Taft High School’s ticking time bomb

[Jolie Rouge]

Students warned in December that alleged shooter had “made a hit list,” “always talks about murder”
By Michelle Malkin • January 11, 2013 09:46 AM

After the Newtown school massacre, I compiled a list of 6 simple things we can do in the wake of massacres without government. http://michellemalkin.com/2012/12/17/6-things-parents-can-do-in-the-wake-of-massacres-without-government/

This was item number 2:


2. Train our kids: When they see something troublesome or wrong, say something. If a young classmate exhibits bizarre or violent behavior toward himself/herself, other students, teachers, or parents, report it right away. If it gets ignored, say it louder. Don’t give up. Don’t just shrug off the “weirdo” saying/doing dangerous things and don’t just hope someone else will act.

The shooting at Taft High School in Kern County, California, yesterday illuminates the importance of this very point — and the need for parents to back up their kids when they speak out. It turns out that a few students did speak up about the ticking time bomb in their midst. As Twitchy reports exclusively, students voiced their concerns about the alleged shooter on Twitter back in December http://twitchy.com/2013/01/10/time-bomb-students-at-taft-high-school-tweeted-worries-about-alleged-shooter-last-month-why-is-he-still-allowed-in-school/ — and were then apparently called into the vice principal’s office.

Instead of the school taking action, however, it appears the whistleblowing students were instead disciplined for tweeting about the student. They had warned that the disturbed classmate had “made a hit list” and “always talks about murder like he’s obsessed with it.” http://twitchy.com/2013/01/10/time-bomb-students-at-taft-high-school-tweeted-worries-about-alleged-shooter-last-month-why-is-he-still-allowed-in-school/

Back in December, students also talked about the alleged shooter’s animosity for a student named “Bowe.”

Bowe Cleveland was the student who was shot yesterday. http://twitchy.com/2013/01/10/unconfirmed-student-bowe-cleveland-shot-in-taft-high-school-shooting-teacher-may-have-been-injured/

Who dropped the ball at the school, and why?

http://michellemalkin.com/2013/01/11/taft-high-schools-ticking-time-bomb-students-warned-in-december-that-alleged-shooter-had-made-a-hit-list-always-talks-about-murder/

comments

I actually had an experience with this back years ago when I was in high school. A girl had threatened me with violence. Me, a straight A student, obviously told my mom and we went into the school. The administrator told us that she had a troubled home life so…we basically should just move along. Ha nothing ever happened, but I was pretty frightened that they took no action whatsoever. Looking back, we probably should have fought it harder.

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My mil was a school principal. Said the gov’t tied their hands with EVERYTHING. I imagine if they had reported concerns etc… then the school would have been held responsible for paying all of his counseling/medical bills. Not saying its right–they BLEW it. Just another example of how the gov’t is screwing up society.

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The California Teachers Association is being very vocal about this and gun control. However, this is the same CTA that successfully campaigned last year to kill a proposed law that would have made it easier to fire child-molesting teachers. http://www.calwatchdog.com/2012/06/29/bid-to-reform-teacher-firing-process-thwarted/ Which is the bigger threat to CA school children, guns or child molesting teachers? Not even close. Teachers.

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The parents of the kids who alerted the school to this creep’s comments and threats…should have kept at the principal until something was done. I mean…every day! AND, file a police report. Any kid who threatens to murder someone must be taken seriously. If the authorities haven’t learned that by now, they need to be hit over the head with it!! Or a skillet. Or both.

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Joe Biden can head up a Twitter Control task force to stem the violence.

Who needs 140 characters in their Tweets anyway – we need to ban all high-capacity Tweets.

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The school principal that claims nothing can be done about the weirdo student’s threats is the same principal that will expel an honor student for making a ‘gun’ with his fingers.

[Jolie Rouge]

Teen shoots high school student before being disarmed by teacher

A 16-year-old is in critical but stable condition in shooting at Taft Union High School southwest of Bakersfield. 'There's blood everywhere,' a student told her mother.

January 10, 2013|By Ann M. Simmons and Kate Mather, Los Angeles Times

TAFT, Calif. — A 16-year-old was in critical condition Thursday night after a fellow student interrupted a first-period class at Taft Union High School southwest of Bakersfield, confronted him by name and fired a round from a 12-gauge shotgun into his upper body.

The assailant, also 16, tried to shoot a second student and missed before a science teacher was able to talk him down, apparently taking the shotgun as the other students fled from the classroom through a door. Police officers arrived after the teacher had disarmed the assailant and took the teenager into custody. They seized the shotgun.

The teacher, Ryan Heber, was struck in the head by a pellet but was not seriously injured and refused treatment, authorities said.

"If it weren't for this teacher and his quick response, we don't know what would have happened," Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood said.

Police said a school supervisor helped Heber distract the assailant. There were no security guards or police immediately on hand to help them: The school's armed police officer was not on duty Thursday because he had been delayed by snow, authorities said.

The shooting, in which two other Taft students were injured, occurred weeks after the catastrophic school massacre in Newtown, Conn. Calls from students inside Taft brought their frantic parents pouring into streets surrounding the high school. Police locked down the school for hours and searched it. School officials announced that the school would remain closed Friday.

The wounded youth underwent surgery at Kern Medical Center on Thursday afternoon. Police described his condition as critical but stable. The other injured students included a girl who was close to the assailant as he fired; she was being treated at a local hospital for possible hearing damage. A third student sustained minor injuries and may have tripped over tables, police said.

Youngblood said the unidentified assailant is a student at the school and arrived late. He had planned the attack the night before, Youngblood said, and used a shotgun owned by his brother.

