Chalk words of encouragement greeted students at Four Corners elementary the morning of Oct. 4, the day after a 10-year-old student brought a gun to school. (Courtesy/Salem-Keizer Public Schools)
An unloaded handgun sat undetected Wednesday by school officials in a student backpack for hours at Four Corners Elementary School.
A 10-year-old student brought the gun to school, police said. Teachers confiscated the gun immediately after multiple students reported seeing it in the student’s backpack, district spokeswoman Lillian Govus said.
But students first saw the gun on the morning bus ride to school, she said. It remained in the student’s backpack through morning class and lunch before students told teachers at 12:50 p.m.
Following that report, a school resource deputy with the Marion County Sheriff’s Office responded to Four Corners within minutes.
About 515 students attend the school.
This is the first time a firearm has been confiscated from a Salem-Keizer student in over a year. There were none reported across the entire district last school year, Govus said.
Sheriff’s Office spokesman Lt. Chris Baldridge said he wouldn’t provide any more information about an ongoing investigation. The office also denied a public records request for a copy of the police report.
Govus said she couldn’t address questions about the delay from the time students saw the gun on the bus to when it was reported to officials.
There’s no law or policy against the district sharing that information, but she said the district typically follow the lead of local law enforcement when something is being investigated to avoid compromising evidence.
“What they share is what we default to,” she said.
Neither agency has said how the student obtained the gun or why they brought it to school.
Four Corners principal Phil Decker met with parents after school Wednesday and before school Thursday morning. About 20 parents came to each session, Govus said.
Parents suggested the district send home information about safe gun storage, which Govus called a “really good suggestion.”
“We’ll work with the sheriff’s office to get something written,” Govus said.
While Decker spoke in public session to parents, he wasn’t available to the media, Govus said.
“He’s got several hundred students and several hundred parents that he needs to focus on,” she said.
After the gun was recovered, staff at the school developed talking points for students, Govus said. In kindergarten, that talk was about the importance of talking to an adult if something feels unsafe. Older children were told a student brought a weapon to school that was immediately confiscated.
The student has not returned to school and is not in police custody. Two processes – one by the district, and one by the juvenile justice system – will determine what happens to that student next.
The district will evaluate the student using its student threat assessment, a process designed to figure out if a student who has implicitly threatened others, brought a weapon to school or acted aggressively is likely to commit violence.
It’s a system that the district has used since 2000, partnering with police and mental health agencies, according to the website explaining the system. The goal is to get a realistic sense of how dangerous a student might be and develop a plan to address that risk, rather than using a one-size-fits-all system which may see a student expelled by default.
That process will determine any school discipline for the student, such as suspension or expulsion.
If the student does return to Four Corners, Govus said the district would develop a re-entry plan to balance letting students, staff and parents know without identifying the student to the entire school.
Separately, the Marion County Sheriff’s Office is conducting a criminal investigation with results gong to the county’s Juvenile Department.
Troy Gregg, the juvenile department director, said it’s rare for children under 13 to face any criminal or court proceedings.
He said it’s likely the student would be referred into the family support program, which serves about 500 young people and their families annually. The program employs two probation and family support workers who try to figure out why a young child is acting out or behaving criminally. Their help can include parenting skills instruction and referring families to services such as mental health care.
Families typically stay in the program for three to nine months, he said. There’s currently a waiting list, but a student bringing a gun to school would jump to the top of that list and receive immediate support.
Correction: The Salem-Keizer school district reported no firearms were found on any school campuses last school year. Due to a reporter’s error, the originally article incorrectly stated no weapons were found.
Rachel Alexander is Salem Reporter’s managing editor. She joined Salem Reporter when it was founded in 2018 and covers city news, education, nonprofits and a little bit of everything else. She’s been a journalist in Oregon and Washington for a decade. Outside of work, she’s a skater and board member with Salem’s Cherry City Roller Derby and can often be found with her nose buried in a book.
