Fight at Dalton High sends one to ER

Published 11:50 pm Thursday, January 24, 2008

A fight Wednesday at Dalton High School resulted in a student being taken to the hospital emergency room by ambulance. In his report, Officer Brandon Carter said one of the students involved in the fight is a current gang member and the other student was once a gang member.

“When I arrived, (a student) was laying on the ground vomiting blood, bleeding from the nose and having a seizure,” Carter wrote in his report. “I helped EMS as they loaded up (the student) and took him to the emergency room.”

Carter wrote that he was on patrol inside the school when he heard a yell from someone about 25 feet from him and ran to investigate. All the students were pointing to a student, Carter wrote in his report, so the student was detained in an office. Carter said the student told him the other student “had been picking on him all day” and had finally made a threat “about knowing where he lives and going to get him.”

Carter said he contacted Juvenile Court officers, who told him to cite and release the student. He cited the student with simple assault and simple battery and released him to his mother. Carter also contacted Detective Chris Johnson with the Conasauga Safe Streets Task Force, since both students had gang ties. Johnson did not immediately return a phone message left at his office Thursday evening, but Carter’s report said Johnson would further investigate the incident. Names of the juvenile students were not released.

“Two students lost their tempers in an incident yesterday, and charges were filed against the people involved,” DHS principal Debbie Freeman said Thursday. “They will go through (the school district’s) disciplinary process. We take these things seriously. We want a safe environment for all our kids.”