A Miramar high school student found himself behind bars after he was caught with a gun on school grounds, authorities confirmed. Eighteen-year-old Kyzaiah Connor was slapped with charges of possessing a firearm on school property when Miramar police discovered a 9MM handgun and fifteen live rounds at Henry D. Perry Education Center on Tuesday, as NBC Miami reported.
The school was promptly locked down following a tip about a potential weapon on the campus, leading to Connor's apprehension that involved officers finding the firearm stashed in his waistband, the teen himself reportedly acknowledged possession by telling officers, "I've got a pole," before his arrest and subsequent charging, according to the same report from NBC Miami. Facing a judge on Wednesday morning, the troubled youth's bond court hearing saw his parents desperately pleading for leniency, with Connor's father labeling the incident "a stupid mistake," and his mother, Nicola Davis despairingly wishing to "just get him home," as WSVN divulged.
Despite his family's shock over the allegations and their insistence on Connor's upstanding history devoid of legal skirmishes, the gravity of Connor's actions was met with a stern proposition from the Broward State Attorney's office, which pushed for a $20,000 bond. Conversely, Broward Circuit Judge Chris Brown weighed the first-time offense and set the bond at $5,000, adding a pretrial release, curfew, and GPS monitoring stipulations to Connor's confinement, "he just made a stupid mistake, and we just had to support him and try and get him home," Connor’s father told WSVN.
The argument against leniency came from Assistant State Attorney Eric Linder, who highlighted the potential for tragedy, "This is very serious, and it's not a mistake," adding that the country's painful familiarity with school shootings warranted decisive action, "and now we have a case here where a student was found with a gun at the school and, I guess, are the appropriate steps going to be taken to ensure that it doesn't happen again?" Linder put forth during the court session. Despite this, Connor was given the benefit of the doubt due to his clean record, although restrictions on his movements and prohibition from returning to the school are in place unless the district consents, as per WSVN's coverage of the court proceedings.
In the wake of the unsettling episode, Connor, as an adult, finds himself detained at Broward County Jail among the general population; at the time of the latest reports, he had yet to post bond. The arrest serves as a jarring reminder of the ongoing crisis of firearms surfacing on educational grounds, with this latest incident in Miramar casting a spotlight once more on the urgent dialogue surrounding school safety and the nation's vehement quest for answers and preventative measures.
