Superintendent Dr. Michell Reid of Fairfax County Public Schools and Chief Kevin Davis of the Fairfax County Police Department Source Facebook FCPD video
April 24, 10:01 a.m.
Chief Kevin Davis of the Fairfax County Police Department joined Superintendent Michelle Reid of Fairfax County Public Schools at a press conference early yesterday afternoon to address a stabbing that occurred at about 9:40 a.m. that morning inside West Potomac High School in Mount Vernon.
Three students got into a physical fight, police say, which resulted in a 16-year-old student stabbed and being transported to the hospital in a life-threatening condition. A 15-year-old student was taken into custody and charged with malicious wounding. Viral videos document dozens of students witnessing the sudden violent altercation that left the victim collapsed and bloodied on the hallway floor.
Worried parents rushed to the school after getting texts and videos from their teens who were still inside, only to find that officials wouldn't let students leave or be signed out.
“For the students who had to endure this today, it's tough. They're teenagers; they’re kids. They need their parents. They want to talk to their parents,” Davis said. “But their presence in such a traumatic scene like this is worthy of our attention.”
“The last thing we want as responsible adults, whether we're FCPS or FCPD, is to release emotional groups of students, and something retaliatory in nature happens down the street this way or down the street that way. So it's always a measured, calculated decision. … I'm sorry your children had to endure what they had to endure today,” Davis said.
The suspect and the victim were known to each other, police say, and the victim's condition has since been upgraded to stable. Police have recovered the knife and are interviewing a third person. The school implemented a modified lunch schedule and brought in counseling teams; classes remained in session.
Davis, Major Elizabeth Melendez and Brian Lambert of the Fairfax County Police Department and Reid provided an incident overview and initial response.
“The perpetrator is in custody. A third person, whom we are questioning, we are not describing him as a person in custody because, at the moment, we don't anticipate any criminal charges on this third person. He was close enough to the altercation that we want to interview him to figure out what he knows,” Davis said. He stressed that the department has a video of the altercation, just like others do. “But the video doesn't tell the entire story. So we're interviewing that third person.”
Reid said they have counseling support to work with the students and provide on-site services before they leave. ”To answer the gentleman's question to our decision around the tape put inside, it's also a crime scene. And so we also have to take direction from law enforcement in terms of the use of certain parts of the building.”
One parent told Reid that this incident has multiple victims, and his daughter is one because she witnessed it. “She's telling me, ‘Dad, get me out of here.’ [If] everything is safe, like you're saying, why can't I check my daughter out of school right now?”
Reid replied that their leadership team's paramount responsibility is to ensure our campus is safe. “At this moment, they're also making sure that our four lunch periods happen in a calm and orderly and safe manner. … As soon as the administrative staff is not focused on the current students in front of them, they're going to be able to have an orderly dismissal before school ends for parents that want to have their students, but they do need to take care of first things first.”
When asked about security measures, Reid said they are currently “in the middle of a pilot structure this spring.” “They were not in place at this school this morning, but they were at another school in Fairfax County."
The system Reid referenced is the Weapons Detection Pilot program.
“The weapons detection scanners are more sensitive than traditional metal detectors. The technology in the system can more accurately identify metal sources that may be potentially harmful rather than sounding an alarm for all types of metal, such as coins,” reports FCPS in online FAQs. “Beginning the week of April 21, 2025, the system will be deployed at least once a week by the Office of Safety and Security. The system will be deployed at a randomly selected high school during morning arrival. The system may be in place for one day or several days …. The safety screening technology can detect assorted items, including but not limited to knives, firearms, handguns, long guns, and materials and components used to construct an explosive device.”
View the FCPD video at https://www.facebook.com/fairfaxcountyPD/videos/1403252414367994/.