Armed Resource Officer Stops Maryland High School Gunman

This report was originally published by Tyler Durden at Zero Hedge

A 17-year-old gunman is dead following an exchange with an armed School Resource Officer (SRO) at Great Mills High School in Maryland on Tuesday morning. Two students were injured.

The gunman opened fire on a 16-year-old female student before class in a central hallway, hitting a male classmate, before the (SRO) exchanged fire with the shooter who was armed with a handgun, disabling him and ending the incident. The SRO was not injured in the exchange which began at 7:45 a.m.

St. Mary Co. Sheriff Tim Cameron on shooting at Great Mills HS: shooting happened in hallway; shooter, a student, fired at a female student, another was student hit. Armed school resource ofc, a deputy, exchanged shots w/ shooter; shooter & female student in critical condition

— Peggy Fox (@PeggyTV) March 20, 2018

The female student is in critical but stable condition at a trauma facility, while her male classmate is in stable condition. They were taken to separate hospitals in D.C. where the shooter died at 10:41 a.m.

St. Mary’s Co. Sheriff: 3 students injured at Great Mills HS have been taken to hospitals in DC, Prince George’s County & St. Mary’s Co. Shooter & female student in critical, another student taken to MedSTAR is critical but stable. SRO who stopped shooter was not hurt. @wusa9

— Peggy Fox (@PeggyTV) March 20, 2018

WATCH: Officials give update on school shooting at a high school in Maryland https://t.co/n77utODxMu pic.twitter.com/kMNfqFDZKE

— CBS News (@CBSNews) March 20, 2018

The ATF and FBI are investigating the incident which came just days after threats were made on Snapchat against the school. The sheriff’s department reportedly investigated the threat but did not determine it to be authentic.

Agents from the FBI in southern MD are on scene assisting @firstsheriff at Great Mills High School in Saint Mary"s County. Evidence Response Team is on standby.

— FBI Baltimore (@FBIBaltimore) March 20, 2018

“This is what we train for, this is what we prepare for,” said Sheriff Tim Cameron.

Quick thinking student Jonathan Freese called CNN from his cell phone during lockdown in math class, telling the network “I’m still a little shaken up.”

Freese said the school had held drills a couple of times for this kind of situation.

“I didn’t really expect for this to happen. I do always feel safe, though, because they always have police at the school,” he said. –CNN

School buses were used to transport students to a neighboring school to be reunited with their parents.

The shooting comes a week after Great Mills High School students staged a walk-out to protest gun violence in the wake of the February 14 school shooting in Parkland, Florida which was not stopped by the school’s resource officer, Scot Peterson.

President Trump has repeatedly called for arming teachers following the Parkland incident as a means to safeguard students against future mass shootings.

President Trump was right.
Armed resource officer stopped shooter at high school.
Only bad guy is dead.

Can"t stop all evil, but, can lessen it substantially.

— Thomas (@Thomas_195813) March 20, 2018

BREAKING: Surveillance Video Released of Parkland Shooting—Does Not Show Shooter

New surveillance footage has been released from the Parkland Shooting—but it fails to show the gunman entering or exiting the building.

The post BREAKING: Surveillance Video Released of Parkland Shooting—Does Not Show Shooter appeared first on The Free Thought Project.

Kids Injured as School Cop Shoots Gun in a Class—Officials Cover It Up, Wounded Kid Blows Whistle

Not one, but two school cops discharged firearms in schools this week. One of the officers injured multiple students in the process and the media and school officials attempted to cover it up.

The post Kids Injured as School Cop Shoots Gun in a Class—Officials Cover It Up, Wounded Kid Blows Whistle appeared first on The Free Thought Project.

Taxpayers Held Liable as Cops Refuse to Apologize for Attacking Innocent Child on Video

Taxpayers shelled out tens of thousands of dollars this week after cops were seen on video brutally attacking the victim of a bullying incident and then refused to even say they were sorry.

The post Taxpayers Held Liable as Cops Refuse to Apologize for Attacking Innocent Child on Video appeared first on The Free Thought Project.

