Teacher accused of firing gun in Dalton High School may be mentally ill

(CitizensOutpost) More information has come out since the initial report of a teacher who barricaded himself inside his classroom and fired a gun.

Dalton Police say social studies teacher Jesse Randal Davidson is responsible for firing a shot out a classroom window with a .38 caliber revolver which he smuggled in with his computer bag. At the end of a 2 hour planning period, at about 11:40 AM, students couldn't get into his classroom because they had been locked out.

Via the Times Free Press:

Principal Steve Bartoo came to the room and turned his key. But as he tried to open it, he said, Davidson slammed the door shut and yelled. He then allegedly fired his shot out of the building, not toward anyone. With students tucked away inside their classrooms, officers negotiated with Davidson for about half an hour before he turned himself in.

Dalton police charged Davidson, 53, with aggravated assault, carrying a weapon on school grounds, terroristic threats, reckless conduct, possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime, and disrupting a public school.

Students were evacuated and no one was injured. Police praised school officials for their proper response to the situation.

"I can't tell you enough about how absolutely proud I am of our staff and our students," Bartoo said at a news conference Wednesday afternoon.

Soon after Davidson was put into custody, Sara Imam, one of the Florida school shooting survivors, reached out to one of the Times Free Press reporters:

"To learn that a teacher you know and trust has opened fire in your school must be devastating, traumatizing and scary really," she said in a message to a Times Free Press reporter.

"Any threat underscores a need for change. It doesn't matter whether those kids were hurt or not; their lives have henceforth forever been changed. They're never going to forget the sound of that gun. They'll never forget the sirens blaring; or the darkness and unknowingness of a lockdown."

"But we see now that arming our teachers or having more guns on campus won't stop a threat — it may even be the problem, as it was today," she said. "It's time for America to change. It's time for us to realize that our children's lives are at stake. Because today could have been much worse. We're lucky it wasn't — but we can no longer take any chances."

It seems coincidental that this event takes place not long after President Trump has been talking about preparing policies that would arm school teachers:

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/966650397002813440

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/966653833047887874

A more in depth look at who Davidson is reveals a recent troubling pattern of behavior that is becoming a common, underlying thread within incidents of guns at schools: mental health disturbances.

Davidson began teaching at Dalton High School in 2004 and appeared to have a solid, clean record up until 2016 when some changes in behavior have been clearly documented.

In recent years, however, Davidson seemed to struggle with mental health issues. In March 2016, according to an incident report, he told the Dalton police that he accidentally arranged to have a woman killed. He said he had an affair with his son's girlfriend, and she had become pregnant with twins.

He said the woman seemed to be an abusive mother. He complained to his friends about her, and they promised to "take care" of her. He believed they killed her. But investigators could not find any evidence this woman existed. According to the report, Davidson said he took several medications for depression and had just gotten out of the hospital.

"We never found any reason to believe she existed or that any of it ever happened," Dalton Police Department spokesman Bruce Frazier told the Times Free Press on Wednesday night.

The 2016 police report can be viewed [here].

There was also another incident in 2017 where Davidson had an aparant psychotic episode.

Via Time.com:

Police said in another report last year that officers found Davidson during a school day sitting on the curb of a street, conscious but unresponsive and being held up by two school staff members. He was again taken to a hospital.

The 2017 police report can be viewed [here].

Political pressure from the gun control debate aside, when will the mainstream media focus more on what is more seemingly the root cause of a lot of the gun related aggression seen lately? Namely, mental health. This teacher should have been more closely monitored since these reported incidents.

Sources:

• Teacher accused of firing gun in Dalton High School may be mentally ill [photos, videos, documents]
• Teacher Fired Gun in Classroom and Barricaded Himself at Georgia High School, Police Say

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Posted from my blog with SteemPress : https://citizensoutpost.com/2018/03/01/teacher-accused-of-firing-gun-in-dalton-high-school-may-be-mentally-ill/

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