(NEW YORK) — Students in K-8 schools in Texas are being sent home with child identification kits, meant to help identify kids in the unlikely event they go missing, get abducted, or are trafficked.
The kits are being distributed by local schools as required by an amendment to Texas’ education code law that passed in the state legislature in the spring of 2021. Texas Senate Bill 2158 mandates the Texas Education Agency provide “inkless, in-home fingerprint and DNA identification kits” such as the kits from the National Child Identification Program to kindergarten, elementary and middle school students and their parents or custodians.
The TEA confirmed to ABC News’ Good Morning America that the state agency provided funding to The Safety Blitz Foundation to work with the state’s 20 educational service centers to distribute the child ID kits through school districts and that the initiative first began in the fall of 2021.
In an email to GMA, the Safety Blitz Foundation said it had partnered with the state of Texas to send out more than 3.8 million child ID kits so far this year.
According to the National Child Identification Program, such kits, which are also sold for $9.95 on its website, include an ID card for printing fingers, inkless solution, a DNA section, a section to record a child’s physical description, space for a photograph, and a section to record doctors’ phone numbers. The kits have been endorsed by the FBI for at least two decades and are a program the American Football Coaches Association founded back in 1997.
Dallas Independent School District, the second largest school district in Texas, said it received 92,400 kits from the TEA and began distributing the kits this week. The district told parents and caregivers they have the option to participate or opt out of the program.
“Once received, parents can complete the form with their child’s information and store it in a secure location at home. Each kit includes instructions in English and Spanish; participation is entirely voluntary,” the district said in a statement.
The TEA also told GMA the kits are intended to be kept by parents and caregivers and provided to law enforcement if an incident does occur and the information would help an investigation.
The timing of the kits’ distribution comes just four months after the Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde, Texas, which resulted in the deaths of 19 students and two teachers. After the May 24 shooting, victims’ families were asked to provide DNA samples to help identify their loved ones. Now, some question whether the new child ID kits being distributed could be used to identify children in future school shootings and say more action needs to be done when it comes to gun regulations and protecting students in schools.
“It was almost like the state just throwing their hands up and saying, ‘We can’t do anything about the guns. We’re not going to change any of the laws. So, therefore, the next best thing is to make sure that we can identify your K through eighth grader if they are killed in any type of school incident,'” Anthony Crutch, a Texas parent, told ABC News station KTRK-TV.
A financial analysis by the Texas Legislative Budget Board estimated last April the kit distribution program would cost about $8 million to implement.
(NEW ORLEANS) — For 28 years, Kunta Gable, Leroy Nelson and Bernell Juluke were wrongfully imprisoned, convicted as teens for a fatal drive-by shooting in New Orleans that they did not commit.
The three men were finally freed Wednesday when a state judge vacated their murder convictions after prosecutors cited the interference of two notoriously corrupt police officers in their case.
Gable, Nelson and Juluke have reunited with their families and are now adjusting back to normal life.
Michael Admirand, Juluke’s attorney, said in a statement to ABC News that they are grateful to the court, the prosecutor and the District Attorney’s Office’s Civil Rights Division for their work in “correcting this grave injustice.”
“Mr. Juluke maintained his innocence from the moment of his wrongful arrest. I am relieved that he has finally been vindicated, if dismayed that it took so long,” Admirand said. “Nothing can make up for the three decades Mr. Juluke and his family lost because of his wrongful conviction, but thanks to the Court’s action yesterday, at least they will have their future together.”
Gable, Nelson and Juluke were arrested on Aug. 22, 1994, shortly after the shooting death of Rondell Santinac at the Desire housing development. Gable and Nelson were 17 at the time while Juluke was 18.
The state judge ordered the three men released, responding to a joint motion by a trio of defense lawyers and District Attorney Jason Williams’ Civil Rights Division.
After an extensive investigation by the division, which involved reviewing records and re-interviewing remaining witnesses, the motion outlined numerous flaws in the original case.
According to the district attorney, the state failed to disclose significant evidence that would have exculpated Gable, Nelson and Juluke, including a record of manipulating cases by investigating police officers, Len Davis and Sammie Williams, who were the first on the scene of Santinac’s murder.
Davis, who headed a small cadre of New Orleans police officers and their drug dealing operation, and Williams were infamous for tampering with murder scene evidence at the housing project to protect their network of local drug dealers and cover up the homicides they committed, according to the district attorney’s investigation.
