WASHINGTON — Prince George’s County State’s Attorney Angela Alsobrooks said authorities believe the stabbing of a teen in the woods near Parkdale High School was tied to the violent MS-13 street gang.
“We can’t deny it,” she said Wednesday during a news conference. She added: “We believe it is associated with MS-13 and we are taking whatever precautions are necessary to protect the children and teachers and staff in these schools from this sort of activity.”
Alsobrooks called the news conference one day after the 16-year-old Parkdale High School student was stabbed multiple times in a wooded area near the school. Police took more than half a dozen males into custody for questioning.
Earlier in the week, a 17-year-old student was shot and wounded by two other teens in a parking lot on the campus of Oxon Hill High School, according police.
The shooting is not related to gang activity, and police said there is no relationship between the two attacks. But Alsobrooks said the two violent incidents on or near schools grounds are “distressing.”
“I don’t care who it is — we will not tolerate violence in our schools,” Alsobrooks said. “Our kids go there to learn. They have the expectation that they will be taught there. They have the expectation that they will be safe there. And we will not allow any person to interrupt the feeling of security and safety that children, teachers, administrators and parents have to have to be able to trust us, to send their students to these schools. So any person who harm a child on school grounds, we will handle those people very aggressively.”
Police departments in the D.C. area have grown concerned about a resurgence in MS-13, which has roots in Latin America and got its start in Los Angeles in 1980s.
“We want it stamped out of our communities but most especially, we want to make sure that it is not growing in our schools,” Alsobrooks said of the gang activity. “This is generally a breeding ground for gang activity. They choose very young children.”
In the Oxon Hill High School shooting, two teens have been charged as adults with armed robbery and attempted murder. Alsobrooks said 17-year-old Zanaya Bryant, the ex-girlfriend of the victim, and 18-year-old Anthony Hollingsworth, lured the student into a vehicle in the school’s parking lot.
“We believe that he was set up, that he was invited to get into that car,” Alsobrooks said Wednesday. She said authorities are still seeking a third suspect.
