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''Man with two firearms in school'' turns out to be teenager with pellet gun PDF Print E-mail
Written by Jeff Garvas   
Sunday, 05 June 2005

According to a report in the Toledo Blade, an incident the Ohio Coalition Against Gun Violence's Toby Hoover prematurely flaunted in a press release last week, entitled "OHIO'S KIDS AT RISK OF BEING SHOT", has turned out much differently than Hoover's initial press release would have had you believe.

The press release shouted:
    "On Wednesday, Riverside Elementary school in Toledo went in to lock down after witnesses saw a man entering the building with at least two firearms. Fast action by Toledo police and the school personnel kept the children safe this time. Parents gathered outside the school panicked about their children's safety.

    Everyone was concerned about the schools and the police doing their jobs, but they did them well. It's the rest of us who have to take the responsibility for the guns in our society that enable this kind of event..."
But the fact is, as she has done on other occasions, Hoover issued her press release after the first headline, and before all the facts of the case were known.

As it turns out, this incident was nothing to have been panicked about. While Hoover's press release eagerly recounted initial news reports of "a man entering the building with at least two firearms," the facts of the case, however, have now been determined to be much different than the reports Hoover tried to exploit. From the Toledo Blade:
    A 15-year-old boy was arrested yesterday for the May 25 incident that caused a lockdown at Riverside Elementary School, Chicago and Chase streets, police said.

    Police recovered the pellet gun the boy was carrying.