incidents at Huntington didn't indicate a more widespread problem at the middle school.

There is "no more trouble at that school than any other district middle school," she said. "(Tuesday's incident) worked exactly the way all administrators want it to.

"Students came forward and told us that they heard someone hid a gun nearby, and they were even able to point them in the right direction."

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Copyright (c) 2006, Daily Press, Newport News, Va.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

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Source: Daily Press

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