NEWS & OPINION :: NOVEMBER 24, 2004

Security breach at Eastern High worse than disclosed

Schools officials ‘less than honest’ about beating incident, Lansing detective says

By TODD HEYWOOD

The breach of security at Eastern High School on Sept. 17, which resulted in the life-threatening beating of a student by a non-student, was worse than school officials disclosed.

A Sept. 21 letter to students and parents by Eastern Principal Pamela Diggs referred to only one person being involved in the assault, whom she called an “outside intruder.”

But school documents show that the intruder did not enter the school alone. The documents say he was accompanied by another non-student as well as an Eastern student. The student was suspended the day before the principal’s letter was dated. He was ultimately expelled because he “aided and abetted two non-students in entering Eastern for the purpose of assaulting an Eastern student.”

City Pulse obtained the documents under the state Freedom of Information Act.

The Lansing police detective investigating the case, James Gill, said that Diggs’ letter to parents and students was “not accurate to the facts we had at the time.

“The district has been less than honest on this incident all along,” Gill said.

The beating was one of two incidents at Eastern this fall that have called security at the school into question. An Eastern student has been arrested and charged with raping another student in the hallway while most students were outside waiting for buses.

Police have charged Jeremy Lee, 17, with assault in the beating that left the victim hospitalized in a coma. He has been arraigned and is awaiting trial in Ingham County Jail.

Police have called the incident a gay bashing. They said Lee and the victim, a 16-year-old male, knew each other when they both attended Walter French Academy the previous year and that the beating may have been retribution against the victim for having claimed to have had sex with Lee.

Gill says the victim remains hospitalized but is improving.

Lee told police he was at the school to pick up academic records and that he bumped into the victim by chance. The school district has said Lee had no records at Eastern and no reason to be there.

Police are continuing to look for the other non-student who accompanied Lee into the school.

The role of the expelled student in the incident is unclear.

An Eastern High document dated Sept. 20 says the student was suspended for nine days for violating the provision of the school district’s Code of Student Conduct governing intimidation, threats and stalking.

An Oct. 7 document says that the student was expelled for having “aided and abetted” the two non-students. The expulsion was for up to 180 days.

Another document said the expelled student “participated” in the assault.

However, Gill said, “He was too forthcoming and honest to have been hiding his participation in conspiring with the other two in the attack. I do not believe he knew that Jeremy Lee intended to attack the victim the way he did.”

Gill says the student’s expulsion by the district was not appropriate. The student never faced charges from the city. Gill said the expelled student is a witness against Lee and that he has received no deal for his testimony.

Mayes took exception to Gill’s defense of the student. “They (the expulsion committee) are enforcing our code of conduct. They felt there was enough evidence to proceed as they did, for what they needed to do. The school district stands by the expulsion.”

Asked about the information in the school documents and how it compared to the information in Diggs’ letter, school district spokesman Mark Mayes said, “We released what we felt was prudent to release.” He added that all questions were referred to the police. “There was still a police investigation going on at that time.”

However, the principal’s letter is dated the day after Lee’s arraignment, where police reported that a student and another non-student had been involved. The media did not cover the arraignment and have not reported the involvement of others in the incident.

Mayes said he does not “see a problem” with what the letter says and what had come to light at the arraignment about the more serious nature of the breach of security at Eastern.

He said the district never had a plan to follow up with a letter to inform the public that others were involved in the beating.

Mayes said the district reported to students and parents information it had been provided by the Lansing Police Department in conversations with Lt. Bruce Ferguson, the Lansing Police public information officer, and in a press release from the Police Department.

Ferguson, however, says there was no press release. He said reporters were told about the incident in person or by telephone.