Working Together to Protect Our Children
Key West Police Chief Donie Lee wants to intensify efforts to ensure the safety of children in our schools. He will invite key stakeholders to meet next week to explore ways in which law enforcement and the schools can tighten security to keep tragedy from striking.
“We need to double down on what we’re doing,” he said. “We need to look at our capabilities, address the challenges, and implement any changes we can. We need to do all that we can do.”
Lee hopes to sit down with school administrators as well as mental health officials to explore every possibility of ensuring that gun violence does not occur in this community.
In addition to concrete efforts that can be accomplished on the ground, Chief Lee’s goal is also to send recommendations to our state and federal representatives.
How about posting on the KWPD Facebook page a current photo of the little shit that put his photo behind a loaded revolver onto Facebook, with a threat to cap a fellow Horace O’Bryant Middle School student, which, based on the blue paper’s reporting, and what I later saw in the Key West Citizen, the principal of of HOB, the superintendent of schools, the school board, KWPD, and the Citizen tried to cover up, as if there was nothing to it. Word has it the little shit comes from a Key West old Conch (white) family. The point of putting the little shit’s mug shot on the KWPD website, and in the blue paper, and in the Citizen and the Keynoter, is to show people in Key West what the little shit looks like, just on the off chance they don’t want to have anything to do with him, or more to the point, they don’t want their children students to have anything to do with him. We all know what the little shit who did much the same thing toward a Marathon High School looks like, because he got found out and arrested by the Sheriff, the FBI and Homeland security, after his IP address led law enforcement to him, and his photo was published in the blue paper, the Citizen and the Keynoter. Yes, that little shit from Big Pine Key was 19, thus not a juvenile, while the little shit at HOB is 15, thus a juvenile. But what right to privacy does he have after putting that shooter threat on Facebook? What’s the difference between him, really, and the little shit from Big Pine Key? How many people knew about the Cruz kid in Broward, who ended up killing all those students last week, and no one reported him to local law enforcement, the FBI, homeland security? What does it matter to parents and siblings of shot-dead students whether the shooter was 19 or 15? Show the people of Key West what the little shit at HOB looks like.
As we said in our article, when it comes to our school children we should be very careful in how we deal with situations such as this. The 19 year old you mention was arrested by law enforcement after an investigation. A newspaper is not the place to try children. The essential point here is to show systemic problems and to encourage the creation of better policies. There is a potential for over-reaction and lynch mob mentality here that must be avoided and we should keep that in mind. Here is some of what is distubing in this story:
1. The KWPD officer did not write a report or keep a copy of the photo to document the gun threat. We don’t know the whole story. We do know he did not do his job. and we do know the child comes from a well-connected family.
2. KWPD admittedly sent out false information on their Facebook page and to the Citizen. (Claiming that the gun threat was investigated by MCSO – not true.)
3. KWPD corrected this on Facebook (after we pushed for a copy of the MCSO report and none could be found) by writing a fairly ambiguous correction in a note at the end of the message containing the false information. Anyone who doesn’t bother to read to the end will still believe the false information about a non-existent MCSO investigation to be true. Anyone who read the original post will not be alerted by a new post that the information they had read previously was false.
4. The Citizen has not corrected the false information that they published leaving their thousands of readers to continue to believe it is true.
5. There are also disturbing allegations about the same child dealing drugs on campus and not being appropriately dealt with by KWPD and the school.
6. These allegations lead to questions about purposeful coverup by KWPD and the school administrators.
7. The School District told parents all gun threat allegations had been properly investigated by law enforcement but gave no specifics and were presumably of the belief when they wrote that statement to parents and the press that the false information given by KWPD about a full MCSO investigation was true. They have not corrected their statement either.
8. The School Principal did not inform faculty of the threat (including school guidance counselors.)
9. There are allegations that the School administrators are more interested in who is leaking information to The Blue paper then in school safety or understanding why a KWPD officer would not so much as document what appears to be a very serious crime. Certainly the alleged criminal conduct was just as serious as the crime the 19 year old was just arrested for.
10. The School District claimed that they have “protocols” that “can not be shared” with the public (ignorance of public records law).
11. The School District has yet to send a copy of those “protocols” they refered to in their letter to parents and press release to The Blue Paper despite multiple request pursuant to the Public Records Act.
Chief Lee, there is one very important thing you and our elected reps could do and that is to help challenge or repeal the Florida law that fines or removes any public official who attempts to regulate firearms. Tell me if that wasn’t pushed forward by NRA and ALEC lobbyists. Come out so to speak and face them off please. It’s a disgrace to Florida and common sense. Nothing new there though.