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May 31, 2002
Students stabbed during lunch
Two freshmen were stabbed by a former student in a fight near Blair at lunch on Friday, May 31.
The students were injured in a fight with two former students that started as a fistfight at 11:45 AM near Marvin Memorial Methodist Church, across the street from Blair. The fight later moved to the corner of Lexington Drive and Pierce Drive where the freshmen were stabbed. After the stabbing, the victims called police from the Four Corners 7-11 and the suspects fled the scene.
Montgomery County police officer Debra Marshall said that the victims knew the suspects. Police arrested two suspects at 2:10 PM at the residence of one of the suspects. "Only one suspect was armed," said Marshall, and "only one suspect did the stabbing."
One student was wounded in the chest region and the other recieved several wounds in the back; both were taken to the Washington Hospital Center MedStar Unit for treatment. The student who was injured in the back was released on Sunday, and the student who was injured in the chest was listed in stable condition on Monday.
The student suspected of committing the stabbings was a former Blair sophomore who "the administration had tried to expel," said principal Phillip Gainous through PTSA president Marilyn Shoenfeld. "He had been placed in an alternative school for 45 days but came back to Blair" as a student on the day of the fight. The other suspect, who is accused of participating in the fight but not the stabbing, was a sophomore who was suspended from Blair at the time.
The student accused of committing the stabbings, David Ernest Dominguez, of the 700 block of Ludlow Street, is being held without bond. He is being charged as an adult with two counts of first degree attempted murder and two counts of first degree assault. The other student is being charged as a juvenile with two counts of second degree assault and was released into parental custody. Both of the victims and both of the suspects are 15 years old.
According to Marshall, the incident was not gang related. "It was just a long-running dispute," she said.
On the day of the stabbing, NBC4 news reported that MCPS spokesman Brian Porter said that the freshmen were out of the building because of Blair's open lunch policy. Porter's statement was not supported by school rules, which establish a strict closed lunch policy, and was contradicted by Assistant Principal Pat Hurley, who said, "we don't have open lunch."
The victims of the stabbing did not have permission to be outside of Blair at the time of the fight. "We don't have security ... at every door in the building," said Hurley. "We'd ostensibly need a body at every door" to make sure nobody left the building at any given time.
According to Hurley, MCPS and Blair are taking many actions, but declined to give details about the "confidential" proceedings. "This is a very serious situation," she said, "and we are treating it as a very serious situation."
The students were injured in a fight with two former students that started as a fistfight at 11:45 AM near Marvin Memorial Methodist Church, across the street from Blair. The fight later moved to the corner of Lexington Drive and Pierce Drive where the freshmen were stabbed. After the stabbing, the victims called police from the Four Corners 7-11 and the suspects fled the scene.
Montgomery County police officer Debra Marshall said that the victims knew the suspects. Police arrested two suspects at 2:10 PM at the residence of one of the suspects. "Only one suspect was armed," said Marshall, and "only one suspect did the stabbing."
One student was wounded in the chest region and the other recieved several wounds in the back; both were taken to the Washington Hospital Center MedStar Unit for treatment. The student who was injured in the back was released on Sunday, and the student who was injured in the chest was listed in stable condition on Monday.
The student suspected of committing the stabbings was a former Blair sophomore who "the administration had tried to expel," said principal Phillip Gainous through PTSA president Marilyn Shoenfeld. "He had been placed in an alternative school for 45 days but came back to Blair" as a student on the day of the fight. The other suspect, who is accused of participating in the fight but not the stabbing, was a sophomore who was suspended from Blair at the time.
The student accused of committing the stabbings, David Ernest Dominguez, of the 700 block of Ludlow Street, is being held without bond. He is being charged as an adult with two counts of first degree attempted murder and two counts of first degree assault. The other student is being charged as a juvenile with two counts of second degree assault and was released into parental custody. Both of the victims and both of the suspects are 15 years old.
According to Marshall, the incident was not gang related. "It was just a long-running dispute," she said.
On the day of the stabbing, NBC4 news reported that MCPS spokesman Brian Porter said that the freshmen were out of the building because of Blair's open lunch policy. Porter's statement was not supported by school rules, which establish a strict closed lunch policy, and was contradicted by Assistant Principal Pat Hurley, who said, "we don't have open lunch."
The victims of the stabbing did not have permission to be outside of Blair at the time of the fight. "We don't have security ... at every door in the building," said Hurley. "We'd ostensibly need a body at every door" to make sure nobody left the building at any given time.
According to Hurley, MCPS and Blair are taking many actions, but declined to give details about the "confidential" proceedings. "This is a very serious situation," she said, "and we are treating it as a very serious situation."
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I am sure stabbing someone near a church won't to any good either. St. Peter will frown apon that....
~~I hope the people have a safe recovery!
