Twelve students face suspension after a botched prank attempt at Escalante High School.
State Police Patrolman Daniel Martinez responded, the night of May 10, to a reported vandalism at the high school. Principal Gilbert Martinez called the officer about the incident, the police report states.
Gilbert Martinez allegedly found out about the incident from teacher Anna Atencio, who was present when it happened.
“Mr. Martinez stated he had received a phone call from Anna Atencio stating she was at the school and could hear kids,” Daniel Martinez wrote in his report. “Gilbert said he went to the school to check on things. There he caught some of the junior class trying to pull a prank.”
The students were allegedly trying to block all entrances and drench the school, Daniel Martinez wrote.
“Mr. Martinez said they had pushed all the tables into the commons area up against the doors and also had lots of Styrofoam cups, which they were going to fill up with water and place them all over the school,” Daniel Martinez wrote.
Once he caught them in the act, Gilbert Martinez demanded the students collect all the cups and put back all the tables in their proper places, the report states. He then contacted the students’ parents.
While doing so, Gilbert Martinez allegedly noticed the students had entered his office to counter the school’s security system.
“The kids had gone into his office and messed with the monitoring system,” Daniel Martinez wrote. “The cameras had been moved and also two dry eraser boards hanging on the walls had been erased.”
Daniel Martinez wrote a student informed the principal that the pranksters were going to return later that night to finish what they started.
The following morning, Gilbert Martinez told the officer three of the offending students returned. As planned, they pushed the tables against the doors and threw cups of water around the school.
When a Rio Grande SUN reporter visited the school May 13 to inquire about the incident, staff members said they weren’t aware of the incident.
Gilbert Martinez didn’t return requests for comment by May 22.
Chama Valley School Board member Tirzio Lopez said although school pranks have recently been a banal phenomenon in other schools, high school administrators took the prank seriously because of the damage it caused.
“I believe that when anybody violates policy in a school district, they should be held accountable,” Lopez said. “It’s the same thing as being caught for a speeding ticket. If they’re caught now, we can break the chain of delinquent behavior, which will make them better people in their adult life.”
Lopez said although the school does not yet have an estimated cost of damages, the prank resulted in “damage to security cameras and minor damage of furniture,” due to some desks being turned over. The students also allegedly took food from the school cafeteria for the prank, he said.
Lopez said the length of suspension ranged from three to seven days, but students were also allowed to instead be subject to a two- to five-day in-school suspension, which means they could go to school with a parent or a guardian by their side.
Prank participants were required to pay 7 percent of the total damage costs as soon as the exact price of damages is identified.
Lopez said to prevent a similar problem in the future, school administrators should restrict issuance of keys to school facilities. He said although it is unclear how, exactly, the students got in the building on a Sunday, he believes they somehow accessed a key.
“We need to have better control over access to the school after hours,” he said.