Youth Gives Up After Taking 40 Pupils Hostage

An armed high school sophomore held up to 40 schoolmates hostage for more than five hours Thursday, releasing some in exchange for candy and soda before growing dizzy and surrendering, officials said.

No one was injured during the ordeal at the combined South Forsyth high school and middle school in Forsyth County, about 40 miles north of Atlanta.

Most of the school’s 1,200 students were evacuated, and hundreds of worried parents flocked to the campus as word of the incident spread.

Forsyth County Sheriff Wesley Walraven said the youth, identified as 10th-grader Randy Addis, pulled a rifle in Don Hutchins’ civics class and fired it over the students’ heads.

Johnny Tallant, who was teaching in the next room, struggled with Addis and got the rifle away from him, but not before another shot was fired, the sheriff said. Addis then ran, Hutchins tackled him, and the youth pulled out a shotgun, he said.

The youth, armed with the shotgun and a pistol, ordered Hutchins’ students into Tallant’s classroom and held both classes--about 40 students--at gunpoint, Walraven said.

Most of the students were released gradually during the morning, including all of the girls but one, who chose to stay because she knew Addis, he said.

Some hostages were freed in exchange for candy and soda, said Joyce Shadburn, a spokeswoman for the county’s school superintendent. Addis demanded a school bus also, she said.

Walraven said the youth demanded the bus to take him to Savannah, and $3,000 in cash. But Addis began to get dizzy, and two of the hostages ran out, the sheriff said. Officers moved in to take his weapons, and he did not resist.

Seventh-grader Shawn Abercrombie, whose older brother was among the hostages, described Addis as “a quiet guy. He has problems and has seizures and takes pills for them.”

The youth had a seizure last week, Abercrombie said.