Life goes on for Enfield pupils Parents, children allowed to air concerns in wake of gun incident Body Spec: Body Text; colw: 12p2; depth:13.81 (in.)

ENFIELD – Teachers and staff at Enfield Station Elementary School planned to return to a normal routine today while police wrap up their on-site investigation into the accidental discharge of a handgun that led to the arrest of a fifth-grader.

No one was injured in the incident Wednesday.

The 11-year-old boy remains at the Northern Maine Juvenile Correctional Facility in Charleston after a Friday detention hearing in 3rd District Court in Bangor. Court officials could have released him to his parents and ordered him kept under house arrest.

He has been charged with reckless conduct with a firearm, a Class C felony, and could face additional charges, according to police. The maximum penalty would be incarceration in a juvenile facility until he turns 21.

The boy broke into a locked gun cabinet at home and took the gun to school, which houses pupils in kindergarten through grade eight, according to Chief Deputy Glenn Ross of the Penobscot County Sheriff’s Department. The .380-caliber semiautomatic handgun accidentally went off when the fifth-grader went upstairs to the boys’ restroom sometime Wednesday morning.

The bullet struck the concrete floor and disintegrated, Ross said. He said there was only one bullet in the weapon.

Friday night, parents got answers to some questions at a community meeting held even though school was canceled that morning because of bad weather.

Investigators told the more than 200 people gathered in the gymnasium that they could not discuss details of the case because it has been turned over to the Penobscot County District Attorney’s Office.

Ross told the group that investigators’ initial belief that the boy brought the gun to school for protection against an older student who was bullying him was being reconsidered.

He refused further comment on what might have been the boy’s motive. Parents expressed concern about the boy having ridden a bus to school while he most likely had the loaded gun with him.

While Krass also refused to discuss details of the incident, she answered a fifth-grader’s question during the meeting. Krass confirmed that a student did leave the building and hide in the woods behind the school for a short period of time on Wednesday afternoon. She would not say why the student left the school.

Parents also told Krass that too much time elapsed between the time the student reported there was a hole in the restroom floor and when the gun was found.

Principal Laura Cook said 35 minutes elapsed between the time the bullet hole was reported and the time the gun was found.

Krass said another community forum would be scheduled before the end of the year.