GREENFIELD — A 17-year-old admitted to police he’d jokingly offered to pay an older classmate to carry out a shooting at a rehearsal for Greenfield-Central High School’s commencement ceremony, according to court documents.
Both students are now in police custody, and local law enforcement is assuring families that there is no ongoing threat to the safety and well-being of parents or students planning to attend Saturday’s graduation.
Still, there will be an extra police presence at the high school during the ceremony to bring peace of mind to celebrating families.
Greenfield-Central’s annual graduation rehearsal took place midday Friday at the high school. A woman told police she overheard two young co-workers Thursday talking about “shooting up the school tomorrow during rehearsal,” court documents state.
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Greenfield Police Department officers immediately began investigating the threats. With help from high school administrators, they identified the suspects as 18-year-old Clayton Smith, a Greenfield-Central High School junior, and a 17-year-old graduating senior, whose name was withheld due to his age.
Police questioned the teens, and both admitted to talking about carrying out a shooting at the commencement rehearsal; but they said the comments were made jokingly and that neither intended to go through with any act of violence.
Both were arrested before the commencement rehearsal had begun, officials said.
Greenfield Police Chief Jeff Rasche said investigators have and will continue to take any threat to student safety seriously, especially given the tragic school shootings that have taken place across the country in recent weeks.
“It sickens me that someone may think that even talking about conducting school shootings or any violence … is going to be looked any other way than very seriously,” Rasche said. “We are not going to blow this off as a joke.”
Greenfield police always provide security at graduation, Rasche said. Typically, six uniformed officers patrol the campus during the ceremony. This year, a seventh uniformed officer will be at the ceremony along with several in plain clothes, Rasche said.
Friday’s incident marks the fifth time in the 2017-18 school year that police have been alerted to a threat of violence at Greenfield-Central Schools.
Student safety is among the district’s chief concerns, Superintendent Harold Olin said. Safety procedures at each school are continually being reviewed and updated to ensure the buildings are as secure as possible. Students are taught to report any concerning remark made by a classmates, and teachers know to offer emotional support to any student who appears to be struggling, he said.
Both teens involved in Friday’s incident told police they didn’t like their classmates. The 17-year-old said he’d often felt picked on by the other seniors, according to court documents.
The younger of the two teens “admitted that he did say he would pay (Smith) to shoot up the school, but insisted that he was not serious,” court documents state. He told police he did have access to guns, but they were all locked away.
He’s been taken to a juvenile detention center. Prosecutors anticipate filing juvenile charges against him in the coming days. Juvenile records are sealed from public view.
Smith did not have access to weapons, he told police.
He said the conversation with the 17-year-old was “a bad joke” and “something they would never do,” court documents state.
Olin said he couldn’t comment whether the district would take disciplinary actions against Smith, who would start his senior year in August.
Smith is now locked in the Hancock County Jail on a single Level 6 felony count of conspiracy to commit intimidation. He’ll be held without bond until he can make his first court appearance.
The charge carries a maximum penalty of 2½ years in jail.