Boy shoots himself in 8th-grade classroom
Tragedy rocks small community of Joyce near Port Angeles
By KERY MURAKAMI AND LEWIS KAMB
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTERS
JOYCE -- The owner of the Joyce Cafe watched the boy ride by on his bike yesterday morning -- just like any other day.
The boy waved to his grandfather, who was having a cup of coffee at the cafe outside Port Angeles. His grandfather waved back. Cafe owner Alex Stevens couldn't remember if the boy was carrying a backpack or a guitar case.
A parent accompanies shocked students from Crescent Elementary in Joyce after a 13-year-old boy shot and killed himself in front of about 20 classmates. (Keith Thorpe / Peninsula Daily News)
Shortly after 10 a.m., according to Clallam County Sheriff Joe Martin and Crescent Schools Superintendent Rich Wilson, the 13-year-old boy pulled a short .22-caliber rifle out of a guitar case in a portable classroom at Crescent Elementary School.
Without saying anything, and in front of about 20 other eighth-graders, the boy put the rifle to his chest and fired, killing himself.
The boy was in the rear corner of the classroom, not drawing attention to himself, at the end of social studies and languages period.
"He just quietly did it," Wilson said.
Many in the class didn't know what happened, Wilson said. The teacher, hearing the shot, ordered everybody out. Only later did everyone realize that the boy who was always telling jokes and doing stunts on his BMX bicycle wasn't there.
The boy's name was being withheld until all his relatives could be notified. But as Stevens describes it, Joyce is essentially two restaurants, a general store, two schools and a post office off scenic state Route 112, 16 miles west of Port Angeles.
"It's not even a town, it's a spot on a map," Stevens said. "Everybody knows everybody else."
No one could imagine what demons could have been driving the boy.
The boy's father is a log truck driver. The boy's mother works in the post office. The boy's older brother also goes to the school, and the two of them had ridden by yesterday morning.
"Just like any other day," Stevens said. "Mom's home by the time the kids get home from school. They're all just nice, well-respected people, who spent time with their kids. They had motor bikes. They were not wanting for anything. Their grandfather and their great grandfather live here in the community."
Rebecca Baillargeon found an ambulance and paramedics at the school when she stopped to drop off something for her son. At first, she thought somebody had tripped and fell or there had been a fight.
"But not something like this," Baillargeon said.
Her son is also in the eighth grade, but wasn't in the same classroom as the boy with the rifle.
"Thank God," she said, but "he heard the gunshot."
Although she didn't know the boy, Baillargeon said her son told her he "was a popular, well-liked, nice kid. They've been over to his house."
Baillargeon and her son were on their way to see a grief counselor, who was at the school.
Wilson, the superintendent, said the boy didn't show outward signs of trouble.
"He's not someone you'd say was having trouble with life," Wilson said, shaking his head and pushing up his glasses, as if deep in thought, as he spoke.
The boy played basketball, rode his skateboard, and Wilson would see him outside his office window doing tricks. He was always joking, talking, smiling, and would say hello when he passed.
"He clearly didn't fit into any of the niches to suggest he would harm himself, that he would kill himself," Wilson said.
Sheriff Martin said the school automatically locked down the wide-open grassy campus -- which holds the 120-student Crescent Elementary and 110-student Crescent Junior-Senior High School.
Sheriff's deputies did a sweep of the school but found no one else with guns. The school stayed open, but many parents picked up their kids.
A group went to the Joyce Cafe.
"There were two or three parents and a few kids at one table." Stevens said. "There was another table with three kids and five parents. Mostly they sat and talked about it."
Jeff Baillargeon, Rebecca's husband and a Crescent School Board member, was baffled how the boy could have been that troubled without anyone noticing.
"As a parent and a board member, I've heard next to nothing about bullying or kids picking on each other," he said.
He said the Crescent school is just a "little country school."
"My son shares some of the same teachers and I'm here to tell you, they are the most concerned group of people," he said. "They will send weekly e-mails home to let you know what's going on or (to say) they noticed something that didn't seem quite right."
Jeff Baillargeon said he broke down when he heard of the suicide.
"Education isn't just giving kids textbooks. It's building people with integrity and good citizens," he said.
"To see this happen, you can't help but see it as a reflection on yourself. My heart really tears for the boy. I just can't imagine someone feeling that kind of pressure and pain, at that age, to do this."
Parents, talk to your kids. Hug them too. Listen more.
Boy Commits Suicide in Front of His Classmates
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