By Petrina Francis, Staff Reporter

Esther Tyson, principal of Ardenne High School, St. Andrew, yesterday condemned the police officers who were involved in a shooting incident on the school compound.

Corporal Oneil Patterson of the Constabulary Communication Network (CCN), said about 2:30 p.m., man was in the vicinity of the school throwing stones at a group of Ardenne students when a police patrol car which was in the area, signalled him to stop.

Cpl. Patterson said the man then began to throw stones at the police officers. The police, he said, accosted the man, who attempted to disarm one of the officers.

The CCN spokesman did not provide further details but Mrs. Tyson said she was told that the man ran on to the compound and the police chased after him, fired a shot, which is alleged to have hit an 11-year-old Covenant Academy Preparatory student who was in a bus that was on the compound picking up students from Ardenne High.

The man then ran into the staff room, where he was shot by the police. This was in full view of the teachers, one of whom went into shock and had to hospital.

"We are going to have to deal with this as a school because I consider it really very distressing that this type of thing could take place. It is a mad man, he was not armed as far as eyewitnesses could see, yet shooting took place in my staff room. As far as I am concerned, it is not acceptable because the man was not armed," an obviously shaken Mrs. Tyson, told reporters yesterday.

The incident took place as the institution was having its Home Coming Week celebration. Alumni from Canada and the United States, among other countries, were on the compound.