Student Shot by Police Pronounced Dead
By TRAVIS REED, Associated Press Writer
54 minutes ago
LONGWOOD, Fla. - Family and friends mourning the loss of a troubled teenager prepared a candlelight vigil Sunday to remember the boy, who died two days after being shot by deputies at his middle school.
Christopher Penley, 15, was officially pronounced dead at 4:57 a.m., the Seminole County Sheriff's Office said in a statement posted on its Web site.
The boy had been described as clinically brain dead Saturday and was kept alive so his organs could be harvested for donation, said Mark Nation, a lawyer for Penley's parents.
"It's just unbelievable to me that he's gone," said Bucky Hurt, a family friend who had been with the boy's father, Ralph Penley, at the hospital. "It's very, very devastating. Good kid too — it's a tragedy."
The evening vigil was planned at nearby Landmark Community church to remember Christopher.
Friends and neighbors described the teenager as emotionally troubled, saying he had been bullied at school and had run away from home several times.
On Friday, he was at school with a pellet gun that closely resembled a 9mm handgun when another boy scuffled with him for control of the gun inside a classroom. Christopher was later cornered by sheriff's deputies and a SWAT team in a school bathroom, authorities said.
Seminole County Sheriff Don Eslinger said the boy was suicidal and couldn't be talked into surrendering the weapon. The teenager was shot after he raised the gun at a deputy, Eslinger said.
No one else at the 1,100-student school in suburban Orlando was injured.
Eslinger said it wasn't until after the incident that authorities realized the weapon was only a pellet gun.
But the family's lawyer said Saturday that Ralph Penley had told authorities during the standoff that his son had a pellet gun. Nation said police wouldn't let the father inside when he arrived at the school.
"If Christopher was alive and (Ralph Penley) was able to go into the school, he would've been able to talk him out of it," Nation said. "He did everything he could to avoid this situation."
Credit to Yahoo.
Sad thing really He was only 15.
