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Police use stun gun on Hayfield student
A faculty-student basketball game at Hayfield Secondary School in Alexandria turned violent Wednesday afternoon resulting in a Fairfax County policeman using his electronic stun gun to subdue a student who allegedly attacked the officer.
Second Lt. Dan Courtney, a spokesman with Fairfax County Police, told The Times that around 3:30 p.m. on March 12, several disturbances and scuffles broke out off the court during the game held inside the school gymnasium at 7630 Telegraph Road. The altercations involved several Hayfield students and at least one teenage noy not from the school.
According to Courtney, the police officer assigned to the school, often referred to as a school resource office (SRO), contacted Fairfax County Police for assistance in restoring order. After about 30 officers arrived at the scene, one 17-year-old male Hayfield student allegedly attacked one of the officers, who then used his conductive energy device (CED) on the student. A CED is often referred to as a taser or stun gun.
Neither the officer or student were injured, and no other injuries were reported, Courtney said.
One media report had an eyewitness countering the police account of the incident.
The student, Courtney said, was taken into custody, transported to the Juvenile Detention Center in Fairfax and charged with assaulting an officer and disorderly conduct. A second male teenager, not a Hayfield student, was charged with trespassing.
Blaming the incident on pre-spring break nerves, Hayfield principal Bill Oehrlein wrote, "Some altercations broke out, none of which resulted in student injury... One Hayfield student was tasered and arrested when he assaulted a police officer and resisted arrest... I have been talking with principals from many surrounding schools and, they too, are seeing a general decline in appropriate student behavior this week before spring break. Administrators will be meeting in the next few days to put in place additional strategies to maintain our school as a safe place to work and study."Times staff reporter James Cullum contributed to this report.
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