Usual suspects: White boys from the ‘burbs:

Ohio law prohibits agencies from sharing information about a troubled child.

By JEANNE STARMACK

VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER

AUSTINTOWN — Who is more likely to begin a shooting spree at your school? Studies point to a kid, usually white and usually male, from the suburbs.

He may have a history of mental health problems, run-ins with the police and fights in school.

For years, he may be a regular in the therapist’s and principal’s offices and the juvenile court system without those agencies knowing about one another’s involvement in his life.

If such a kid decides he can’t take it anymore and starts shooting in an Austintown school one day, school staff and the police will act fast.

Staff will put as much space and as many locked doors as possible between him and his classmates, said Superintendent Doug Heuer.

Police will track him from laptops in their cruisers that will let them access the school’s security system to see where he is in the building, said Police Chief Bob Gavalier.

They won’t wait for a Special Weapons and Tactics team. They can’t.

The days are over when police would be “securing the perimeter” and waiting for a special team to begin negotiations, Gavalier said.

“Now it’s respond to the call and go after the shooter,” he said.

There’s no negotiating because there’s no turning back for the boy by then. Most chilling of all, the boy expects, maybe even plans, to die anyway.

“What they’ve found — people who reach this stage don’t care if they die or not,” Heuer said.

But what if the troubled kid was headed off the deep end before he took a gun to school?

What if the police, the court system, mental health agencies and Children Services were allowed to share information about him to paint a clearer picture of all his problems before they erupted with gunfire?

It can’t happen in Ohio.

Legal restrictions in Ohio prohibit the sharing of such information between agencies, Heuer said. He and Gavalier believe that should change.

“Police can’t call us and ask for a history on a kid they have,” Heuer said.

“Federal statistics show most information comes toward the end, not the beginning,” Gavalier added. “School may see him once or twice, police may see him three or four times. Children Services may be involved. Mental Health may see him a few times. If agencies were talking, they’d see it.”

Children Services, said Heuer, is “very restricted.”

He said the school district is required by law to notify the agency of suspected child abuse.

“But we can’t get information back. You can report and never hear again about the situation with that particular kid,” he said.

Laws also govern confidentiality with discipline in schools, he said. Records are accessible only to certain school personnel and the child’s parents, he said.

In April, the superintendent and Gavalier traveled to Wisconsin for a seminar on the benefits of agencies sharing information to prevent school shootings. The seminar was sponsored by the Justice Department’s Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.

Trying to communicate

Though Ohio agencies can’t release information without parental permission, Heuer said, he and Gavalier are looking at how to create a way to communicate despite the laws.

A judge could order communication, Heuer said, and that decree would supersede state statutes.

Gavalier said he is hoping to meet with Judge Theresa Dellick of the Mahoning County Juvenile Court about the idea. If agencies here in Mahoning County decide to pursue information sharing, she and other agency heads would travel to the next seminar to learn how to set it up, he said.

Gavalier and Heuer say they also want to talk to state representatives, having done so informally already.

Getting the laws changed statewide would be ideal, but a formidable job, they acknowledged. Heuer said school districts from other Ohio regions were at the April seminar, including some from the northwestern, southeastern and central part of the state.

Heuer said that even though police and the schools believe in the idea, other agencies have to be on board for it to work.

But if it can work here, he said, information sharing could identify a child who’s a threat to himself and others.

“And we have an opportunity to sit down and work with that student for intervention, and hopefully get the child back on track,” Heuer said.