Gun parts found in student’s bag at Ocoee High School, police say

OCOEE, Fla. – Officers acting on a tip located parts of a handgun, among other contraband, in a 14-year-old student’s backpack at Ocoee High School on Thursday, according to police.

Other students remained in their classrooms while the investigation was conducted, starting around 8:30 a.m., as officers at the school heard that a student may have brought a gun to campus, the Ocoee Police Department said in a news release.

The student was located and their backpack was searched, the release states. Inside the bag, police said they found “the lower half of a handgun,” as well as an extended magazine and “other contraband.”

The location of the weapon’s other parts was unknown at the time of this report, police said, adding that no students were injured.

The student faces charges of carrying a concealed firearm inside an education institution and interrupting or disturbing a school function with a credible threat, according to the police department. News 6 is not naming or showing the student.

Orange County Public Schools in 2023 began a pilot program to decide whether to deploy metal detectors at district high schools, opting to conduct the trial at Wekiva, Boone, Horizon, Lake Nona, Evans, Timber Creek and Jones. By the end of the pilot, which was completed in the last school year, it was determined the program would not be implemented district-wide “due to the overall cost and the required number of staff to run the system on a daily basis,” a district spokesperson said in a statement.

Thursday’s incident in Ocoee is among the latest in a wave of reported threats, rumors and instances of weapons on the campuses of Central Florida public schools.

Volusia County Sheriff Mike Chitwood on Wednesday announced the arrests of two more students accused of making “joke” threats. He implored parents to talk with their kids “and help them understand these ‘jokes’ are just about the dumbest way to find yourself locked up with a felony.”

Thursday in Polk County, Sheriff Grady Judd stood alongside Polk County Public Schools Superintendent Frederick Heid and others to address social media threats.

“We’re serious about keeping kids safe and creating a safe environment so when kids go to school, we’re not going to have an environment like Fort Knox where they’re not safe, they feel like they’re locked up,” Judd said. “We’re going to have a safe, warm, fun learning environment, but we’re going to be dead serious about anyone who threatens to shoot or kill another person.”

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