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Additional suspects in East High fight arraigned
By Joe Gorman
YOUNGSTOWN
The 11 additional students charged this week in a series of fights March 8 at East High School have all been taken into custody and arraigned.
The last of the 11 were arraigned Thursday in Mahoning County Juvenile Court. All defendants spent the night in detention before their arraignments and were then released on house arrest.
Court dates have not been set for the cases.
The arraignments were handled by magistrates Anthony D’Apolito and Karen Romano Melone. They entered pleas of denials for the students, which is the juvenile equivalent of not guilty.
A total of 14 people – 13 juveniles and one 18-year-old student – have been charged in connection with the fights, which broke out about 11:20 a.m. March 8 over a pair of scuffed shoes.
More than two dozen police officers had to respond to the school to restore order.
Charges range from misdemeanor counts of assault, failure to comply with the order or signal of a police officer, aggravated menacing, misconduct at an emergency and disorderly conduct to second-degree felony counts of inducing panic and fourth-degree felony counts of aggravated riot.
Penalties for the inducing-panic charge are a minimum of 12 months in the custody of the Department of Youth Services up to age 21 and for the aggravated-riot charge, a minimum of six months in the custody of DYS up to age 21.
Penalties for misdemeanor sentences are up to 180 days in detention in the Martin P. Joyce Juvenile Justice Center.
None of the students who has been charged have been back to school since the fights broke out. The school was closed for a day and a half because of the fights.
On the day of the fights, six of the students were taken to the JJC, but all were released later in the day.
Some veteran officers who responded to the school that day said the scene was one of the worst fighting scenes they ever witnessed. Students were running in front of the school as well as parents, and there was a lot of yelling and cursing, they said.
Several students complained they were sprayed for no reason with chemical spray, but officers say they used it to restore order. Not one complaint, however, has been filed against any of the officers at the school.