This one looks bad

[Jim147]

Another school shooting. 20-50 injured, at least one dead shooter at large.

Edit: on phone can't get link to work.

[Ben]

Yup. Looks ugly at this time:

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2018/02/14/florida-high-school-under-lockdown-after-reports-shooter-victims-police-say.html

[Hawkmoon]

Hmmm ...

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/local/broward/parkland/fl-sb-active-shooter-marjory-stoneman-high-20180214-story.html

“I’m freaking out,” her father said. “This is crazy, this stuff shouldn’t be going on in these schools. People are crazy. I don’t know what goes on through these people’s minds these days, it’s a scary thing. It’s one of those things - you don’t want to put a metal protector and treat them like prisoners but they have to figure something out. You put your kids in school and it’s supposed to be a safe place and this stuff happens all the time.”

Yeah, it's "supposed to be" a safe space ... why, again? Oh, right ... because there's a law on a piece of paper that says no guns are allowed on school property. DAMN these school shooters -- can't they read?

[RocketMan]

Up to 16 dead being reported.  Shoot in custody.  Eighteen year old ex-student.  Others had expressed concern about his behavior in the past when he attended that school.

[Angel Eyes]

https://heavy.com/news/2018/02/nicolas-nikolas-nick-cruz-florida-school-shooter-gunman-instagram/

Looks like there were plenty of warning signs, all of which were rigorously ignored.

[T.O.M.]

Drift #1, people often say in court "all the signs were there. Why didn't you  (the justice system) do something before someone got hurt?"  Like it or not, prosecutors don't file charges because someone shows "all the signs" of maybe committing a crime.  We don't lock people up because there are a lot of red flags.  And, I don't want to be part of a system that does.

[KD5NRH]

Drift #1, people often say in court "all the signs were there. Why didn't you  (the justice system) do something before someone got hurt?"  Like it or not, prosecutors don't file charges because someone shows "all the signs" of maybe committing a crime.  We don't lock people up because there are a lot of red flags.  And, I don't want to be part of a system that does.

Kid was banned from carrying a backpack on campus due to threats to other students.  Somebody had legitimate reason to believe he was a threat long before this happened, but never followed up.

[Jim147]

Turned into a long afternoon here after posting that but yes sounds like anouther mental problem with access to weapons but the news is blaming guns.

[TommyGunn]

Turned into a long afternoon here after posting that but yes sounds like anouther mental problem with access to weapons but the news is blaming guns.

Fox News seems to be covering this pretty pretty fairly.  Some of the libs they interview go on about gun control .... one Kongresskritter from Florida went on about AR15s  not being appropriate for hunting,  being unaware that people do use them for hunting,  and that the 2nd Amendment isn't about hunting.

[Scout26]

I have not read, nor seen anything about this other then the top and bottom of the hour radio newz about what happened and numbers.


I'm going to guess he was on Psychotropic meds.

[RoadKingLarry]

At least they have him in custody instead of at the morgue. Now we can have a big show trial, he'll be declared insane and the taxpayers will support him for the rest of his life.

[Fly320s]

https://heavy.com/news/2018/02/nicolas-nikolas-nick-cruz-florida-school-shooter-gunman-instagram/

Looks like there were plenty of warning signs, all of which were rigorously ignored.

Other than the threats that were reported by his ex-school, I didn't see anything unusual.

[Hawkmoon]

https://heavy.com/news/2018/02/nicolas-nikolas-nick-cruz-florida-school-shooter-gunman-instagram/

Looks like there were plenty of warning signs, all of which were rigorously ignored.

QFT

“We received no warning… Potentially there could have been signs out there. But we didn’t have any warning or phone calls or threats that were made.”

Not "potentially," Mr. Superintendent. The signs were there, teachers and students were aware of them, the kid was deemed to be enough of a problem that he was expelled (not suspended) -- and now you want to pretend that there were no hints? Sorry, but that dawg don't hunt.

Nick Cruz was a former student at the school and was reported for making threats to students in the past, the Miami Herald reports.

“We were told last year that he wasn’t allowed on campus with a backpack on him,” Jim Gard, a math teacher who had the suspected shooter in his class last year, told the newspaper. “There were problems with him last year threatening students, and I guess he was asked to leave campus.”

Nope, there were no signs at all. (Hey, can I take off the blinders and remove the ear plugs now?)

