DRAPER — The telephone call came into the office of Chris Long, assistant principal for student services of Juan Diego Catholic High School, Oct. 29, just as the lunch hour was beginning. The 911 operator told him plainly: "There is a teenage boy on your campus with a gun."
"My first thoughts were, where is he, and what are his intentions?" Long said in a Nov. 1 interview with the Intermountain Catholic. "I got on the public address system and said, ‘Attention please. The school is going into lockdown. This is not a drill.’ I said it four times so there would be no mistake. The middle school was just starting lunch. Our policy is that when the school goes into lockdown mode, the students drop what they’re doing and get behind locked doors. The school reacted very well. We went from lunch-time chaos to empty hallways and a deserted cafeteria in 30 seconds."
Long said students were scared. "I was scared, too. It’s the kind of thing we pray will never happen."
As Long was leaving his office at a run, he realized he hadn’t pushed the telephone code that alerts the St. John the Baptist Elementary and Middle Schools. Minutes later, every student and teacher in the Skaggs Catholic Center was behind locked doors and the Draper Police Department was on the scene. "They established a perimeter and began a grid search," Long said.
The incident began when Vita Fulton, mother of a student at Juan Diego looked up from her car, parked in front of the school to see a teenage boy near the Center’s bell tower with what appeared to be a gun. She called 911. The Draper Police Department 911 operator notified the school.
Three teenage boys were arrested, one with a Sig Sauer Nine Millimeter Semi-automatic P226 Air Soft gun; a frighteningly authentic looking gun that shoots solid plastic BBs. It has a muzzle velocity of 300 feet per second, and a warning on the barrel that if handled wrong, it may result in serious injury or death.
"It’s manufactured by the same company that makes the real weapon, and it’s designed to look just like the real weapon," Long said. "Each year from five to 10 juveniles are killed because they are carrying this very BB gun, and people think it’s a real gun."
Long said even discharging this type of BB gun in Draper’s city limits is against the law.
"The Draper Police Department response was fantastic," said Long, whose responsibilities at Juan Diego include supervising school security. When the perpetrators, who are not students at any of the Skaggs Catholic Center schools, were apprehended, they had changed their clothes. Long doesn’t know where they were caught, he’s just glad they were.
"Now, we’re in the process of evaluating the incident, compiling information, and studying our responses. We always want to make sure we’re doing everything possible to protect our students, our teachers, and our faculty, as well as any visitors who might be on campus.
"This was a very frightening situation for all of us," Long said. "But I’m glad we had a plan and that everyone followed it, that no one was hurt."
Long said on Dec. 1 he is scheduled to attend a Student Safety and Security Conference in Las Vegas, Nev. "I’m bringing back every bit of information I can," he said.
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