Highlands Ranch CO Aug 29 2019

The STEM School Highlands Ranch now say that they didn’t know security guard who shot a student was armed.

In fact, they now state that the security guard who accidentally wounded a student at STEM School Highlands Ranch in May was carrying a gun without the school’s approval on the day of the mass shooting.

Still, even if that was the case, it’s not clear if he broke any laws.

STEM School had contracted with Boss High Level Protection, a private security company, to provide an unarmed guard for its campus.

School officials weren’t aware that the security guard was carrying a weapon until after he responded to the shooting, spokesman Chris Arnold said.

The school’s contract with Boss didn’t specifically mention guns, either to permit or forbid them. It simply laid out that STEM would pay a rate of $26 per security guard for each hour of coverage from 7:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. weekdays, except school holidays.

However, in emails that were first obtained by The Colorado Sun, school Director Leanne Weyman stated that STEM wanted an unarmed guard. Boss representatives promised Weyman that they could supply the “same caliber” of security guard for a slightly reduced rate compared to the $30 the company usually charged for armed protection.

Grant Whitus, president of Boss High Level Protection, declined to answer questions about his company’s arrangement with the school, including whether the security guard was still employed by the company. In late July, STEM officials said they wouldn’t hire Boss again for the coming school year but asked for recommendations for another contractor.

“It’s still under investigation, so I can’t talk about it,” he said.

The guard responded when two students began firing on their classmates on the afternoon of May 7. Senior Kendrick Castillo was killed while attempting to restrain one of the shooters, and eight other students were wounded.

The security guard told investigators that he fired because he saw a muzzle come around the corner of the hallway. He shot two rounds, and one of those hit a female student in a classroom, according to a Douglas County Sheriff’s Office arrest affidavit for one of the shooting suspects.

The same security officer also confronted one of the two shooters and took him into custody.

The Fourth Judicial District Attorney’s Office in Colorado Springs was tasked with determining whether the security guard should face criminal charges in the shooting. The office has not announced its decision, and spokeswoman Lee Richards said Tuesday there was no timeline to do so.

Colorado law forbids most people from bringing concealed handguns into public K-12 schools, but school security guards are exempt while they are on duty and if they have a valid concealed carry permit. The law does not state that a security guard needs the permission of the school.

STEM School is a charter in the Douglas County School District, which does allow campuses to hire armed guards.

The district’s policy requires any armed officer to complete certification in Peace Officer Standards and Training and prohibits carrying a concealed weapon. It isn’t clear if the guard in question was POST certified, but he may have violated the rule against concealed firearms, since the school was unaware he had a weapon.

“Stars of Hope,” increased security when the STEM School students resumed classes 3 months after the shooting.

John McDonald, executive director of security at Jeffco Public Schools, said officers responding to a report of a shooting need to know if there are any armed people on scene. It can be an advantage to have armed staff if they are highly trained and know how to work with police to secure the scene, he said, but a bad situation could become even worse if police and a guard fired on each other because of a misunderstanding.

“There’s no way for anybody in uniform to know who a good guy or a bad guy is” when they see a person with a gun, he said.

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