The Florida Officer Is Not Alone—5 Times School Cops Hurt Kids—While Refusing to Help Them

The news that a school security guard chose to wait outside while an active shooter killed students inside has shocked many, but he is not the first in his position to harm students instead of helping them.

The post The Florida Officer Is Not Alone—5 Times School Cops Hurt Kids—While Refusing to Help Them appeared first on The Free Thought Project.

WATCH: Cop Attacks Handcuffed School Girl, Violently Slams Her Into the Concrete

A video was released online that showed a 17-year-old being slammed to the ground and arrested by a school resource officer, after a teacher searched her backpack for drugs, found nothing and demanded that she leave class.

Female Officer Blows Whistle as Fellow Cop Pleads Guilty to Raping Her—Faces No Charges

When a female police officer confronted her colleague about strangling and raping her, he admitted to the attack and bragged about the bursts of anger that gave him the nickname "The Hulk."

WATCH: Gay Teen Bullied on Bus, Cops Show Up, Body Slam HIM — Face-First into Pavement

When police were called to break up a fight on a school bus, they targeted and violently body-slammed the teenager who was a victim of bullying.

WATCH: Dallas Cop Breaks Tiny 12yo Girl’s Clavicle by Body-slamming Her

Dallas, TX — The Dallas Independent School District is once again under fire for the way one of its school resource officers (SRO) handled a student. An unnamed SRO was attempting to break up a fight between two female students when the officer slammed the girl to the ground, fracturing her clavicle.

Cell phone footage taken by classmates at the Piedmont G.L.O.B.A.L Academy shows the officer slamming the girl, Mariana Valadez, a sixth grader, violently to the ground. Alma Valdez, the girl’s mother now wants the officer fired.

“I don’t want him to be suspended. I want him to get fired. Why is he still working with kids? He’s not capable of working with girls like that,” she said.

Adding insult to injury, the young child was also pepper sprayed, she claims. DISD said they’re conducting a thorough investigation of the incident but won’t say if or when the unnamed officer will return to duty.

Alma explained her confusion upon learning what happened to her daughter. “I was crying because I didn’t know what, how can it happen,” asked Valadez.

The officer’s move, which arguably looked more like a Judo throw than police academy tactics, injured the 12-year-old.

Mariana was suspended for three days for her role in the fight. “She’s a twelve-year-old girl,” remarked her mother.

The incident is the latest in a series of missteps by DISD SRO’s. As The Free Thought Project recently reported, a 7-year-old was placed in handcuffs for acting out in school. He’s reportedly autistic and is a special needs student.

The child was then taken without his parent’s permission to a mental health facility and kept there for six days. That’s considered kidnapping in many parts of the world, especially since the parents were reportedly not notified nor gave their consent for him to be confined there.

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According to the Dallas News, “David Ramirez, an investigator hired by the family’s attorneys, said the boy was sedated at the behavioral facility and admitted without notifying a parent. He spent nearly a week there and was released Monday afternoon.”

There are two disturbing associations public schools have with nefarious entities which seem to be causing many of the legal troubles school systems are facing; their use of police officers in school, and their embrace of psychologists and social workers who together seemingly have more power than parents.

There are, however, conscientious police officers who work in public schools as SRO’s and who don’t behave in like manner when confronted with troubled teens and children.

As TFTP reported last week, one NC SRO disarmed a would-be mass killer simply by treating the suspect as a person, simply having a conversation with him.

SRO’s need to be trained in de-escalation techniques instead of relying on their police training. It appears as though the DISD needs to employ such people to handle security in-house.

When law enforcement gets involved in school matters, kids are mistreated, treated inhumanely, and sometimes killed by officers trained to work with adults. Unfortunately, we write too many stories of SRO’s who choke, knock out teeth, slam, throw and shoot children without any due process occurring.

When that happens, lawsuits happen, and taxpayers saddle the costs of court settlements.

