Northside High School incident: 1 dead, 1 hospitalized after apparent stabbing

Four days into the new school year, a student was killed and another injured after an apparent stabbing at Northside High School on Thursday morning.

The Jacksonville Police Department received a call at 7:01 a.m. Thursday from a school resource officer requesting assistance due to a physical altercation between two students at Northside High School, Police Chief Michael Yaniero said at a news conference.

Two people were stabbed during the incident and taken to Naval Medical Center Camp Lejeune, Yaniero said.

One person died, while the condition of the second victim wasn't known as of Thursday afternoon. The Jacksonville Police Department is not releasing the names of the victims at this time because they are minors.

"The school resource officer who was on campus rapidly responded to the scene with the first SRO arriving within 20 seconds, and he was able to take somebody into custody," Yaniero said during the conference. "Staff on the scene provided medical care to the two victims until EMS arrived. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the family of this tragedy. This is an active and ongoing investigation."

The suspect in custody is a student, Yaniero said, and their name will also not be released because the student is a minor.

Yaniero said a teacher sustained a minor injury, but not from being stabbed.

Police discuss incident: Watch: Jacksonville police address Northside High School fatal stabbing

Northside students released, virtual class on Friday

Students were released from school and officials said the school would hold virtual classes on Friday but return to in-person classes Tuesday after the Labor Day holiday. All athletic practices and events for Thursday and Friday were postponed or canceled, Onslow County Schools Superintendent Barry Collins said.

Yaniero and Collins said they are in the process of identifying witnesses.

"On behalf of the school district, we send out our prayers and our thoughts to the victims in this case," Collins said at the conference. "I do want to say a special thank you to our staff who has done an outstanding job of being able to handle a situation like this."

Collins said the district's reporting system, Raptor, worked well in this case and everyone who needed to be notified was notified. Collins added that Northside Principal Brad Staley did an outstanding job of managing the situation as it unfolded.

The school was put on lockdown, as well as surrounding schools. However, lockdowns have been lifted, Collins said.

"I don't know, at this time, how it could have been done any better than the way it was handled, considering the circumstances," Collins said. "We had a couple of our own staff who were right there when that happened. One of those staff members was injured. We had two JPD SROs there."

Press conference addresses possible gang ties, response, juvenile code

As part of the investigation, Yaniero was asked at the news conference if the incident was gang-related. He said anytime there is an investigation of this nature, gang affiliation is always a possibility and they will continue to look into it.

Onslow County District Attorney Ernie Lee said the situation will be complicated due to the suspect being a juvenile and he is currently waiting to get all of the facts.

"As y'all are well aware, back on December 1, 2019, North Carolina changed the law, where 16 and 17-year-olds are treated as juveniles," Lee said. "There are going to be some exceptions to that. Just before I came over here, I was reading over the juvenile law again. So, we've got to make some decisions about that, in addition to certain things including contacting Juvenile Justice, which has been done, and we will be working with them in order to secure the appropriate charges.

"At that point, the DA's office will be following the juvenile code, and furthermore, if this case needs to be in Superior Court as an adult, we'll get it transported to Superior Court as an adult."

Collins said the district has put a lot of resources into the safety and security of students, including the addition of several SROs. However, there are some other things they will probably now have to look at, he added.

"We have a very close relationship with law enforcement in the county and the city and the outlying areas of all the cities out there," said Board of Education Chairman Bob Williams. "The Board of Education has done an excellent job in the last eight years I've been on the board trying to make sure that our security and safety of students and staff are up there."

Editor Trevor Dunnell can be reached by email at tdunnell@newbernsj.com. Reporter Morgan Starling can be reached by email at mstarling@gannett.com. Please consider supporting local journalism by signing up for a digital subscription. 

This article originally appeared on The Daily News: Northside High School deadly incident: Jacksonville police investigate