Davis was even known as the “Desire Terrorist” for his dealings in the Desire and Florida projects, the motion said. He was later convicted for ordering the death of a woman, Kim Groves, because she had filed a complaint against him in a separate matter.
He was sentenced to the death penalty in 2005 and remains in federal prison.
Williams said in a statement to ABC News that Davis was widely known to have “wreaked havoc on marginalized New Orleanians.”
“There is extensive documented evidence that while operating under color of law he engaged in illegal drug trafficking, framed individuals who got in his way and even went so far as to order the murder of a private citizen who dared to report his systematic abuses,” Williams said.
Williams called it “unfathomable” that no agency had reviewed any of Davis’ cases during his “reign of terror” for 28 years until now.
The motion said the state also relied heavily on the testimony of their only eyewitness, Samuel Raiford, who claimed to be driving the vehicle with Santinac in the passenger seat. However, his statements, the motion said, were riddled with inconsistencies.
Still, prosecutors “vigorously defended” Raiford’s credibility, using it to undermine the defendants’ alibi witnesses as well as two additional witnesses claiming to have seen the crime and contending the defendants were not perpetrators, according to the motion.
(LOS ANGELES) — Making his first public comments since a recording of council members making racist and offensive comments was released online, Los Angeles City Councilmember Kevin De León said he does not plan on stepping down from his position, apologizing to his constituents for not stepping up and shutting down the conversation.
“I’m so sorry to the city of L.A. for not stepping up and being the leader that they expect me to be,” De León said in an interview with CBS News Los Angeles. “I’m sorry to my constituents. I’m sorry to my colleagues. I’m sorry to the family of Mike Bonin, to my family, to all those who have supported me.”
The city council has been the subject of public outcry and protests after a recording posted to Reddit earlier this month captured former City Council President Nury Martinez making allegedly racist and offensive comments about her colleagues and about a council member’s son while discussing redistricting. The Los Angeles Times reviewed the recording and confirmed it as authentic.
ABC News has not independently confirmed the authenticity of the recording.
The recording has prompted the California Department of Justice to open an investigation into the city’s redistricting process in an effort to restore public trust.
Martinez resigned from her leadership position and from the council last week, under pressure from protesters and officials.
While the alleged comments were not made by De León, there has been public outcry from protesters and fellow council members, calling on him and council member Gil Cedillo, who was also on the recording, to resign from the council. Calls for their resignations have gone as high up as President Joe Biden.
During the interview, De León apologized several times, but remained adamant that his district deserves representation, saying he plans to continue to do so.
“I have to do the really damn hard work to repair and to restore the breach of trust that I have lost with so many folks,” De León said.
De León said the meeting captured on the recording was called by Martinez and that he had attended it to be a voice for his district.
In statements released on Monday and Tuesday, Martinez apologized to her colleagues, Bonin and his family.
In the Wednesday interview, De León said he called Bonin to apologize, but it went to voicemail.
The LA Council resumed its meetings Wednesday, closing the chambers to members of the public after protesters caused delays and prevented a meeting from starting last week.
The council also named a new president on Tuesday.
De León did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment.
(NEW YORK) — A spooky species of orchid at risk of disappearing forever as climate change worsens natural disasters, could soon garner conservation protections from the federal government.
The “ghost orchid,” an elusive species in the orchid family that primarily resides deep in the swamps of South Florida, was announced as a candidate to receive protections under the Endangered Species Act on Wednesday, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Protections for the critically endangered flower are of the utmost importance because its survival is at risk every time a hurricane blows over Florida, Melissa Abdo, a regional director of the National Parks Conservation Association, told ABC News.
Historically, hurricanes have severely impacted communities of ghost orchids. After Hurricane Irma hit Southwest Florida in 2017, the high winds caused the destruction of 30% of ghost orchids’ host trees, along with 30% of ghost orchids within the Florida Panther Wildlife Refuge alone. Between 2017 and 2018, nearly 50 mature ghost orchards in the preserve were lost, Abdo said.
There are fewer than 750 mature orchids left in the wild in the U.S., Abdo said, and conservationists have not even had a chance to survey damage to the flower’s population caused by Hurricane Ian, a Category 4 storm that decimated parts of Southwest Florida last month.
They destruction could be extensive, she added.
