Court docs: Everett student flipped coin to choose school for thwarted shooting



Q13 News photo



EVERETT, Wash. -- Police arrested an 18-year-old Everett man they believe was planning to shoot people at his high school.

Officers arrested the man on attempted murder charges at ACES High School after being contacted Tuesday morning by his grandmother, who showed them a journal where he allegedly drew up plans to shoot students and use homemade explosives at the school.

Detectives serving a search warrant at the grandmother's house seized items including the student's journal, a rifle, and inert grenades.

An official with the Mukilteo School District says the grandmother set a perfect example.

"The best defense against this kind of thing, the school shooting is, that if you hear something or see something is tell authorities. And that’s exactly what she did," said Andy Muntz. "I know it had to have been really hard for her to do that, to turn in her grandson like that. But she quite honestly probably saved a lot of lives including her grandson."



Court documents obtained by Q13 News reveal alleged details of the suspect's plan, including how he chose which school he planned to attack.

According to probable cause documents:

The teen's grandmother called 911 at 9:25 a.m. on Tuesday to report that she found her grandson's journal, which detailed plans to carry out a shooting at ACES High School. She then found a guitar case with a semiautomatic rifle inside, which she did not know he had. She believed her grandson was close to carrying out the plans detailed in his journal.

The 18-year-old's journal indicated that he flipped a coin to decide which high school he would target. He then wrote that ACES "won" the toss and would become the target.

"I'm preparing myself for the school shooting. I can't wait. My aim has gotten much more accurate... I can't wait to walk into that class and blow all those f****** away," an entry in the journal read.

The teen's grandmother said he recently bought inert grenades and wrote in his journal about plans to make them "live." There was also an entry about making pressure cooker bombs and details about where and in what order he planned to place explosives.

The grandmother told police what she knew and allowed officers to search his room, where they spotted two grenades.

At the same time, the school was notified of the potential threat and an officer pulled the suspect from class, handcuffed and detained him.

The officer took the suspect to the Everett police south precinct. At some point, the suspect was able to get one of his hands out of the cuffs. He spun away from the officer and ran across the parking lot before falling down in some bark. The 18-year-old then "mule kicked" the officer before he was placed back in both cuffs.

Police booked the suspect into jail for investigation of first-degree attempted murder for "planning and taking substantial steps toward executing a school shooting/bombing of ACES High School."

The suspect appeared in court Wednesday afternoon. He has not been identified because he has not yet been formally charged.