The shooter apparently had some prior dealings with the student who was shot. According to police, he came into class with the shotgun about 9 a.m., spoke to the victim directly, then fired, striking him once.

Authorities said witnesses' accounts were conflicting but that up to 20 rounds may have been fired. It was unclear when Heber was shot.

Youngblood described Heber as being distraught after the incident. The teacher later sent a text message to his mother to say he was OK, according to his father, David Heber.

The elder Heber said his son is 40, has been teaching for about seven years and was an Eagle Scout. "He likes people, he likes the students and he stands up for them," said the father, 70.

Ryan Heber, arriving at his home in Taft late in the afternoon with no visible wounds — his wife and one of his two young sons at his side — declined to speak about what happened in his classroom. He said he was fine, but too exhausted to relate his experiences.

Moeloa Savea, 52, who was at her son's home opposite the school's science center, said she was picking up trash in the frontyard when she saw a young man walk by with a shotgun at his side. He entered the school through an unlocked gate on Wildcat Road, she said. She heard two shots, then saw a woman run out of school screaming for help. Savea called 911, she said.

Danielle Overton said she got a phone call from her daughter, Corey, 16, who was next to the student who was shot. "She was just crying, telling me that there was a shooting at the school.... There's blood everywhere."

Students who were in other classrooms said they heard an announcement on the public address system about the shooting. Several students said it caused confusion because they had been told of an upcoming lockdown drill — the subject of a meeting by organizers on campus that morning, authorities said — and they assumed it signaled a practice exercise. The sound of helicopters soon told them otherwise.

Jacob Jackson, 15, a sophomore, said he and his classmates sat for more than an hour in the library, with the lights off and doors locked. "I was just thinking, 'I don't want to die,' " Jacob said.

Police searched the building and slowly released the students to their parents. Into the afternoon, students were still leaving the campus with parents, some wrapped in blankets against sleet and cold.

Many parents and students at Taft compared the incident to the Newtown shooting, and so did various public officials who hastened to issue condemnations. In a statement denouncing the gun violence, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said her father had attended the school.

Angela Hayden, whose 16-year-old daughter attends Taft High School, said the assailant allegedly threatened to kill her daughter and other students last year while they were on a school bus during a field trip to Universal Studios. "He was telling everyone that he had a list of people who messed with him over the years and that he was going to kill them," Hayden told The Times. She said the youth allegedly said his brother would be the first victim.

She said her daughter complained to a vice principal about the incident and that the teenager was expelled for several days. After the youth returned, Hayden said, she called the principal to find out why he was not permanently barred from campus. The principal declined to discuss the punishment, citing privacy concerns, according to Hayden.

"Everybody knew about this kid," Hayden said.

A neighbor who knew the suspect told the Associated Press that he was often teased because he was "a short guy" and "small."

Police declined to comment on those assertions Thursday, saying that they were still investigating.


http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jan/10/local/la-me-taft-shooting-20130111

[i]comments


said she was picking up trash in the frontyard when she saw a young man walk by with a shotgun at his side

so did she call 911 before or after hearing shots ?

..

[Jolie Rouge]

Hero teacher who faced Taft High School shooter has dedicated his life to school
By Caitlin Dewey,
Jan 11, 2013 07:35 PM EST

The Washington Post Published: January 11 : Ryan Heber dedicated his life to Taft Union High School in California long before he took a bullet in his science classroom Thursday.

His mother taught English at the school for 24 years, according to the student paper. His wife, Emmy Lou, works in the business office. His father, also a teacher, once subbed at the school, according to school board documents. And Heber, a Taft graduate himself, served a wide variety of extracurricular functions outside the classroom, advising the sophomore class, overseeing the school’s weight room, co-organizing prom and teaching driver’s ed classes after school.

Heber drew wide attention Thursday when he talked down an armed student who brought a rifle to his first-period science class, planning to target “bullies.” The student shot at Heber and one of his classmates, currently in critical condition, before the teacher persuaded him to put his weapon down. Heber was grazed by a stray bullet, but not otherwise hurt.

According to the Associated Press, the student told Heber, “I don’t want to hurt you.”

Heber was, by all accounts, a popular teacher at Taft. “Mr Heber and Kim [Fields] are both the greatest guys ever,” one student tweeted, also referring to the guidance counselor who joined Heber to help talk the gunman down. “No doubt they would stop a messed up situation they treated [everyone with] respect.”

“What kind of person would shoot two of the nicest people at Taft High?” Another student wrote.

In addition to teaching integrated science, Heber advised the sophomore class in the 2012-2013 school year and previously advised both freshman and juniors, according to published school board agendas. For several years he has overseen the school’s weight room and taught driver’s ed, where he bought donuts for the kids in his car, according to one student’s tweets.

His wife also coached cheerleading and danced in the school talent show with several teachers, reports the student paper. Photos on Emy-Lou Heber’s Facebook page show the couple with two young children, both boys.

Heber’s mother, Carol Sue, was an institution at the school. She chaired the English department before retiring in 2010, when students remembered her as “one of the most positive and loving teachers on campus.”

In an interview with The Bakersfield Californian, David Heber described his son as “not the kind of teacher a student would try to hurt” and “definitely someone who could talk a kid down in an emergency.” On Twitter, students seemed equally unsurprised that it was Heber who prevented a larger tragedy at the school.

“All I’m saying is that somebody had to have put a stop to the kids [sic] plan,” one student tweeted Thursday. “And I want to know who it is so I can go shake his ... hand.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/hero-teacher-who-faced-taft-high-school-shooter-has-dedicated-his-life-to-school/2013/01/11/beaab638-5c1c-11e2-beee-6e38f5215402_story.html