The Tampa Bay Times reveals that as Florida lawmakers get ready to vote Wednesday on whether to let some school employees carry guns, records show there have been at least 19 instances where workers have been disciplined for threatening students or colleagues, hurting kids or using firearms illegally.
Reporters, scouring through state records, found such examples as:
- In Miami Lakes, a guidance counselor said he would "shoot" the administrative staff, if he had a gun.
- In Fort Myers, a middle-school assistant principal yanked a school employee by the hair and hit her on the back of her head and then threatened an investigator looking into the matter.
- In Santa Rosa Beach, a high-school athletic director punched a football player in the throat twice during practice, leaving him in pain and gasping for breath.
- In Port Charlotte, a coach grabbed a 16-year-old by the arms and throat, lifted him off the floor, and repeatedly slammed him into a wall. When another student tried to intervene, the coach shoved him through a set of doors onto the floor.
State legislators are considering arming certain school employees following in the Valentine's Day massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in which 17 children and adults were shot dead.
But Florida state Rep. Larry Lee, who was once a school employee, told the Times: "These people are so stressed and we're gonna put a gun in their hand. It's going to have some unintentional consequences."
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