A 16-year-old student at Walt Whitman High School in Bethesda, Maryland, was arrested Wednesday and accused of bringing a gun to school.
At about 12:12 p.m., police responded to Bethesda’s Westfield Montgomery mall after getting word that teens from two high schools were fighting and that one of the youths brandished a gun, the Montgomery County Police Department said in a release.
After identifying that person as a Whitman student, the police notified school officials, who searched for him.
School security then removed suspect Andre Wilson from class and found a loaded 9 mm Ruger pistol with the serial number destroyed as well as an ammunition magazine in his backpack, police said.
Andre was subsequently taken into custody by police and is being held at the Montgomery County Detention Center in Rockville.
Prosecutors are charging him as an adult with carrying a handgun on his person, carrying a loaded handgun on his person, illegal possession of a regulated firearm, possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number, possession of a dangerous weapon on school grounds, possession of a firearm by a minor and illegal possession of ammunition, police said.
Walt Whitman High School officials told families in a letter that “this incident is unrelated to any previous unfounded threats or safety concerns. … The possession of any weapon or firearm in Montgomery County Public Schools is strictly prohibited. … Appropriate discipline in alignment with the MCPS Student Code of Conduct will be assigned,” according to Washington’s WUSA.
The police did not say which school the other teens involved in the fight at the mall came from.