“Park staff and conservationists alike want to do all they can to protect this really rare and beautiful plant, but they need more help,” Abdo said.
When in bloom, the long spurs at the bottom of the ghost orchid resemble some popularized versions of cartoon ghosts. However, most of the time, all that is visible in the rare plant are the tangled jumble of green roots clinging to the trunks of its host trees.
The rare flowering then occurs during the peak of the hot, humid summer in Southwest Florida, Abdo said.
Although the species is “incredibly iconic,” they are only found in a tiny pocket of Southwest Florida, Abdo said. The current range of ghost orchids in Florida includes the Big Cypress National Preserve, Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge, Fakahatchee Strand Preserve State Park, Audubon’s Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary and additional conservation and tribal areas in Collier, Hendry and possibly Lee counties. The flower is also found in Cuba.
The ghost orchids live in such remote locations that it took six months of searching through deep swamps of the Everglades for Abdo to find one in the wild for the first time, she said, describing the places where the flowers choose to bloom as “habitats truly out of fairy tales.”
Climate change and poaching are the biggest threats to the species, Abdo said. In addition to the increase of frequency of intense storms that climate change is expected to bring, drought continues to dry up the swampy marshes of the Everglades, leaving less habitat for the ghost orchids to thrive.
“The situation has been dire for some time,” she said.
In addition, because the flower blooms so infrequently, it has an overall slow reproduction rate — imperiling it even more, Abdo said.
“The ghost orchid is a testament to how biodiversity can have a monumental impact on our collective spirit and imagination,” said Elise Bennett, Florida director and attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Its rare and cryptic beauty has captivated authors, photographers and filmmakers alike. I really hope federal officials make haste and protect this gorgeous specter of our swamps before it’s too late.”
(NEW YORK) — Family members of Irene Gakwa, a 32-year-old Black woman who went missing in Wyoming, are still seeking answers to what happened to her over 7 months into the search.
“It gets harder and harder each day,” Chris Gakwa, her older brother, said in an interview with ABC News.
Before she went missing, Irene Gakwa, a native of Kenya, spoke daily to her mother and father who reside in Kenya through Whatsapp, but those conversations came to an end Feb. 24 – the last time her family says they heard from her. Her brothers filed a missing person’s report March 20 after not hearing from her for almost a month.
Irene Gakwa moved to the United States from Kenya in 2019 in hopes of attending nursing school, her family says. She had attended the College of Western Idaho and “did well,” according to her brother.
“When she first moved here, it was a little different. It took her a little while to get used to everything,” Kennedy Wainaina, her oldest brother told ABC News. “It was good to see her let loose and make friends with people.”
Wainaina and Chris Gakwa who both reside in Idaho, say they would see their sister almost every weekend until she met her boyfriend, Nathan Hightman.
“We’re a very close family,” Chris Gakwa told ABC News. “She would come to hang out with us…she had some friends and would hang out, but things didn’t go well when she met Nate…That’s when things started going downhill and I feel like Nate is the one who kind of pushed her away from the family.”
Her brothers say they only met Hightman a couple times after Irene Gakwa met him on Craigslist – adding they were not aware how long the couple were dating. Irene moved over 700 miles away from Boise, Idaho, to Gillette, Wyoming, with Hightman without her family’s knowledge, her brothers say.
“From day one when I met him, I just didn’t like him to tell you the truth but I never told her,” Chris Gakwa told ABC News. “I just knew he was trouble.”
He says the couple had a rocky relationship and Irene Gakwa would call Chris’ wife when they were having issues.
At one point, authorities in Gillette, Wyoming, investigated claims by Hightman that Irene Gakwa “stole money” to purchase airline tickets to Kenya, according to the Gillette Police Department. But police found no merit to the allegations and dropped the case against her, they said.
In April, almost a month after Irene Gakwa’s disappearance, Hightman became “a person of interest,” according to a press release from the police department in Gillette, Wyoming. The press release stated Hightman had been charged with a handful of felonies – including two counts of theft, one count of unlawful use of a credit card and two counts of crimes against intellectual property. Irene Gakwa was listed as the victim of these crimes. The press release also stated, “Irene went missing under suspicious circumstances.”
Hightman was arrested for these charges, but later released on a $10,000 bond, Gillette Police Deputy Chief Brent Wasson said in the press release. Hightman pleaded not guilty to the charges, Wasson said.
