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Palo Alto police arrested a teenage boy for allegedly setting two Palo Alto Unified classrooms on fire at Cubberley Community Center early Sunday morning, April 30, police said.
The Palo Alto teen, 16, was arrested Monday, May 1, at Greer Park on suspicion of arson and booked into Santa Clara County Juvenile Hall, according to a police press release.
Palo Alto firefighters responded to a fire alarm at 4000 Middlefield Road around 12:01 a.m., police said. At first, they found no signs of a fire. Shortly before 1 a.m., someone called the city’s emergency dispatch center to report seeing and smelling smoke at the center, police said. Crews who looked into the tip found the blaze in the center’s B wing and contained it.
The Police and Fire departments joined forces for an arson investigation and discovered that the fire began near the two classrooms, which the school district uses to serve special-education students in its post-secondary program, and quickly spread to the structure.
The fire caused substantial damage to that wing of the building, Palo Alto Unified spokesperson George Pinckney said. The district also lost property, including books, smartboards and supplies for visually impaired students. The district doesn’t yet have a monetary estimate of the damage, Pinckney said.
With help from Palo Alto Unified, the Police and Fire departments identified the alleged arsonist as a 16-year-old Palo Alto resident. He was arrested at Greer Park shortly after 9 p.m. on Monday. His name was not released to the public because he is a minor.
Pinckney confirmed that the suspect is a student in the district.
The teen also is accused of starting a small fire at a picnic table at Ohlone Elementary School at around 3:30 a.m. on the same day as the Cubberley fire. The blaze burned itself out and didn’t result in extensive damage, police said.
The roughly 18 students who attend class in the damaged rooms have shifted to different rooms at Cubberley, Pinckney said.
He added that the district is pleased that students are back to learning and stressed the seriousness of the crime.
“It was a felony … and we are glad our staff was able to assist the police department in locating the suspect,” Pinckney said.
Anyone with information about the case is asked to call the department’s 24-hour dispatch center at 650-329-2413. Anonymous tips can be emailed to paloalto@tipnow.org or sent by text message or voicemail to 650-383-8984.
Our youth are in pain. In no way am I condoning such impulsive and very harmful actions. In less than a week two teens have impulsively acted our. AND we continue to have no positive outlets for our older teenagers. No revamped skate park, nill art, music programs for the needy at an 80% discount. Parents or guardians working a combined 180 hours a week in one or several jobs. Rents housing food, fuel sundries skyrocketing. I keep hearing the city, county , state talking words to behavioral health (not Telehealth health). Kids are shot in the chest for shoplifting, handcuffed for taking a pair of underwear, setting fires, leaving notes of a bomb threat. Obviously —- a cry for help. What does Palo Alto do??? Defer defer defer. Ore WW11 “juvenile delinquent” was not a term. Fast forward . Global Pandemic, local neglect. Not one private psychologist in PA accepts covered California or Medi-cal. Instead my teen daughter has to choose Telehealth care from Yuba City, Roseville. Her anxiety stems from distance, electronic interaction. It’s a trigger. Hello. Keep hearing about adolescent behavioral health from Stanford and it’s”health fair”. Kids need real tome invested care. Why does’t Stanford behavioral health accept medi-cal? Is it a religious thing. My kid is hurting. And help aside from a drop down menu, app, web link that leads back to 211 or 911 it’s empty promises. Our family should not have to travel beyond our city/Stanford borders for care!! Yet hey. Housing, health care, humanity are on the brink of extinction. God that pie in sky hospital is architectural wonder of up the air, air. Yet us down here on the ground need the oxygens such is sucking for their brevity of awards that only serve a few not the many. Local teens are hurting. Is Palo Alto helping???
I agree with the previous poster on many levels. Yes, we have very poor amenities for teens and they have worsened over the years. The pandemic has taught them that screens can be used for all school and social interactions with friends and family. Even before the pandemic we were concerned about the amount of time kids spent on screens then the pandemic gave them permission and encouragement to spend even longer online in front of a screen. Now they have lost upward of a year (variable) of important socialization skills and we expect them to know how to handle it.
Yes, teen health, relaxation and socialization skills need better attention.
However, these two teens seem to have different ends of the problem and that means that we have to pay attention to all teen problems rather than group them all together.
It is time to have that conversation in a meaningful way. Forget the PC language and start calling things what they are. Our teens lives are worth it.