A Michigan mother is fighting to get her 11-year-old son back in school after he was expelled for disassembling a loaded pistol that one of his classmates brought to the school.
Dwight Rich School of the Arts in Lansing expelled Sakir Everett back in May because of the incident. Savitra McClurkin told NBC News, “I’m upset with everybody.”
The incident unfolded after an unidentified student allegedly brought a loaded gun to the middle school. McClurkin said the student pulled out the gun in a bathroom and "gave my son a firearm."
"Like here, take this, hold on to this," she said.
Sakir, who knows how to hunt and learned about gun safety from his godfather, knew the weapon was not allowed in school.
"Sakir's natural reaction was, there's no way I'm going to hold on to this gun all day," his mother said. "He proceeded to go to class ... and dismantled it in class. There was a teacher in class and everything. People were around and everything."
After taking the gun apart, McClurkin said her son "put it inside of a heater" in the classroom and threw the bullets in a garbage can.
"He didn't want it on his person, but he didn't want nobody to mess with it," she said about why her son dismantled the firearm.
“He didn’t want to implicate himself in it, nor did he want to tell on the person who actually brought the firearm, because he knows firearms aren’t supposed to be in school,” McClurkin told WILX News. She said her son was scared and believed he was protecting the safety of other students.
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Michigan mother Savitra McClurkin is speaking out after her son, Sakir Everett, was expelled from Dwight Rich School of the Arts for disassembling a gun one of his classmates brought to school.
The classmate asked Everett to hold on to the… pic.twitter.com/ATYv0r0Upk
The district released a statement claiming “the full account of the incident has not been reported,” but said it could not give more details because of privacy laws.
Meanwhile, McClurkin is still fighting to provide her son with an education. “He’s 11-years-old. Seventh grade. Never been in trouble before,” she told the school board during a recent meeting.
Sakir is an A and B student who has played sports since he was six years old. He has no prior disciplinary issues. She has been homeschooling him since his expulsion, which has led to a financial strain because she had to reduce her work hours.
The details of this story raise a few questions. For starters, how was he able to dismantle a pistol in a classroom with students around him? The teacher was also present in the room — did she see him dismantle the firearm?
If the details are as reported, I see little reason for Sakir to have been punished. If the teacher didn’t see the gun, he should have informed them. But it is clear that he had no nefarious intent. If anything, he could have possibly saved lives by making sure the firearm was not dangerous. It’s yet another reason why teaching kids gun safety is so important.
The school indicated it will reconsider his reinstatement after the end of the school year. I’m hoping this kid gets another chance.