Citizens Fight Back, Move to Impeach Judge For Letting Pedophile Cop Off Easy

As The Free Thought Project has consistently reported, police officers, even if they’re caught on video committing a crime, are rarely punished to the same standards the public which they’re sworn to protect are held to. And now, it seems, even retired police officers are given the same preferential treatment.

Gerald Cookus, a twenty-year veteran of the Wilkes-Barre Police Department in Pennsylvania, was sentenced to just 3 months in prison for admittedly molesting an 8-year-old girl at his home on Mayock Street in Wilkes-Barre.

Cookus, who was working as a greeter at the school known as the Solomon Plains Education Center, was seen by the victim’s mom hugging the victim in a way that aroused her suspicions. Upon further investigation, it was discovered Cookus had molested the girl because, in his words, he felt like she liked it.

According to WNEP News, “Court papers show he admitted to police he touched the girl inappropriately because he believed she thought it felt good. School leaders do not think the assaults happened on school grounds. He was fired from his position at Solomon Plains Elementary in November.”

News reports indicate the former career police officer was overcome with emotion, “Inside the courtroom, his lawyer told the judge he’s living with the loss of his family’s respect.” And, “Before he was sentenced, Cookus told the judge through tears, ‘this is the worst thing in my life and I’m sorry. I’m very, very sorry.’” But all of the emotion, the tears, the words of remorse, mean nothing when you examine the research that exists on pedophiles.

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Pedophiles are serial offenders. Very few are arrested as a result of their first offense, and go on to molest children, over and over again. While it’s too early to tell in the case of convicted pedophile retired officer Gerald Cookus (mainly because he’s only been convicted of one crime by one accuser), pedophiles are experts at victimizing.

According to one source which examines research related to pedophiles and their victims, “Pedophiles have a strong, almost irresistible, desire to have sex with children. The average pedophile molests 260 victims during their lifetime. Over 90% of convicted pedophiles are arrested again for the same offense after their release from prison.”

We at The Free Thought Project encourage you to come forward, if you’re a victim of this pedophile cop. Be strong and courageous and take your own accusations to the police station nearest you. If you recognize this police officer as someone who molested you, don’t stay silent any longer.

While Cookus was working at a local elementary school, he also worked in security at Wilkes University in the 1990’s.

Moreover, citizens of Wilkes-Barre are outraged at the judge in the case, Judge Sklarosky, for going easy on the retired police officer. Three months is an outrage to anyone who’s ever been a victim of a pedophile, has been molested, or has been involved in the process of a police investigation of the horrors associated with child sexual abuse.

Citizens want to know how a judge can be so callous as to not bring a harsher penalty to the former police officer and use him as an example for the rest of the community. They’ve established a petition to impeach Judge Sklarosky.

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According to the petition:

This is a deep problem in NEPA that has to be addressed. Corruption, nepotism, and racially/economically unequal sentences. If this Judge wants to impose only a 3 month sentence to a cop who admitted to sexually assaulting an 8 year old while throwing the book at everyone else, let’s make an example out of him and show the local government officials we’re not putting up with this blatant corruption that haunts our area anymore. It’s morally wrong. A man who sexually assaults an 8 year old will not be properly rehabilitated, if that’s even possible, after three months. This judge obviously lacks empathy to the victim or possible future victim(s) and is totally incompetent. He has no business collecting our tax dollars anymore, he obviously doesn’t represent what we the people stand for. Minorities caught with marijuana do more time than this man. Shame on him. The judge also had the audacity to claim he was not a “sexually violent predator”. So judge, if sexually assaulting an 8 year old isn’t sexually violent, what is? Please resign. Don’t make us impeach you. Leave with whatever little shred of dignity you have left. If not, and you prove to us you have absolutely no morals or backbone, don’t for a second think we’re going to allow you to win your reelection coming up. #PowerToThePeople

If you’d like to sign the petition, you may do so by clicking here. Let’s send a message as a nation and a world that we will not sit idly by as judges go easy on former cops. The world needs to be a safer place for children. Priests, pastors, missionaries, teachers, counselors, police officers, anyone who works with children, take notice, we will not sit idly. If you take the perp walk, we will make sure your face is known to the world.

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