Hightman did not immediately respond to a request for comment from ABC News. Current attorney information for Hightman was not immediately available.
His former attorney Steven Titus told the Gillette News Record in May that “he had not had time to talk with Hightman at length” about the five felony charges and that his client has consistently said he had nothing to do with Irene Gakwa’s disappearance. Titus also told the paper that police did not have enough probable cause to charge Hightman for her disappearance, which brought on the five non-violent charges instead.
Irene Gakwa’s brothers and Stacy Koester, a volunteer from Gillette who leads a search team to find the woman, claim they have not been updated by police as often as they said they should’ve been.
“Every time we reach out to them, they give us the same answers,” Koester, who never met Irene Gakwa and updates her brothers regularly on the search, told ABC News. “They keep saying there are no updates to provide and they’ll keep working on the case…it’s like we’re going in circles.”
The Gillette Police Department did not comment on the family’s claims regarding their response, but Wasson provided ABC News with a press release about an Oct. 13 search of Hightman’s residence.
“Analysis of evidence has led to the development of additional cause to return to the residence that Irene shared with Nathan Hightman. Detectives applied for and were granted additional search warrants to further the investigation,” the release said.
No further updates on the search were provided by Wasson and no arrests have been made since then.
“I’ve had several deaths in my family…my mother and two sisters, so I know what missing a family member feels like,” Koester said regarding her interest in the search.
Koester says she has reached out to and tried to schedule meetings with Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon, unsuccessfully. Despite her failed efforts, Koester says she leads a search team of 15 to 20 people for Irene weekly. They search for any evidence that may help find her – including a 55-gallon metal drum that police said they believe was burned in Hightman’s backyard around the time she was reported missing and that they have asked for public assistance in locating.
The governor’s office did not immediately respond to ABC News’ requests for comment.
Dusty Martin, the owner of Gillette car dealership Auto Scene, says Hightman and Irene Gakwa sold her silver Acura in January right before she was reported missing.
“The whole encounter was very odd,” Martin told ABC News in an interview. “Nathan was an odd character and I thought it was weird because Irene had to okay everything with him. Every move she made, she had to look at him,” Martin said.
The couple sold the car to Martin for $2,000, he says. Hightman was “very persistent” in selling the car although it was registered and titled in her name, according to Martin. Irene Gakwa said they were going to trade her car in for a new one, so Martin says he insisted on showing some cars he had in his lot, but Hightman told Martin they had already found one.
As the search for Irene Gakwa continues, Koester says she ‘s been trying to draw attention to the case through social media, creating a TikTok dedicated to bringing the missing woman home. The account has garnered over 62,000 likes.
“I just feel like if Irene was white with blonde hair and blue eyes, police would be having a press conference every week,” Koester, who is white, told ABC News. She noted the law enforcement response to the disappearance of Gabby Petito, a 22-year-old white woman who went missing last year and was later found dead. “I feel personally that [Irene’s] case didn’t get the attention it deserved.”
Despite the lack of media coverage that Irene Gakwa’s family and supporters say the case has been receiving, they won’t be giving up on the search anytime soon. The family created a website detailing what they say is a timeline that led up to her disappearance.
“I wish I could do more, but we try to do the best we can,” Wainaina said.
“I’ve never met her, but I want to help find her and help her family in any way that I can,” Koester said.
(JACKSON, Miss.) — The Environmental Protection Agency announced Thursday that it will open a federal civil rights investigation looking at Mississippi’s use of federal funds in Jackson and if the majority Black residents were discriminated against by not funding improvements to the water supply.
The EPA investigation will look into if Mississippi’s Department of Health and Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality “discriminated against the majority Black population of the City of Jackson on the basis of race in the funding of water infrastructure and treatment programs and activities in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.”
In August, historic flooding in Mississippi severely damaged a major pump at the main water treatment facility in Jackson, leaving about 150,000 of the city’s mostly Black residents without drinkable water. Jackson is 82.5% Black and white Jackson residents only account for 16.2 % of residents, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Thursday’s announcement comes nearly a month after the NAACP filed a Title VI Complaint for Investigation with EPA Administrator Michael Regan, requesting “an immediate investigation into the use of federal funds related to drinking water in Jackson and to seek the rapid adoption of comprehensive enforcement remedies.”