Come on who would belive that school would be cancaled
Thank you. And I'm not even going to look into who brought up the idea that school would be affected in any way. Just because we've sunk to new depths doesn't give us an excuse to slack off, especially this close to the end of the year! Although I don't even know whether I know the victims at this point (yes, I understand Chips has probably given us all the info they can and witholding names is probably prudent) I hope they are recovering and that we don't have to deal with any more incidents of this nature (and for God's sake not before the end of the year!!).
www.msccsp.org/guidelines/appendixa.html#murder.
The way the sentence guidelines are calculated is based on a point system -- the more points you get, the longer your jail term. There are two categories of points: offense points (what the crime was) and offender points (if the assailant had a previous criminal or juvenile record). For example, if a person had 5 offense points and 1 offender points (for example, one count of first degree assault for a kid with two previous juvenile convictions) -- he could face anywhere from 1 to 5 years in prison (it could be mitigated somewhat by his youth -- so maybe slightly less). However, if someone had 15 offense points (first-degree murder and assault, one count each) and 1 offender point, he/she could face between 30 years - life behind bars. To put things in perspective, the "stabber", with 2 counts of attempted murder and 2 counts of assault, has racked up 34 offense points. The sentencing guidelines don't go past 15. Unless they really have some mitigating circumstances, I don't forsee this guy getting out until at least 2040 (and that's on parole.)
I also note that you don't talk about any of the information you're referring to except in broad generalizations, even with an anonymous name. Please don't attack our newspaper randomly, sir or madam, unless you can find a specific problem of ours.
dismayed, I believe Mr. Gainous gave Mrs. Shoenfeld the information so she could (as PTSA president) inform the community about what happened. That's just my personal opinion, though, not an official statement.
no school fight gets that far when the problems are handled from the begginin the way they should be. i don't know what way it is, i'm not from the school staff, but if the school don't know either then how is that school safe and "hate free" like the papers posted all over the school says??? and for msr. or mr. chris mulligan, the stabber got sliced too, if ya didn't know that, now u do. just becuz he wasn't taken to the hospital in a rush doesn't mean that he was alright.
I don't know how the school handled the problem, to be honest; I'm trying to talk to administration, and the MCPS media department told me they had nothing to say to me. If you want to post stuff with the comments form, go ahead; unless it specifically mentions names or is a string of expletives or something, we'll post it. You'll notice that I have posted everything you said before, unedited, even though I theoretically have the power to reject and/or edit all comments.
As Jeanne said, if you have any suggestions or more information, we'd appreciate it if you came to talk to us or submitted another comment (just say "Don't Post This" at the top or something).
student, like I said to anonimo, nobody on staff knows anybody involved personally, so we can't say what effect the article has on people who do know the victims or suspects. The article is aimed towards the majority of our audience in this case, and if it bores you, don't read it.
Look here, anomino is starting to really piss me off. First you're knocking on Silver Chips, then you're knocking on Kevin. And one more thing: how can you say that SC should print why the victims got stabbed? Obviously you're one of those dudes' friends, and fine, you wanna defend your buddy. But writing in the article that they were stabbed because (fill in the blank) just to please a small majority is dishonest, and besides, it might not be everybody's truth.
And as for student...what do you mean SC has nothing good to say? Their job is to print the facts, and frankly the facts might not be what everyone wants to hear or express the opinion of everybody, but that's how it works. Jeez, everybody is gonna be biased about this and most of us are pissedscaredworried about all this and plus it gives our school a bad name...we don't need anyone sitting here trying to harass the newspaper cuz they're just trying to do their job. And I'm sure I'm gonna get a lot of B.S. because of what i just wrote but ya know what? I have freedom of speech just the way the rest of ya'll do. thanks for reading.
Is it really right to stab a human being just because they made verbal threats?
I will not call that action as defensive..it is not justified
however..Goodluck to the 4 who were involved
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Has a date been set for the trial? It is interesting to hear that the suspects received injuries as well, which was not disclosed to the public. Hopefully the matter can be resolved because such incidents fuel the stereotypes that loom over our school.
Everyone - Please don't knock SCO for providing us with all the information that they can get, if it weren't for ppl like Kevin Chang you wouldn't have all this information to criticize! And if you read the article carefully, there are no opinionated words, just facts as given to SCO.
There's something called libel, which is basically published defamation of someone. If I wrote an article saying that Kevin Chang is a terrorist, that would be libel, because it's not true and I have no proof, and I could get the publication in trouble for that - ie, lawsuits. Now, all these comments being posted are published on SCO, and thus SCO is responsible for their content. From what I've learned, if we print a libelous comment, we are republishing libel and thus are open to legal troubles.
SCO walks a fine line. Someone intimated earlier that it was controlled by the administration of the school, which is utterly untrue. Indeed, it has never been censored by the school. Instead, it must censor itself in printing only appropriate material.
All that being said, I'd like to congratulate SCO for how it has handled and continues to handle this situation. Keep up the good work.
