Student had gun parts at a Fresno middle school. What police, district leaders are saying
The Fresno Police Department responded to Tioga Middle School on Thursday after a student was found to be in possession of a handgun frame and other handgun parts.
No criminal charges were filed against the student, since the gun parts could not be assembled into a functioning weapon and no threats were made, said Lt. Bill Dooley.
The student was cooperative with school officials and officers, who were able to determine why the parts were brought to school, Dooley said. Police aren’t sharing that information, beyond saying that no threats or attempted threats were made.
An adult on the middle school campus reported the student to site administration around 11 a.m. Thursday. Administrative officials pulled the student into the office and called the police, according to Fresno Unified School District spokesperson Nikki Henry.
Police confiscated the weapon and the student will face disciplinary action, Henry said.
“The student did not have any ammunition either,” Henry said in an email. She noted that police also found two knives in the student’s backpack.
Families at Tioga were informed of the incident by the principal in a message, “reminding them that weapons of any kind are never allowed on campus, and thanking the adult who reported the suspicious behavior,” Henry said.
The incident did not involve a so-called ghost gun, Dooley said, in that it wasn’t a gun at all, just pieces that could not be put together. Dooley said the parts had all been purchased, but wouldn’t give any further information because the case involves a juvenile and no crime had been committed.
Ghost guns have become the topic of much debate in recent years. The guns can be bought legally (often online or at guns shows including one in Fresno) in kit form and assembled at home from parts without traceable serial numbers. The guns are troublesome for law enforcement because they are harder to track.
But FUSD trustee Terry Slatic pushed back against police’s assertion that the student didn’t have a ghost gun. He spoke about the incident on KMJ radio Friday morning and said the disassembled gun did not have a serial number on it.
“That’s a problematic statement,” he told The Bee Friday afternoon. “We’re not calling it a ghost gun because it’s not assembled (and) the holes weren’t drilled yet? That’s 30 minutes of work.”
Slatic called on the district to be more transparent with the district’s families and employees about safety incidents like this one.
“We have 10,300 employees. Unless you were right there when this happened, you don’t know,” he said. “The district has to begin being honest with people about the statistics.”
This story was originally published June 10, 2022 at 2:28 PM.