The NAACP in its complaint claim that state officials held a “decades-long pattern and practice of discriminating against the city of Jackson when it comes to providing federal funds to improve local water systems,” according to a statement on Thursday.
NAACP President Derrick Johnson, a Jackson resident who was one of several residents named in the initial EPA complaint, applauded Regan and the Biden administration for opening an investigation.
“This action is only the first step. NAACP and its partners will continue to press the Biden Administration and Congress to hold state officials accountable and ensure that Jackson officials and residents are active participants in the decision-making that will be required to fix the unacceptable problems with Jackson’s water,” Johnson said in a statement.
Liz Sharlot, Director of Communications for the Mississippi State Department of Health and the Agency spokesperson, told ABC news in a statement that compliance had been adhered to for all residents.
“The Mississippi State Department of Health is a regulatory agency that ensures compliance, offers education and guidance, and protects the public health safety of all Mississippians,” Sharlot said.
“The Agency also works with all eligible public water systems needing funds to improve their plants through the State Revolving Loan Fund,” she added.
(CLARK COUNTY, Nev.) — A Nevada child died after being infected by a brain-eating amoeba in an “extremely rare” occurrence, the Southern Nevada Health District announced on Wednesday.
The district said that the Clark County, Nevada, resident might have been exposed to the amoeba, which it identified as Naegleria fowleri, on the Arizona side of Lake Mead in October.
“My condolences go out to the family of this young man,” Dr. Fermin Leguen, the district health officer for SNHD, said in a press release. “While I want to reassure the public that this type of infection is an extremely rare occurrence, I know this brings no comfort to his family and friends at this time.”
People can become infected by the amoeba when contaminated water enters the body through the nose, usually from swimming, diving or putting their heads underneath the water, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
An infection from Naegleria fowleri can cause headaches, fever, nausea, vomiting, stiff neck, seizures and coma that can lead to death, according to SNHD.
According to SNHD, the patient began to develop symptoms a week after exposure.
“Once symptoms start, the disease progresses rapidly and usually causes death within about five days,” the district said.
Once diagnosed, Naegleria fowleri is very difficult to treat, Darien Sutton, a Los Angeles emergency medicine physician and ABC News medical contributor, said last year. Once it enters the brain, it causes a form of meningitis, and once the patient is exhibiting symptoms it’s often too late to save them.
According to the CDC, Naegleria fowleri is found in warm fresh water and soil around the world. In the U.S., it thrives during the warmer months.
Experts said that climate change might contribute to life-threatening risks for swimmers as waterborne pathogens flourish and multiply faster in increasingly warming waters.
Scientists are becoming increasingly concerned about the possibility of dangerous pathogens, such as Naegleria fowleri, and Vibrio vulnificus, a flesh-eating bacteria, Dr. Sandra Gompf, an infectious disease specialist and professor of medicine at the University of South Florida, told ABC News last year.
The National Park Service will still allow recreational swimming at Lake Mead since the amoeba is natural to the environment and rarely causes disease, NPS said in a news release.
“However, recreational water users should always assume there is a risk anytime they enter warm fresh water,” Dr. Maria Said, a U.S public health service officer with the NPS, added.
ABC News’ Julia Jacobo contributed to this report.
Bizuayehu Tesfaye/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Tribune News Service via Getty Images, FILE
(LAS VEGAS) — A former Nevada county official accused of fatally stabbing a Las Vegas journalist who was investigating his office has been indicted by a grand jury on murder.
Robert Telles, 45, was arrested and charged last month in connection with the death of Las Vegas Review-Journal reporter Jeff German, who police said was found stabbed to death outside his home on Sept. 3.
He has now been formally indicted by the Clark County grand jury on the charge of murder with use of a deadly weapon.
The indictment, filed Thursday, alleges that Telles, “with malice aforethought,” killed German by stabbing him multiple times.
The murder was “willful, deliberate and premeditated,” and “perpetrated by lying in wait” for the 69-year-old German, the indictment alleged.
Telles, who served as the Clark County public administrator, blamed German for ruining his career in politics and his marriage, according to prosecutors.
Telles lost his bid for re-election following an investigation by German in the Review-Journal that exposed turmoil in his office and accusations of bullying, retaliation and an “inappropriate relationship” between Telles and a staffer.
Police said the day before German’s murder, Telles was seen approaching the journalist’s home, where he allegedly had an altercation with him.
