Armed Boy, 12, Arrested in Va. School Plot

Student Planned Attack, Police Say

A 12-year-old boy plotting to frighten or even kill students who had teased him and then hold hostages to extort money was arrested yesterday morning at a Prince William County middle school after an administrator found him with a loaded rifle and two other guns, police said.

The seventh-grader was arrested in full camouflage gear on the last day of school after officials at Bull Run Middle School locked down the building and police stormed it under a plan developed after the shootings at Colorado's Columbine High School in 1999.

Police also arrested the boy's mother, Naomi Lewis, 38, a cafeteria worker at the school in the county's Gainesville section, and charged her with possession of a weapon on school property, law enforcement sources said. The boy had gotten a ride to school with his mother and left the guns in her car. Lewis noticed the guns and locked the car but never reported that they were there, police said in a statement. The boy later went back with a car key and retrieved the guns, police said.

Lewis did not know her son had a key and did not know of the plot, sources said. The guns belonged to the family, and neighbors said police removed about 20 additional weapons from the home on Brave Court in Haymarket.

Police Chief Charlie T. Deane said detectives believe that the boy wanted to scare or hurt other students and that he also was planning to take hostages.

"Some information leads us to believe there could have been a hostage situation with demands for money," Deane said. "It's still early, and we just don't know the extent of it yet."

Detectives were questioning about 10 students who learned of the student's plan in recent days but either did not take him seriously or did not believe he would go through with it. Deane said police are also investigating whether some students had agreed to take part in the plan and whether others "were going to do it and then changed their mind."

No shots were fired, and the student never pointed a gun at anyone during his apprehension, police said. It is unclear whether the student pointed the gun before police arrived. When he was arrested, he was talking to a school administrator and carrying a loaded .30-06 rifle. Police also found a .410-gauge shotgun and a .22-caliber rifle in a bathroom, where the boy was initially spotted.

As police charged the school, the 1,100 students inside the two-year-old building were locked in their darkened classrooms. After police went room to room searching for weapons, the students were taken to nearby Tyler Elementary School, where shaken parents arrived throughout the late morning and early afternoon to pick them up.

"You hear all this stuff, and you never think it'll be you," said Jane Buchanan, mother of a seventh-grader.

Her son Taylor Buchanan, 13, said: "I thought that we would sign yearbooks and say goodbye and that's it. I didn't get to do either."

Deane and law enforcement sources said the incident began about 8:30 a.m., when the student sneaked out of the building and to his mother's car to retrieve the guns. He went first to a bathroom, and as he popped a cartridge into the .30-06 rifle, an assistant principal on routine rounds heard the unmistakable sound of a gun being loaded. The administrator called police, and the school system and police department immediately implemented the county's school violence response plan, put into place after the Columbine shootings.

Officer Bryan Nevitt arrived first with a team of others. He said he looked through a window and spotted the student holding a rifle and speaking to the assistant principal. Nevitt and his team entered the building and caught the administrator's attention. The administrator moved away, and the officers challenged the boy. He complied with their orders and was immediately arrested.

Under the response plan, officers quickly formed a search team, entered the school and began separating possible shooters from possible victims by isolating the armed student and locking down the rest of the school. Police in Colorado were criticized for cordoning off the school and waiting for reinforcements as children inside were being shot.