Posted on 02/29/2012 12:36:26 PM PST by marktwain
GRAND RAPIDS (WZZM) -- A Grand Rapids Public Schools spokesman says a man was trying to make a political statement by bringing a gun into a school that was also serving as a voting site.
The incident happened around noon Tuesday at Aberdeen Elementary School, 928 Aberdeen St. NE.
Spokesman John Helmholdt says the man entered the school's gymnasium -- the location of the polling site -- through the doors designated for voters. The man voted, then tried to exit through the school building.
Helmholdt says a teacher spotted the man and saw he was clearly carrying a gun in a holster. The teacher alerted administrators, who stopped the man and asked him to come to the school office. Staff members also called in Grand Rapids Police and school district security.
The district spokesman says that, at no time were students or school staff members in any danger. He says school employees followed proper procedures for handling such incidents.
The man told officers he was trying to make a political statement that people who are legally permitted to carry concealed weapons could bring them to polling sites, according to Helmholdt. But the district spokesman says state law does not allow people with concealed carry permits to take them to properties like schools and churches. Helmholdt says schools are also legal gun-free zones.
Helmholdt says the Kent County Prosecutor's Office is reviewing the case, but he expects the man to be charged with a misdemeanor for violating the gun-free school law.
The incident comes one day after an Ohio student brought a gun to a school and began shooting people, killing three teenagers and injuring two others.
He couldn’t think of a better political statement?
The point of Concealed Carry is for it to be CONCEALED.
I'm trying to decide who is a bigger moron in this story. Hemholdt or the ZZM "Journalist" who presented Helmholdt's statement as accurate.
The reporter probably thought he was mocking the man when he mentioned the Ohio shooting.
Instead, he’s mocking the “gun-free-school-rule”; a man who means no harm is arrested, while a kid who wants to shoot people has no trouble bringing a weapon and accomplishing the goal.
Laws are for the law-abiding.
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