GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — The gun used to shoot a middle school student this Spring was reported stolen just a day beforehand.
Grand Rapids police officers discovered the 9mm handgun inside a trash can at Alger Park after 13-year-old Javeon Childrey was shot in the face on May 21. The gun's owner reported it stolen the morning before.
FOX 17 obtained the information through police reports we requested through the Freedom of Information Act.
The gunowner told police he'd left his gun inside his unlocked car on Dickenson Street SE near Lafayette Avenue the night of May 19. The next morning he could not find the gun inside and called police.
Just over 24 hours later, a bullet from the gun went into the teen's face.
Conflicting accounts
One other teen was with Javeon when he was shot. That 13-year-old told police the pair had found the gun behind some houses on Alger Street, taking it to the park's bathroom.
The teen claimed Javeon was "playing with [the gun] and it went off while in his hand." The unnamed student led investigators to the gun, partially buried in a trash can.
The teen's story, however, didn't match how others recalled the situation, including the victim himself.
Javeon, despite being shot in the face, spoke with police in the hospital that day, telling officers the other teen had been picking on a friend during gym class. Javeon claimed he stepped in to stop it and that's when the teen told him "catch him after school."
The two then reportedly left the school building and ended up in the park bathroom. The teen claimed he had a "pole," slang for a gun, according to the police report. Javeon said he doubted the statement until the teen pulled out the gun.
The next thing Javeon remembered was feeling like he was "hit in the face by a basketball." The police report states that was when he was shot in the right cheek, with the other teen pulling the trigger.
Immediate response
After the gun discharged, the teens ran from the bathroom to get help. Officers were able to track the teen's path through a trail of blood that led from the building through the park and ended at the school's east entrance.
A woman who first called 911 was in the parking lot on the other side of the school with her two young children. She told police a teen ran around the school, yelled that a student was shot and needed help.
The woman ran around the building, spotting Javeon bleeding outside the door. She called 911 at 12:09 p.m. Officers were dispatched a minute later.
The first officers on scene attended to Javeon. They wrote in their reports that the 13-year-old was "laying on the ground screaming" and "writing on the ground in pain."
The reports show the bullet hit Javeon in his right cheek and exited his head behind his right ear.
Reports from eight officers on the scene that day make up the bulk of the records obtained by FOX 17. 11 people were interviewed the day of the shooting, including both teens and the gun's owner.
Police also found the shell casing and a flattened bullet inside the bathroom.
Shooting aftermath
Classes at Alger Middle School were canceled for the rest of the week before students returned to class.
The 13-year-old student who was with Javeon at the time of the shooting has since been charged with careless discharge of a firearm causing injury and larceny of a firearm. Even if convicted the teen would not be sentenced to prison because of his age, according Kent County Prosecutor Chris Becker.
Javeon's mother told FOX 17 she wants accountability for Grand Rapids Public Schools policy that allowed her son and the other student to leave their building during class hours.
“Alger is something different. If I could talk all day, I could tell you about Alger. It’s not a place to send your kids. It’s not a safe environment at all,” Bianca Bridgeforth said during an interview a day after the shooting.
In the police reports, Bridgeforth is recorded as saying Javeon and the other teen had been spending more time together. She claimed the two had been getting in more trouble, including being kicked out of school.
An officer who spoke with the school's principal reported the boys left the building without permission at 10:35 a.m. that morning. The principal says the pair tried to come back in minutes later, but were stopped and told they need to wait to be searched. According to the police documents, the principal directed the teens to wait at a nearby gazebo.
That principal told officer he did not see the students again until after the shooting.
Alger Middle School added metal detectors at entrance doors and changed policy for what doors students could access following the shooting.
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