Valley Vandalism Irks Parents, Officials

AKRON - Concerned parents of Tippecanoe Valley High School students are upset about recent incidents involving dead animals and live chickens.

One parent and employee of TVHS, who asked to remain anonymous, said the last week in May several dead animals, including fish, possums and "roadkill," were placed in the school's ceiling tiles. He also said maggots were found in the ceiling tiles as well as in one of the classrooms.

"It sounds like they were thrown completely around the room," he said.

"The stench was so bad that a lot of kids didn't eat lunch," another concerned TVHS parent said.

Thursday morning between 2 and 4 a.m., 15 to 20 live chickens reportedly were put in the ceiling tiles, teachers' desk drawers and students' lockers by approximately 12 TVHS students wearing masks. These students were caught on the school's surveillance camera but have not yet been identified.

"It's the usual suspects," a TVHS substitute teacher said Friday. "You know who they are when you're there every day like I am."

As to whether these two incidents were related, the substitute teacher said, "That's almost a certainty."

TVHS Principal Charles Mills said chickens were released into the building Wednesday night.

Mills said a number of things happened at the school, including a break-in. He said students "really messed up the building quite a bit as far as moving desks into hallways," and chickens were placed in the ceiling tiles, lockers and "various places."

The senior breakfast to take place Thursday at 7 a.m. was canceled because "we had a lot of things that we had to take care of before opening the school up," Mills said.

Thursday was the last student day at school, Mills said, and due to "sanitation and health concerns, there were concerns about whether we could even hold school" because of the chickens and chicken manure that needed to be cleaned up.

"We had a number of parents that took off work (for the breakfast)," Mills said.

The food for the senior breakfast was later fed to underclassmen.

"That was much later," he said. "We had only so many choices as what to do with this food and we really didn't want to throw it away. It was the last student day and we couldn't keep it."

One parent also said some are calling the incidents "senior pranks."

"It's beyond pranks to me," he said. "It's vandalism."

Parents claim there were other "pranks." Two TVHS parents said balloons filled with bleach, urine and spoiled milk were being thrown by students at the school Thursday.

Regarding the chicken incident, Mills said: "At this particular point we have quite a list of names and they are all seniors," Mills said.

But, he said, that doesn't mean only seniors were involved.

No arrests have been made yet, he said, "but we have a lot of names. We still hope to do something."

The other incident occurred the last week in May when roadkill and maggots were brought into the school. Mills believes students also were responsible for that incident.

The dead animals and maggots were discovered prior to the beginning of the school day, Mills said, and the mess was cleaned up before school started.

"It was isolated to a couple of classrooms," he said.

"We're very concerned about some of these kinds of things. We realize that some of these people think that they're harmless practical jokes," Mills said. "In fact, they're trespassing and breaking in."

We cannot condone those kinds of activities," he said. "Our society does not support that kind of activity and it did cost our taxpayers money because we've had to replace ceiling tile (and) pay overtime to custodians to clean up.

"I feel like our taxpayers should be upset about those kinds of things as well."

Mills said there are a few people who know who the students are who broke into the school, but "nobody likes to stand up and be counted ... people are not willing to commit themselves."

Mills urged "those individuals out there that think it's wrong and know something about (the incidents)" to come forward.

These incidents left parents concerned about Sunday's graduation ceremonies, but no incidents occurred.

"Graduation went very smoothly," Mills said. "I want to compliment the class.

"This past week was maybe a little rough in some respects. I think maybe it turned out to be a positive - that maybe a message did get across here on how we need to conduct ourselves and respect our school. ... And so we did have a good graduation."