Cottonwood Heights » Classmates of a Brighton High School student who was critically injured Wednesday after falling through a skylight say climbing on school roofs is a form of teenage recreation.
"It's an adrenaline rush," said Jackson Brown, a junior at Brighton who says this summer he climbed on the roof of Brighton and Alta high schools with a group of seven or eight other teens.
On Tuesday, two 16-year-olds were cutting class from Brighton High School when they climbed to the roof of the vacant Cottonwood Heights Elementary School, according to police. One of the boys stepped on a skylight and landed headfirst in a kitchen prep area about 15 feet below, said Cottonwood Heights police spokesman Beau Babka. The teen, whose name has not been disclosed, suffered injuries to his head and upper body.
Babka on Wednesday said there is no indication the two boys had climbed that roof or other school roofs before. The principal at Brighton and a spokeswoman for the Canyons School District said they were unaware of previous cases of kids climbing onto roofs.
But Rey Bavi, another Brighton junior, said she climbed on the roofs of Albion Middle School and Hillcrest High School this summer.
"It's fun to go up there and see the whole city and the view and everything," she said. "We're not doing anything wrong. It's just something fun to do."
Cynthia Shaw, a sophomore at Brighton, said she also went on the Brighton and Alta roofs during the summer despite a fear of getting hurt or caught. "But everyone else was doing it, so I figured it was OK," Shaw said.
Brown said he reached the Brighton roof by finding narrow spots on facing walls where he could brace his feet in opposite directions then push up. Shaw and Bavi said they climbed part of the way but had some help from boys.
Once on the roof, Shaw said, the kids "just chill." She said no one was drinking or using drugs.
Shaw said she told her mother about the roof climbing a few weeks later when it came up during dinner conversation. Her parents "were disappointed in me and grounded me for a week," Shaw said.
Jennifer Toomer-Cook, a spokeswoman for the Canyons School District, said custodians at all district school buildings have been asked to identify access points to their respective roofs and report back to the district.
A risk management specialist for the district is reviewing Cottonwood Heights Elementary to determine if changes are needed there, Toomer-Cook said. The building is vacant but the district has maintained the alarms and still patrols the facility, she said.
"It's not an abandoned building by any stretch," Toomer-Cook said.
Brown said he won't climb any more roofs after what happened to his classmate. "It's not worth it," he said.
