After several tense days in the Loyalsock Township area — which saw 15-year-old Ahmeen Palmer gunned down at TGI Fridays, 1840 E. Third St., on Saturday evening, followed by gunfire striking the rear of a home in the 1500 block of Randall Circle late Sunday night — the fears of parents in the school district were evident Wednesday night at a board meeting as several questioned the response of officials to a trespassing incident in the morning hours that same day.
About 8:30 a.m., Sabree Simmons, a homeless man from Philadelphia, made the gesture of firing a handgun at the Loyalsock Township High School building, state police alleged in an affidavit.
“Our officers immediately responded as the individual walked through the backside of our campus, cut across the Christian property and walked to Joe’s Pizza,” Superintendent Gerald McLaughlin said.
“I responded appropriately as soon as I could and once we had the information that the individual was arrested, we put out the state police press release,” McLaughlin said.
Extra police officers were both inside and outside the school throughout the day, McLaughlin said.
When an attendee of the meeting identified as Mr. Koons asked why the school wasn’t immediately put on lockdown, school police officer Paul McGee stated that when he made visual contact with Simmons, he was already off school property.
“We called state police and ascertained everything was safe,” McGee said. “He didn’t have a weapon. There’s no reason to lockdown school when he’s off the property.”
“He was on campus pretending he was pointing a gun when the report came in,” Koons said. “Somebody saw it, right?”
“The maintenance supervisor saw him,” McGee said. “He was already leaving campus.”
When pressed on the threatening gestures, McGee explained that no one had seen Simmons making them until reviewing school surveillance footage after police initially released him, deeming him to not be a threat.
“We were initially going to send him a summons and a trespass notice,” McGee said. “After his release, we discovered he was actually closer to the building, and was probably doing some things he shouldn’t have been doing that was not observed by anyone.”
At that point, hours later, the footage was shared with a state police supervisor, who received approval from a district attorney for Simmons to be charged with a higher degree of crime, McGee said.
Simmons was picked up shortly before 1:30 p.m. and remanded to the Lycoming County Prison in lieu of $150,000 bail on charges of simple assault, disorderly conduct, defiant trespassing on school grounds, harassment, possession of a small amount of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia.
“This person was on campus, doing what he was doing. Luckily, he didn’t have a gun, and it took a long time for anything to be done about it,” Koons said.
“Sometimes we think we’re safe in our little bubble and we’re not… this is a wakeup call for us,” said Nancy Spagnuolo.
“We think we can protect them by having a private police force, but they didn’t look at the cameras until after the fact,” said Spagnuolo, who not only has a grandchild and grandnephew in the district, but also a child that teaches there.
“The children are scared, they know what happened at PennVale, they know what happened over at Fridays,” she said. “Parents are scared. Grandparents are scared. The township is not thrilled.”
Parent Larry Allison called the incident a “very scary moment,” and recounted how his 13-year-old daughter was frightened to go to school after the weekend’s events.
“She’s pressed me pretty hard about not going to school,” he said. “I told her Sunday night, she’ll be fine, nothing will happen.”
Allison witnessed much of the incident from his vehicle just seconds after his daughter entered the school.
He described Simmons as “combative” as officers tried to take him into custody.
“The school should have been locked down,” Allison said. “That’s what should have happened.
“You didn’t know whether that guy had a gun or not when you were chasing him,” he said directly challenging McGee. “You had no clue.”
Allison said he had a conversation years back with McLaughlin about an advanced security system called Clear Asset Protection, but said he was told it was “too expensive.”
“You don’t have kids in the school, we do,” Allison said to the board. “Get the metal detectors in the school.”
“I spoke to the DA twice this week and was told, ‘don’t be surprised if there’s guns in the school,'” Allison said, echoing a sentiment expressed by Lycoming County District Attorney Tom Marino at a press conference regarding gang violence earlier this week.
“Protect my kids. Don’t use excuses. I’m tired of it,” Allison said.
“I moved back here last year from Philly, and after this past week, I’m not sure that was the right thing to do,” another attendee said.
“At least down here I felt safe sending my kids to school because they have metal detectors on every door, and they have full police forces. And to hear somebody say that we’re not going to discuss it, what the Hell? I’ll help raise funds,” the attendee said. “I’m sure everybody here would.”
Earlier in the night, during a Community Wide Safety Committee report, David Bjorkman said he saw this as an opportunity to reassess and improve response plans.
“I think it’s very important after a critical incident like this, that we look at what happened, examine some of the good things we did, but also some of the areas we may need improvement, and how we can implement those recommendations.”
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