AND IN DEFENSE OF SILVER CHIPS: When reporting news in any medium, it is illegal to release the names of minors unless they are being tried as an adult.
At least in criminal cases. i'd like to say good job to the reporters for Silver Chips and congradulations for a great year. Hope next year goes just as well for you all.
One of the victims is my boyfriend(the one that got stab several times is the back) and I thank GOD that both of them came out to be fine out of this whole mess. But to the people that say that they should not only think about the victims i think ya need to shut up because ya dont no how everythin happened and all the pain that the victims family felt that day. Im also postin that they are both doin fine.... and i also think that montgomery blair high school is the dumbest school in the county...because the way they are handling the situation is very stupid. But better for me....i dont have to attend that retarded school no more. Thats all i have to say.
AND THANX GOD I DON"T HAVE TO ATTEND YOUR DUMB RETARTED SCHOOL. I COULDN'T STAND IT ANYMORE. Shorty... I feel u when u say that.... "and i also think that montgomery blair high school is the dumbest school in the county..."
All doors are locked except for two main doors: one by the SAC and one by the office. All students entering the building must be wearing their ID cards and are subject to randomized searches to make sure that no one brings anything dangerous into the school building - alcohol, drugs, cigarettes, guns, knives, etc. Periodically, a complete locker sweep would be conducted by K-9 police units, and anyone found in possession of guns, explosives, or drugs would be facing criminal offenses in court. Anyone found in school without their I.D. card around their neck is to be suspended for a number of days they have previously been caught not wearing it: the suspension starts out at 1 day, then the next time is 2 days, then 3 days, etc.
All of the side doors of the building will be kept locked and will only open in the event of a fire emergency. Anyone entering or exiting the building using any doors other than those by the office and the SAC will face a long suspension and trespassing charges.
There, you happy now?!! If this plan were to be implemented, you couldn't possibly say that Blair wasn't preventing violence. Blair is just a school, and it cannot do anything about off-campus violence. That's where the police come in. Even in this afore-mentioned 1984 school scenario, it would easily be possible for a student to skip school altogether and go to a knife fight.
But, yeah, I guess the school could stop this too. Each morning a police team could be sent to every student's house and deliver them DIRECTLY from home to school. They would then take them home and guard the house until the next morning, to make sure the students don't go anywhere and get into some stupid fights.
The bottom line is, the school can only do so much. You can't expect it be able to solve ALL problems that may cause students. Just as you wouldn't expect the state government of Texas to solve the famine problems in China; it's simply not in their jurisdiction. In this example, China is MBHS, and the U.N., which could work on the famine situation, is the police.
And as to the varied comments that Blair is a dumb school - you couldn't be more wrong! Last year we were the NUMBER ONE HIGH SCHOOL in the nation for Intel semi-finalists! Far from being the worst school, I think it is the best school - the best public school anyone can attend for free. Anywhere.
And then for all the people bangin on Silver Chips, please don't hate. It's not worth it. They do the best to do their job without pissin a bunch of people off. If you wanna say your piece, go publish your two cents in your own newspaper, but Silver Chips has spent years developing itself as a premier student newspaper and as some damn good stuff to read while your teachers talk too much. (Silver Chips: Yall can edit out the word damn if you're not allowed to publish damn, though the Bible says damn a lot. I dunno. That's the editor's choice).
Lastly, for all the haters bashin on Blair... I realize things about it suck, and things about it are bomb. There's ups and downs to everything. However, when I was an iddy biddy freshman and I hated the school, I realized it's a lot better than other schools. For example, Blair is better than certain schools in Queens, NY which I was attending where stabbings occurred somewhat regularly and violence was much more prevalent than it is in Blair. You'd get jumped in middle school daily, coming home bleeding for being white. Same thing if you were black. Same thing if you were hispanic, asian, or from wherever. Blair lacks these circles of violence in which race related attacks occur regularly, sometimes ending in blood stains on basketball courts and young children in wheelchairs.
Back to the point, if anyone wants to say Blair sucks, go to Jamaica or Rockaway, NY get jumped and shot, then come back and then you might appreciate the programs, opportunities, courses, and all the support that Blair provides for its students. Though there are downsides to the system, Blair does its best to provide to the largest group of students in the county, second largest in the state. We don't go to a school with 50 people in a graduating class. Yall might not realize it, but we got it good.
I'm not too informed of this particular situation...maybe there were previous fights that the administration knew of...but then again, is administration supposed to keep track of every single altercation in the school? You'd need like an entire committee for that...
If they were outside of school legally, for a good reason, and they were just randomly stabbed, then I would feel sorry for them.
As it was, they were outside of school when they weren't supposed to be, and decided to get in a fight. While I'm not going to say, 'they were asking for it,' they certainly shouldn't be surprised.
If you play with fire, you get burned, that's just how it is.
Stabbing in a fistfight, however, is both really low and totally uncalled for. If the suspect proves to be guilty I can't help but hope for the maximum sentence.
PEACE