[Hawkmoon]

Drift #1, people often say in court "all the signs were there. Why didn't you  (the justice system) do something before someone got hurt?"  Like it or not, prosecutors don't file charges because someone shows "all the signs" of maybe committing a crime.  We don't lock people up because there are a lot of red flags.  And, I don't want to be part of a system that does.

We're not talking about a prosecutor filing charges for thought crimes. We're talking about a school system not doing its job to protect other students from a wacko nut job student.

To get down to basics, several years ago we had sandy Hook, where a kid shot his way into a school with an AR-15. That was supposed to be the wake-up call for schools all across the country to reexamine and beef up their security systems and protocols. Sandy Hook is a small town, and the school was a small elementary school.

This school is a large high school, with a student population of over 3,000 -- plus who knows how many teachers, administrators, and other support staff. That's the population of a small (or maybe not so small) town. And yet a student who had been expelled for threatening other students was able to just walk into the building WITH AN AR-15 RIFLE, and nobody saw him, nobody stopped him? WTF was this school's security system like? Whatever it was, it clearly was a joke.

[slingshot]

Kid was banned from carrying a backpack on campus due to threats to other students.  Somebody had legitimate reason to believe he was a threat long before this happened, but never followed up.

 And how exactly are the authorities going to "follow up"?  We don't toss people in jail for showing the signs or whatever.  He apparently was an active Facebook contributor according to the media.

Whatever security they have was probably inside the building.  They need to watch the parking lot; that's where it starts whether it be a church or a school.

[MillCreek]

http://www.heraldnet.com/news/grandmother-turns-in-teen-who-allegedly-planned-shooting/

In the same trend as some of the comments above, just yesterday we had a teenager arrested for planning a school shooting. Grandma read his journal and turned him in.

[Hawkmoon]

Follow-up on the superintendent's idiotic comment that there were no signs: https://www.buzzfeed.com/briannasacks/the-fbi-was-warned-about-a-school-shooting-threat-from?utm_term=.oaXklV42a#.lfp2jd4oZ

Synopsis: The FBI was warned about the kid last year. Somebody didn't connect some dots, because here's a person who was expelled from the school, had a history of threatening, had been reported to the FBI, and yet who was able to just walk into a school of over 3,000 students with an AR-15, a gas mask, and smoke grenades. WTF?

[Hawkmoon]

http://www.heraldnet.com/news/grandmother-turns-in-teen-who-allegedly-planned-shooting/

In the same trend as some of the comments above, just yesterday we had a teenager arrested for planning a school shooting. Grandma read his journal and turned him in.

 

Midway through February, the United States has seen six school shootings in 2018. The latest national tragedy unfolded in the opposite corner of the country Wednesday, when an ex-student opened fire at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High in Parkland, Florida. Seventeen people were reported as dead.

The article says there have been six school shootings in 2018. Including the latest one in Florida, I only know of four: Italy, TX; Benton, KY; Los Angeles, CA; and Parkland, FL. What are the other two?

[erictank]

And the usual suspects didn't even wait for the bodies to reach room temperature before starting the same old crap about how disarming all the people who didn't do it is the only way we can possibly stop these people from breaking multiple existing state and federal laws...

[dogmush]

Synopsis: The FBI was warned about the kid last year. Somebody didn't connect some dots, because here's a person who was expelled from the school, had a history of threatening, had been reported to the FBI, and yet who was able to just walk into a school of over 3,000 students with an AR-15, a gas mask, and smoke grenades. WTF?

Serious question:

That school has 3000 kids walk into it every day carrying full backpacks.  I could easily fit an AR, 10 or so mags, a gas mask and smokes into the bag I used in HS, with room left over for a couple books.  How would you propose to handle security so that a school-age bad actor doesn't smuggle *expletive deleted*it in?  Run ECP's?  TSA style checkpoints to search bags?  Those create their own security issues, as this forum has pointed out before.  Camera's and facial recognition software?  Secured doors with entry badges of some kind?

I'm not saying we should throw up our hands and say that there's no solution, but stopping one kid with a backpack in a crowd of 3000 kids with backpacks is a more daunting security problem then you seem to be implying.  I say that as someone who has had to run Entry Control Points professionally, and had to solve some of these very issues, on a smaller, easier scale.

[Ben]

Serious question:

That school has 3000 kids walk into it every day carrying full backpacks.  I could easily fit an AR, 10 or so mags, a gas mask and smokes into the bag I used in HS, with room left over for a couple books.  How would you propose to handle security so that a school-age bad actor doesn't smuggle *expletive deleted*it in?  Run ECP's?  TSA style checkpoints to search bags?  Those create their own security issues, as this forum has pointed out before.  Camera's and facial recognition software?  Secured doors with entry badges of some kind?

