ROTC students accused of plotting attack

SPANAWAY, Wash. – Three Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps students were being held in what may have been a long-range plot for an attack on their high school, Pierce County sheriff’s deputies said.

The arrests were made Monday after a parent of one of the three called Spanaway Lake High School to express concern about a group of students.

Interviews conducted by school administrators and sheriff’s deputies indicated the students had discussed an attack, Bethel School District spokesman Mark Wenzel said Tuesday.

“Whenever someone makes a threat against our school community, we move quickly to address it,” Wenzel said.

No weapons or explosives were found, but investigators were concerned because the 18-year-old male, 18-year-old female and 16-year-old male are in the Junior ROTC program at the school near Tacoma and Fort Lewis, one of the largest Army bases on the West Coast.

“They were out recruiting to try to get help,” sheriff’s Detective Ed Troyer said. “They did have some hand-drawn floor plans of the school, some notebooks and some documentation of what they were going to do.”

As many as nine others, including some middle school students, may have been involved in an anti-government group known as “Final Resistance” but were unaware of the school takeover plan, Troyer said.

Bail was set at $100,000 for the two seniors, who were being held in the county jail. The sophomore was held without bail at Remann Hall, a juvenile lockup.

The three were scheduled for arraignment Thursday on charges that could include conspiracy to commit assault, kidnapping or malicious mischief.

Their full intent remained under investigation, and the attack apparently was to be made only after they had two more years of military training, deputy prosecutor Phil Sorensen said.

“I suppose it could be anything from kids chatter to ‘Tomorrow we get on the bus and we do some damage,’ ” Sorensen said.

Troyer said one had been picked on, another wanted revenge for another reason and the third wanted to show the government was unable to stop a terrorist attack.

“They could make a point, by taking over this building, that nobody’s safe: `See, if we can do it anybody can do it,’ ” Sorensen said after the teens appeared in court Tuesday.

The mother of the 16-year-old, who asked that her name be withheld, said authorities overreacted, adding that her son is an A and B student who has never been in trouble.

“I don’t think the intent was anything more than a war game,” she said.