Board of Education member wants Tasers out of schools

One alternative may be to replace sheriff’s deputies with Maryland State Police troopers, who do not carry Tasers.

At the least, Boffman wants to see the community opinion on the issue through a survey or a public forum. ‘‘I don’t want to replace the officers that we have in the school buildings because I think they do a good job,” Boffman said. ‘‘I just want to get the Tasers out ... until we get more answers.”

The school resource officer program in Frederick County Public Schools assigns sheriff’s deputies to each school feeder in the county. It provides schools with 11 sheriff’s deputies. Ten of them are stationed each county high school, and one is at the Heather Ridge School.

Concerns around the use of Tasers on school grounds have been raised since the death of 20-year-old Jarrel Gray, who died a couple of hours after being a shot with a Taser on Nov. 18.

Ten days before that, a deputy used Taser on an 18-year-old student at Tuscarora High School, the first time a Taser was used on school grounds since deputies assigned to schools were equipped with them in the spring.

Although the State Police do not typically partner with school systems, troopers are assigned to schools in Calvert County.

‘‘[Partnering with schools] is not something that we normally lean toward as State Police officers,” said Greg Shipley, a State Police spokesman. ‘‘But if a request was made, it would certainly be reviewed.”

Maryland Sate Police use Tasers more rarely than Frederick County Sheriff’s Office.

Except for one 18-member special unit, state troopers do not carry Tasers. For the 18 years State Police have used Tasers, troopers have deployed them 20 times across the state, Shipley said.

‘‘[Tasers are] something that the department has felt needed to be carried only by people trained in special weapons and tactics,” Shipley said.

Calvert County Public Schools is the only one in the state to partner with State Police to secure its schools, said Sgt. Larry Titus of the Maryland State Police. who serves as the Calvert County Schools police liaison.

The system does not have armed police officers in any of its 24 schools.

Titus and another officer are assigned to monitor the school system, but they are not based in the schools. They are the only officers who are on-call to handle incidents and arrests on school grounds. While both officers carry guns, neither of them carries a Taser or pepper spray, Titus said.

While this may be a far-fetched solution for Frederick County, the option may deserve some consideration, Boffman said.

Ideally, Boffman hopes to find a way to reach an agreement with the Frederick County Sheriff’s Office. He said he plans to talk about Tasers at the next joint meeting between the Board of Education and Board of County Commissioners.

‘‘We have a mission to provide a safe and inviting environment,” he said. ‘‘Now, we have a lot of young people who are fearful.”

Boffman wants to limit the use of Tasers to situations in which suspects have produced weapons. Neither Gray nor the Tuscarora student displayed a weapon before a deputy used a Taser.

But Jenkins, who met with the Board of Education on Nov. 28, said his deputies cannot be limited by such regulations. ‘‘You use the least amount of force necessary to control a situation,” Jenkins told the board. ‘‘I am confident that that is what we do out there.”

Katie Groth, school board president, said the board will continue discussion on the use of Tasers. Groth said she would not mind exploring alternatives in future discussions, and wants to look further into the way Tasers are used in other school systems.