On the day of the murder, Telles allegedly wore a disguise — described by police as a straw hat and reflective vest — before stabbing German outside his home, police said.
Telles was arrested on Sept. 7 after DNA evidence found by a SWAT team at his home linked him to the crime scene, police said.
Telles has been held without bail in Clark County Detention Center. He was denied bail again during a court appearance this week, despite his attorney’s argument that he is not a threat to the community or a flight risk, ABC Las Vegas affiliate KTNV reported.
Judge Karen Bennett-Haron said she will “reconsider” bail during the preliminary hearing, scheduled for Oct. 26, according to KTNV.
Telles’ term as public administrator didn’t expire until Jan. 1, 2023, though he was officially removed from office on Oct. 5, KTNV reported.
(RALEIGH, N.C.) — The motive remains unknown for the mass shooting along a Raleigh, North Carolina, nature trail that killed five people and injured two others even as police released a five-day report on the incident Thursday.
The suspect, 15-year-old Austin Thompson, was critically injured in the Oct. 13 shooting. Raleigh police have not said if the suspect was shot by officers or himself.
The suspect’s 16-year-old brother, James Thompson, was among those killed, according to the Thompson family.
James Thompson was shot before the other victims, Raleigh police said in a new statement Thursday. The teen was found in a house with a gunshot wound and stab wounds, police said.
Raleigh police said there’s no apparent connection between the slain victims “other than they lived in the same neighborhood.” The other victims were identified as Susan Karnatz, 49, who was on a run; Gabriel Torres, 29, an off-duty police officer headed to work; Mary Marshall, 34, who was walking her dog; and Nicole Connors, 52, who was on a front porch with her dog.
Connors’ dog was also shot and killed, according to police.
Marcille Gardner, who was shot in a driveway, remains in the hospital in critical but stable condition, police said Thursday.
The police department said that it’s “limited in how much information” it can release “due to both the suspect’s age and the ongoing criminal investigation.”
Police did say that at one point the suspect fired at police, injuring officer Casey Clark, and the authorities returned fire. When the teen was taken into custody, he was wearing camouflage clothing and had a shotgun, handgun, ammunition and knives, according to police.
The Thompson family said in a statement Tuesday, “We are overcome with grief for the innocent lives lost … and we pray for everyone who was traumatized by these senseless acts of violence.”
“We have so many unanswered questions,” the family said. “There were never any indications or warning signs that Austin was capable of doing anything like this.”
(HAZELWOOD, Mo.) — A Missouri elementary school located near a contaminated creek in St. Louis County has closed after a private study found high levels of radioactive waste inside the building and its playground area.
The Hazelwood School District announced this week that Jana Elementary School in Florissant will pivot to virtual learning while school officials work on transferring students to different schools in the district in the coming weeks.
“The Hazelwood School District Board of Education will be working with our legal counsel to communicate to the appropriate agencies responsible, the necessity to immediately clean up and remediate any and all hazardous waste at Jana Elementary and any other District sites,” the school district said in a statement Wednesday.
The closure follows years of requests for testing. The school is located near Coldwater Creek, which was contaminated with uranium and other radioactive waste from a World War II nuclear weapons program, according to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.
The school district warned parents in August, weeks before the start of the school year, about potential risks and possible disruptions after U.S. Army Corps of Engineer testing found radioactive contamination on the banks of the creek, at the edge of the school’s property.
The latest findings, from Boston Chemical Data Corp., have sparked calls for cleanup from parents and officials and concerns about potential exposure, while families also figure out next steps.
Creek’s history of contamination
Coldwater Creek, a 19-mile tributary of the Missouri River, passes near sites that were used in the development of nuclear weapons for the Manhattan Project, including radioactive waste storage piles.
The creek is contaminated with “uranium processing residues” that were improperly stored near it, according to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, which in 2019 released a public health assessment report that found an increased risk of certain cancers for residents who “regularly played or lived along the creek for many years in the past.”
Jana Elementary sits on the flood plain of Coldwater Creek. The Corps, which is charged with the creek’s remediation, first detected radioactive contaminants near the school in 2018 and again in 2019, 2020 and 2021, according to the Boston Chemical Data Corp. report.
Following the latest testing, the Corps notified school officials in January that soil sampling conducted on the school’s property “showed the presence of low-level radioactive contamination” on the banks of Coldwater Creek, the Hazelwood School District said in an Aug. 5 letter to the school community.
