WJZ obtains video as students cope with violent assault at Lansdowne High School
BALTIMORE - A 15-year-old girl is still recovering from serious injuries one day after being stabbed at Lansdowne High School.
WJZ has obtained video of the stabbing inside a school bathroom.
In the video, the suspect has a knife in her hand.
We are not showing the full video because of its violent and disturbing nature.
A school resource officer and supervisor were immediately able to get help for the injured student and get the suspect into custody.
Counselors were at the school on Wednesday.
"I think it helps because it's really traumatic what happened," said Justin, a freshman at Lansdowne. "Like a stabbing? It's really crazy."
Lansdowne High School sent a letter to parents saying the school was placed on "lockdown protocol" at 12:40 p.m. because of an assault involving two students.
Baltimore County police said a female student was taken to the hospital with serious injuries from a stabbing, while another female student was taken into police custody.
"Our schools need to be safe," said Cindy Sexton, head of the Baltimore County Teachers Association. "If our students are not safe, they can't learn. I've also heard from educators at Lansdowne specifically who say it was a frightening situation yesterday."
The victim's mother wrote a message on Facebook:
"Thank you for the prayers and to everyone who has reached out. My daughter did not deserve this! No one's daughter deserves to be brutally attacked the way she was. Please continue to keep us in your thoughts and prayers throughout her recovery."
A classmate said she spoke to the injured 15-year-old in the hospital.
"She's getting her second surgery," the classmate said. "She says she is feeling better and stuff like that. I want to send my condolences to her because she's a sweet girl and she didn't deserve that."
WJZ investigator Mike Hellgren asked students if we they felt safe at the school.
"Honestly, I don't think anybody does because today. They were talking about all the counselors they have," a student said. "There were girls walking around the hallway crying. Certain people won't go to lunch."
Maryland students have been traumatized by recent violence, including seven Baltimore City high school students shot in two separate incidents last week, and a stabbing last month in Howard County.
"Our job as a society, not just educators, is to keep our children safe," Sexton said. "And we all need to work to make that happen. It's not something schools can do on their own."
Sexton said she fears violence is leading more teachers to leave the classroom, making a teacher shortage that's already at a crisis level even worse.
"We've had almost 200 teachers leave Baltimore County this school year alone," Sexton said. "We need to recruit and retain our educators because if they're not feeling safe, they're not going to come to or stay in the profession, and we need teachers for our students."
We looked at data from the State Department of Education before the pandemic, It shows 2,484 student arrests in the 2019-2020 school year, and 175 of those were in Baltimore County.
