Last Friday when seven Wake County teenagers attempted to enter West Johnston High School without permission and began causing a disturbance, School Resource Officer Adrian Stone was the first law enforcement officer to confront the unruly group.
Stone, a deputy with the Johnston County Sheriff’s Office, quickly took 4 of the 7 individuals into custody while three others fled out of the school. Stone called for assistance and within minutes dozens of officers converged on the campus and within an hour had the remaining 3 detained.
Stone was credited for keeping the staff and students at West Johnston High School safe during the ordeal.
Today (Wednesday) students at West Johnston wrote messages and signed two posters which they presented to Officer Stone. They also gave her hugs and posed with her for photos.
Chief Deputy Bengie Gaddis said Stone is an outstanding individual and school resource officer.
“Adrian is an asset to this agency,” Chief Deputy Gaddis told WTSB. “She is a people person. She loves kids and we are very thankful to have her as part of this organization. She took charge of a situation last Friday and she did her job to protect the students and faculty at that school and I commend her for it.”
Deputy Stone has been with the department since 2013. She was a former patrol deputy before becoming a school resource officer at the start of the school year at West Johnston.
In addition to honoring Officer Stone, students wrote letters to students at a Parkland, Florida high school where 17 people were killed Feb. 14th.
Several students said they didn’t want Wednesday’s events to be negative or anti-guns, but an opportunity to reach out to people – even those they don’t know – and do acts of kindness and remain positive.
Photos by John Payne
