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Farmington • Criminal charges have been filed against a 15-year-old Bountiful boy who is accused of taking a shotgun to school and firing into the ceiling before his own parents wrestled him to the floor.
The teen was charged Thursday in 2nd District Juvenile Court with two counts of second-degree-felony theft, one count of third-degree-felony discharge of a firearm, as well as two counts of class A misdemeanor possession of a firearm on school premises.
The shaggy-haired boy appeared in court alongside his father via a video feed for a short detention hearing Thursday morning. At that hearing, Deputy Davis County Attorney Ryan Perkins told Judge Mark Andrus that prosecutors want the boy to stand trial in adult court.
The teen's defense attorney, Lindsay Jarvis, asked for a psychological evaluation. The boy is expected to be in court again on Thursday.
On Dec. 1, the boy took two firearms — a 12-gauge shotgun and a 9 mm handgun — from his home without his parent's permission. He then took the guns inside Mueller Park Junior High School, according to charging documents.
After firing a shotgun blast inside a classroom, the boy was apprehended by his parents. Bountiful Police Chief Tom Ross has said the boy's parents went to the school looking for their son after they noticed the missing guns.
They were inside the school when they heard the gunshot, according to police. The parents then went to the south wing of the school where the shot was fired, and disarmed and detained the teen, Ross said.
Bountiful police Lt. Dave Edwards has said that after the parents took away their son's weapons, the boy was arrested by a Bountiful police officer who happened to be nearby when he heard a 911 call about an "active shooter" and arrived within two minutes.
Ross said 26 students and a teacher were in the classroom.
Without saying anything, the teen "racked a round [into the shotgun] and fired into the ceiling," Ross said.
The boy then pointed the gun toward his neck, the chief said.
The teacher and a student tried to verbally engage the boy to prevent him from harming himself, Ross said, an effort that allowed the boy's parents to arrive in time to disarm him.
Ross has thanked the boy's parents for being involved in his life to the extent that they noticed he was exhibiting peculiar behavior. Without the parents' arrival at the school, Ross said he was confident the episode would have had a different, worse outcome.
The teen has been in the Farmington Bay Youth Center, and will remain there at least until his next hearing.
Court officials said the teen has no previous juvenile court history.
The Tribune generally does not identify juveniles charged with crimes unless they are certified as adults.