Sheriff David Zylak, Superintendent Dr. Michael Martirano and Leonardtown HS Principal James Scott Smith talk to parents Monday — The Bay Net photos by Sean Rice

School officials held a parents’ meeting Monday night at Leonardtown High School to answer questions and receive comments about the handling of the gun scare and lockdown of the high school campus Friday.

During the two-hour meeting, school and law enforcement officials received commendations and applause from the group of about 40 parents. Officials gathered only two negative comments from the group, and several questions and suggestions on how things could have been improved.

Leonardtown High School Principal James Scott Smith gave a minute by minute timeline of the events that unfolded Friday, starting with the student and his grandmother witnessing a student pulling a gun from his waistband and stick it into his back pack, to the completion of locker searches at 6:30 p.m.

 

Smith

“It’s amazing that you can take a huge school like this, turn it upside down and shake it and nothing comes out,” Smith said of the lack of illegal substances found during the day’s searches. Only “a pack” of cigarettes and a box cutter were found on students, and a paintball gun was found in a vehicle outside. The box cutter belonged to a student who worked at Lowe’s.

Parents questioned the timeline and the motive behind each action taken. Among the comments fielded before the meeting, concerns were raised about the students not having been able to eat anything for the entire day.

Smith said he will talking with parent groups about having emergency “snack packs” in every classroom is case of an emergency.

When Sheriff David Zylak took the floor to answer questions about the procedure, one parent was visibly upset and loud, claiming the Emergency Services Team, aka SWAT, members were lax in their search of the bags and rough with the students. She claimed a student had a high powered rifle pointed in his face, and another student was slammed onto a desk for no apparent reason.

She claimed her daughter’s room had a student in it that matched the description of the armed student, but his bag was not searched by the commando teams.

Many parents at the meeting became visibly upset at this parent’s accusations, and began shaking their heads. Some even left the meeting.

“Did your student come home safe?” another parent snapped back at her.

“I wasn’t inside those rooms, and ma’am with all due respect you weren’t in those rooms,” Zylak said. “I have to rely on the professionalism and expertise of my men.”

Another parent said, “Maybe those kids warranted that response, but I got a very different impression of what went on.”

Zylak then instructed a deputy to take her information to investigate.

“If my child was doing something wrong and they had to put her on the ground, she would have deserved it,” another parent said later.

The angry parent said she h