Boy, 9, rescued after fall between buildings

Dan Kulin

Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2004 | 11:09 a.m.

A 9-year-old boy accused of breaking into a Las Vegas elementary school with three friends broke his arm and hurt his foot when he fell 20 feet from the school roof into a space between two school buildings, school police said.

The boy fell through a metal mesh screen atop a 4-foot-wide space between two buildings around 3:50 p.m. at Kit Carson Elementary School on the corner of D Street and Alexander Avenue, according to school police and fire officials.

The long narrow space was closed on each side of the school with sheet metal walls intended to keep people from going between the two buildings. Las Vegas firefighters rescued the fallen boy by cutting an opening in one of the metal walls at the ground level.

The name of the boy who fell and the three others police said were with him were not released. All of the boys are being charged with burglary, Clark County School District Police Department spokesman Darnell Couthen said.

While the injured boy was rushed to University Medical Center, the three other boys were taken to the county's juvenile detention center, Couthen said.

Two of the boys, both 13, were released to their parents' custody Monday and must return for a later court hearing, a juvenile court spokesman said. The third boy, 11, was still in custody this morning while court officials waited for a parent or guardian to collect him, the spokesman said.

The injured boy remained at UMC this morning, Couthen said.

The three older boys are believed to be students at Clark County middle schools, Couthen said. The injured boy is also a school district student but did not attend Carson, Couthen said.

School police were first made aware of a possible problem at the school when a burglar alarm there went off around 3:45 p.m., Couthen said.

The boys apparently had gotten onto the roof by climbing up some metal pipes and a metal box attached to the side of the school, Couthen said. The boys apparently entered a custodial room through a roof hatch, tripping the alarm. Once inside, the boys allegedly vandalized a classroom and took a box of unused blank CDs, Couthen said.

But at some point one of them fell through the mesh, and his pals clambered down and called for help.

Firefighters arrived at the school around around 3:50 p.m., Las Vegas Fire Department spokesman Tim Szymanski said.

Paramedics went onto the roof, put ladders down into the space where the boy was trapped and climbed down to begin treating him while an opening was being cut in the metal at ground level, he said.

The boy was carried out on a stretcher around 4:20 p.m. and was taken to the hospital, Szymanski said.

Fred Smith, construction manager for the Clark County School District, said it isn't unusual to find evidence that children have been on school roofs although it's more common at the high schools than elementary or middle schools, Smith said.

"We find bottles, firecrackers, drug paraphanalia," Smith said.

Carson, built in 1956, is one of the district's older elementary schools. The district's newer schools don't have "student-proof" roofs but limiting access was a factor in the design process, Smith said.

"With the new prototype designs we try and make it more difficult for students to have access, but kids are kids, they usually find a way," Smith said.

Couthen said he did not know if there was a history of problems with children climbing onto the roof at this school. But he said that in general more burglar alarms are tripped at schools during three-day weekends than other times, which he attributed to "bored kids."

Georgia Harris, 64, a retired housekeeper who lives across the street from the school said she often sees children climbing onto the school's roof.

"I'm constantly hollering and threatening to call the school authorities," Harris said.

Couthen said he did not know what, if anything, the school district will do to make it harder for others to climb onto the roof.