I'm not saying we should throw up our hands and say that there's no solution, but stopping one kid with a backpack in a crowd of 3000 kids with backpacks is a more daunting security problem then you seem to be implying.  I say that as someone who has had to run Entry Control Points professionally, and had to solve some of these very issues, on a smaller, easier scale.

[Ben takes off his shoes and walks ten miles to school in the snow]

Backpacks??? We didn't have backpacks when I went to school! Make kids put their stuff on those crappy bike racks mounted over the rear bike wheel with the spring loaded retainer and bunjee cords that are designed to make your books and homework fall out on the busiest road between home and school, or whenever you get near a group of school bullies so that they can rip up your stuff and laugh hysterically.

[Ben puts his shoes back on and hails an Uber on his phone to take him to school]

Serious question (not that it really addresses the underlying issue) but how much crap do kids take between home and school nowadays? I have no idea, so just throwing it out, but like school uniforms, could you create a situation where minimal stuff goes between home and school with the kid? Transparent or mesh backpacks? Not that you couldn't fit a pistol in your Space Ghost lunch box.

[makattak]

Serious question:

That school has 3000 kids walk into it every day carrying full backpacks.  I could easily fit an AR, 10 or so mags, a gas mask and smokes into the bag I used in HS, with room left over for a couple books.  How would you propose to handle security so that a school-age bad actor doesn't smuggle *expletive deleted*it in?  Run ECP's?  TSA style checkpoints to search bags?  Those create their own security issues, as this forum has pointed out before.  Camera's and facial recognition software?  Secured doors with entry badges of some kind?

I'm not saying we should throw up our hands and say that there's no solution, but stopping one kid with a backpack in a crowd of 3000 kids with backpacks is a more daunting security problem then you seem to be implying.  I say that as someone who has had to run Entry Control Points professionally, and had to solve some of these very issues, on a smaller, easier scale.

I've got a better idea.

Why do we need a school of 3,000 children? As noted, this is larger than many towns. "Economies of scale" haven't really panned out as administrative bloat has more than over balanced any such gains.

Why don't we break up these massive school districts and return to more local schools and smaller buildings?

[Hawkmoon]

Serious question:

That school has 3000 kids walk into it every day carrying full backpacks.  I could easily fit an AR, 10 or so mags, a gas mask and smokes into the bag I used in HS, with room left over for a couple books.  How would you propose to handle security so that a school-age bad actor doesn't smuggle *expletive deleted*it in?  Run ECP's?  TSA style checkpoints to search bags?  Those create their own security issues, as this forum has pointed out before.  Camera's and facial recognition software?  Secured doors with entry badges of some kind?

Point well taken, and I don't have an answer. I have been in large schools in New York City (as a consultant, not as a student) and, even twenty years ago, they had metal detectors. It's not like new technology.

More to the point, the incident didn't happen in the morning, when the crush of students entering creates the problem you identified. It happened near the end of the day, which means he either snuck in during the morning rush and somehow stayed hidden for the entire school day -- or he was able to walk in with an AR-15, gas mask, and smoke grenades during the school day, when in all schools I've seen in the past decade or more all doors are locked and the only way in is through whatever passes for security at the front entrance.

[Perd Hapley]

Point well taken, and I don't have an answer. I have been in large schools in New York City (as a consultant, not as a student) and, even twenty years ago, they had metal detectors. It's not like new technology.

More to the point, the incident didn't happen in the morning, when the crush of students entering creates the problem you identified. It happened near the end of the day, which means he either snuck in during the morning rush and somehow stayed hidden for the entire school day -- or he was able to walk in with an AR-15, gas mask, and smoke grenades during the school day, when in all schools I've seen in the past decade or more all doors are locked and the only way in is through whatever passes for security at the front entrance.

Not all schools. At least not where I live. I've been surprised by how little security some of these schools have.

[Hawkmoon]

I've been surprised at the lack of security at many schools. The high school my daughter attended a few years ago had solid front doors (no glass). Once the school day started, the doors were locked. Need to get in? Push a button, and a secretary sitting in an office with no view of the entrance (and no closed-circuit camera surveillance) pushed a button to open the door.

Just after Sandy Hook, the grammar schools in the town next to mine made a big deal about installing a new security system. The system they installed was exactly the system that failed at Sandy Hook.