Violence Prompts Call for Increased Security at Inglewood Schools

Inglewood residents called on school board members during an emotionally charged meeting Wednesday night to beef up campus security to insulate students and employees from street violence.

The outcry was prompted by the deaths of three high school students in two off-campus shooting incidents earlier this month and a previously undisclosed holdup of cafeteria workers on a junior high school campus last week.

Board members agreed to revive an anti-gang task force made up of community members and to participate in a march Saturday morning protesting the recent incidents of violence.

Board members said budget constraints make the hiring of more security officers difficult, but parents and employees insisted that something must be done.

“We need more security,” said Leah Stephens, president of the PTA at Inglewood High School. “How would you feel if you had to fight gang members to get to your office? How would you feel if when you left at 5:30 in the evening, you had to fight gang members up and down the street? This is what our children have to deal with on a daily basis.”

School employees described an incident in which a masked man armed with a shotgun held up 15 Monroe cafeteria workers shortly before 6:30 a.m. Oct. 16. The man pointed his gun at the women, who were preparing meals for the day, and demanded their purses.

Cafeteria manager Susie Martin said she distracted the gunman, allowing the other workers to run to the back of the kitchen. As the workers fled, the man fired a shot into the ceiling, then ran out of the cafeteria without taking any valuables. There were no injuries.

“I don’t feel safe,” Martin told the board. “ . . . I’m not here for sympathy. I’m here for security.”

Johnnie Thomas, the district’s security chief, said school police officers patrolled the Monroe campus on the morning of the holdup as they usually do. The gunman arrived on campus after an officer had made his early-morning check of the school.

Thomas said that his department is understaffed but that the answer to the gang problem must begin in Inglewood’s homes.

“The biggest problem is getting someone at home who cares,” he said. “If the parents don’t teach them, the streets will teach them.”

Thomas said parents must prevent their children from adopting the skewed value system of the street.

“When a kid goes to juvenile hall, he comes back to the ‘hood beefed up from pumping iron, and his friends respect him even more,” Thomas said.

Deputy Inglewood Police Chief James Butts told board members that the upswing in gang violence is a countywide phenomenon and that officers are working to bring it under control.

Board President Lois Hill-Hale invited the community to a meeting at 9 a.m. today to revive a communitywide anti-gang task force that was first formed in 1987. A march planned for 8 a.m. Saturday to commemorate Red Ribbon Week, a national anti-drug program, will also protest street violence, Hill-Hale said. Both events will take place at the district’s headquarters at 401 S. Inglewood Ave.

Hill-Hale said the school officials ought to work more closely with the city and its Police Department to provide alternatives to gangs.

In an interview Thursday, Mayor Edward Vincent said he would revive an intergovernmental relations committee of city and school officials to work out problems jointly. Vincent, who is facing four challengers in his reelection attempt, said that after next month’s election, he plans a major offensive against gangs.

“We’re going to take care of the gang situation,” he said. “You can quote me on that.”

Eleanor Owen, an English teacher at Inglewood High, was skeptical that the board went far enough in addressing the problem.

“I don’t think a candlelight vigil or memorial service is going to cut it,” she told the board.

“Every day, I tell students, gang members who are in my classes, to pull up their pants, remove their belts and take out their shoelaces,” Owen said in an interview later, referring to gang attire. “You ask the class how many have been affected by gang violence and everyone raises their hands.”