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Expelled Student Held In Gun Threat To Pastor

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The Associated Press

Published: September 24, 2008

REGINA, Saskatchewan - An expelled 16-year-old student entered a Christian high school during a chapel service Tuesday and put a pellet gun to the pastor's head before he was tackled by the principal and arrested, officials said.

Principal Mark Anderson said he kept talking with the youth, who was forcing the pastor to read a letter.

Anderson said he got close enough to see that the weapon was not a firearm, then grappled with the teen and held him until police arrived and arrested him. Police said they recovered a pellet pistol.

Alex McNair, a student at the Luther College high school, said the gunman forced the pastor to read a letter about his expulsion.
McNair said the letter was about how the gunman had been bullied.

"He seemed completely unstable," McNair said in a message to The Associated Press via the Internet social networking site Facebook.

Almost all of the school's 400 staff and students were in the chapel; teachers opened the doors, and students tried to leave quietly, McNair said.

Another student, Derek DeBolt, told Canadian Broadcasting Corp. television that the suspect put what looked like a fake gun in the pastor's face.

He said a faculty member and police later tackled the suspect.

"I was just stunned. All the people were just stunned," DeBolt said

Police said there were no reports of any injuries to staff, students or the suspect.

The arrest came on the same day as a deadly school shooting in Finland.

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