El Roble Elementary School went into lockdown for about an hour
after an unknown man showed up on campus and called out to a female
student, Friday afternoon.
El Roble Elementary School went into lockdown for about an hour after an unknown man showed up on campus and called out to a female student, Friday afternoon.
Police said the girl was returning to her classroom about 1:15 p.m., having just been at the main office, when a man standing a good distance away, right by the tetherball courts, said one word to her – “sweetie.”
The girl got scared, ran back to her classroom and told her teacher about the incident. The teacher informed school principal Leigh Schwartz and then unsuccessfully searched for the man, Schwartz said. Schwartz then called Gilroy police and put the campus on lockdown – in which students were required to be in an adult-supervised classroom with doors locked.
Police declined to release the age of the girl.
The suspect had fled by the time police arrived at the school, located near the intersection of Third Street and Miller Avenue in central Gilroy. Despite reports of the suspect heading east toward Brownell Middle School, police could not locate him. Officers and teachers then made a campus sweep and called off the lockdown about 2:15 p.m.
The suspect was described as a bald, heavy-set white male between 30 and 40 years old wearing a white shirt and dark shorts. He is between 5-foot, 5-inches and 5-foot, 8-inches and had no facial hair.
Two students saw the man while they were playing during recess earlier in the day. The man was in El Roble Park, which abuts the south side of the school, they said. However, the man did not call out to them or make any gestures.
Schwartz issued an automated message to all parents of El Roble students about 2:45 p.m., just after school ended. The message informed parents about what happened and advised them what children should do when approached by a stranger.
The incident marked the second time in eight days that an unauthorized man was on a school campus. About 8:20 a.m. Nov. 8, a male approached a third-grade boy and ran the back of his hand down the boy’s back in a slow and deliberate manner, sheriff deputies said. When the boy ran off to a classroom, the man left in a teal sedan.
Witnesses described the man as about 30 years old, 5-foot, 7-inches and 165 pounds, with medium-dark skin, brown eyes, short black hair and a mustache. He was still at-large as of Friday.
The incidents, while alarming, demonstrate that the safety education that the Gilroy Unified School District has provided is working, Superintendent Deborah Flores said.
“The students are doing exactly what we want them to do” – run away and tell teachers immediately about strangers – she said. As for adults, “the entire district is being more vigilant than ever, watching for strangers.”
Making changes to the school facilities to eliminate the threat of strangers on campus, such as putting up fencing around the now wide-open El Roble campus, is unfeasible, Flores said.
“If we had all the money in the world, of course we’d probably put up additional fences,” she said. “But given our limited resources, I think our staff is doing a good job.”
Nonetheless, administrators at El Roble are rethinking their approach to campus security. They have discussed increasing the number of campus supervisors – which peaks to six during lunch but drops to zero at some points during the day, Schwartz said. The school is open to any options that would make the campus safer for kids, he said.
“In light of what happened today, I’m sure we’ll be making changes,” he said.
