On Wednesday, October 22 at approximately 2:15 p.m. police were summoned to P.S. 14 after it was reported that a male student threatened to shoot two fifth-grade girls in the cafeteria.
The boy was taken into the principal’s office, and no gun was recovered, but one of the parents of the girls who had been threatened was outraged that the school did not notify her of the incident until 5 p.m. and to add injury to insult, allowed the 5th grade boy back into school the following day.
“When I got to the school before dismissal, I saw two patrol cars and two undercover cars parked out in front, and went inside and asked the security guard what had happened,” said the parent, who did not wish to disclose her name. “The security guard said that she wasn’t at liberty to tell me any details.”
Apparently, the boy who said that he had a gun and was prepared to use it, was talking with a friend in the boy’s bathroom, and told him he intended to shoot the two girls before dismissal for the day.
He then walked out into the cafeteria, and allegedly threatened the two fifth graders.
“He told my daughter and her girlfriend that he was going to shoot them,” the Throggs Neck woman said. “My daughter asked him if he had a gun, and he said yes. She then jumped under the table in the cafeteria and began to cry.”
Principal Jason Kovac sent a letter home with all of the students the next day, alerting parents that an incident had occurred and that it was isolated.
However, the mother of one of the girls that was threatened said that what was really insulting is that it seemed like the administration was trying to protect the boy who had made the vile, but empty, threat.
“The boy was serving an in-school suspension the next day, and my daughter was afraid to go anywhere near the school,” the Clarence Avenue mom said. “My daughter was throwing up on Thursday. They offered to grant my daughter a safety transfer, but why should she have to leave her friends in the school during her last year when she did nothing wrong?”
The boy’s mother finally relented and agreed to have him transferred out of the school.
Despite the outrage, a source in the administration at the school said that P.S. 14 and its staff acted appropriately.
“The school handled it the way they were supposed to,” the source at P.S. 14 said. “We treat every case as if it were a real threat.”
