SCHOOL BOARD, PARENTS AIR GUN INCIDENT

JACKSON -- Jackson Board of Education President Darrell Hanschen believes last week's incident in which a sixth grade student displayed a weapon in a threatening manner could have been handled differently.

But Hanschen denies there was any attempt to "cover up" the incident, saying the school district is taking steps to minimize the chances of a similar incident occurring in the future.

No one was injured, and the student, an 11-year-old girl from rural Jackson, was later accused in juvenile court of flourishing a deadly weapon. She was suspended from West Lane Elementary School for the rest of the year.

The matter has been turned over to Cape Girardeau County juvenile authorities. Authorities said the girl will complete the sixth grade at home under the direction of a school district instructor.

The incident occurred at West Lane on April 19. Investigators said the student brought to school her mother's .25 caliber, semi-automatic handgun and a clip containing rounds of ammunition for the gun. The weapon and clip were confiscated around 2 p.m. last Monday.

It was later determined the girl pointed the weapon which may or may not have had the clip of ammunition inserted at the time at another sixth grade student.

During an interview Wednesday, Hanschen said: "For one thing, we should have contacted the parents of every child in that class instead of letting them find out from their kids. But the problem was that by the time we had some preliminary and sketchy information, the kids were already on the bus headed home.

"I was able to get some information on what may have happened around 4:30 or 5 p.m., so I did call some of the parents, but even then, I didn't have all the facts about the incident and neither did anyone else."

Hanschen said Jackson police were still interviewing people and taking statements by the time some of the students were telling their parents what they thought happened that afternoon.

He said police also got conflicting statements as to what occurred. "We've still got conflicting statements as to what happened. One person says they saw this, and another tells a different story," said Hanschen.

Because the incident involves a student who is also a juvenile, police and school officials cannot comment in detail on the events leading up to the confiscation of the weapon April 19.

On Monday, the Jackson school board and school officials met in closed session after their regular board meeting with a group of West Lane parents concerned about the incident.

After the meeting, Hanschen said he felt the parents were satisfied with what they heard. "We listened to their concerns. They had a prepared statement that was given to each board member. The statement made some very good points. One of them was a suggestion that personal contact be made with each parent to pass on information before the parents get second-hand information from their children," Hanschen noted. "They told us they were not pointing fingers at anyone. They just wanted to know what happened."

Hanschen said there was no attempt by the administration or the board to cover up the incident.20"It's just that neither we nor the police had all the answers to the questions everyone was asking," he added.

Hanschen said nothing like this has ever happened in the school district. "We've never been confronted with this until now, and we did not have a plan in place to deal with this sort of thing," he said. "We are taking steps to deal with it, if something like this should ever occur in the future."

He added: "We're going to train teachers to work with their students on a classroom-by-classroom basis on how to recognize potentially serious situations, including displays of dangerous weapons, such as knives, guns, brass knuckles, even drugs. Anything20that could harm a student. The message we want to get across to the students is that it is not "ratting" or "finking" to tell a teacher or someone in authority that they believe someone has something that is a danger to themselves and others."

As parent of three children who attend Jackson schools, Hanschen said he used the incident as an opportunity to sit down with his children and discuss it. He urged other parents to do the same.

"I told them if they ever see anything that might be harmful or hurtful to themselves or other students to tell someone at once. It's not ratting or telling on someone. It's just good common sense," Hanschen explained.