“They further informed the district that the contamination did not pose an immediate risk to human health or the environment because the contamination was below ground surface,” the letter stated.
The school district gave parents the option for virtual learning while it awaited the results of further testing.
Latest testing sparks closure
The decision to close the school comes a week after the release of the Boston Chemical Data Corp. report, which found radioactive waste in the school and its playground. The report was funded by law firms involved in a class action lawsuit alleging illnesses and deaths caused by the creek contamination.
The school district granted the request for the testing, which was conducted in August, according to the Jana Elementary PTA, which alerted families to the report’s findings on Oct. 14.
Testing of dust and soil samples indicated high levels of radioactive lead in the school, including the library, and playground, according to the report. The levels in the kindergarten play area were “22 times the expected background,” according to the report.
“The most outstanding result of August 2022 testing at the Jana School was that levels of the radioactive isotope lead-210 found on school grounds were entirely unacceptable,” the report stated.
The Corps has not corroborated the findings of the private report.
In a statement Tuesday, the Corps’ Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program for the St. Louis District said the school property has contamination that is “isolated” to the creek bank, and that sample locations in the floodplain between the bank and playground area “aren’t contaminated.”
“The team will evaluate the report that Boston Chemical Data Corp. compiled on Jana Elementary School and the methods used to create these results,” it said in a news release. “That report isn’t consistent with FUSRAP’s accepted evaluation techniques and must be thoroughly vetted to ensure accuracy.”
Calls for cleanup, answers
Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley has called on the Corps to review the findings of the independent report, conduct further testing on the school grounds and publicly report their findings.
“It should go without saying that hazardous, radioactive contamination has no place in schools, or anywhere near schools, or anywhere near any place where children are. And it should also go without saying the federal government must be honest and transparent about the facts,” Hawley wrote in a letter to Corps Lt. Gen. Scott Spellmon on Tuesday.
The senator has also urged President Joe Biden to declare a federal emergency and authorize “immediate relief” for all impacted families and to expedite the cleanup.
Missouri Rep. Cori Bush has also demanded an “urgent response” to the emergency.
“The federal government is responsible for this waste, and we need answers from them on their plan to immediately begin cleanup of Jana Elementary and the surrounding areas so our kids’ health and education is not further disrupted by the presence of toxic chemicals,” she said in a statement earlier this week. “Inaction is not an option. The safety of our children and our communities must come first.”
The Missouri Coalition for the Environment has called on the school district to “act swiftly to secure a comprehensive cleanup of all radioactive bomb waste at the school.”
“In the interim, they must provide parents with options to continue students’ education with minimal disruption,” the group said. “We are approaching 80 years since this nuclear bomb waste has been allowed to plague our neighborhoods.”
What’s next for frustrated, worried families
Some 400 students attend Jana Elementary. Amid the remediation, the school will transition to virtual learning starting on Monday, with plans to redistrict students into other schools by Nov. 28 “if feasible,” the school district said.
Two pre-K classrooms will be transferred to another elementary school to continue in-person learning.
“We recognize that you are being faced with a situation not created by anyone in this District, over which you have no control, and that this is causing a disruption to our students’ education and school climate. For that we sincerely apologize,” the school district said in a statement to families. “Please know that Hazelwood School District will work hand-in-hand with you to provide the support that is needed as we transition through these very difficult times.”
Families are now scrambling to figure out next steps. During a packed meeting with the Hazelwood School Board on Tuesday, parents expressed frustration with the district.
“Just communicate with us,” said Patrice Strickland, who said she has two children who have been attending school virtually since August after learning about the contamination. “We don’t blame you all, but we want to hear what’s going on because these are our babies.
“Help us to make the right decisions for us, and we can’t make the right decisions if we don’t know what is going on,” she continued.
Former students and families of students who now attend the school also expressed concerns for their health during the meeting.
Kimberly Anderson told the board she had bloodwork done for her three grandchildren who attend the school to test their lead levels.
“This can cause long-term effects with children,” she said.
Others want to find a way to keep the community intact amid redistricting plans.
“Our kids should not be strung out through the district unless there was absolutely nothing suitable,” Jana Elementary PTA president Ashley Bernaugh said. “You cannot tear our community apart to punish us for something that our kids have no burden for.”
