Best Senior Prank EVER-TERRORISM!

Just when rosy nostalgia was blurring the harsh edges of my high school memories I'm reminded just how open minded some people aren't.

What follows was taken from the Allentown PA, Morning Call website. They don't archive their site reliably, so here's a link to their home page.

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From The Morning Call -- February 16, 2005

Oley school ape prank alerts FBI, bomb squad
Costumed teen sent to prison under $300,000 bail after police take him from roof at gunpoint.

By Angela Pomponio
Of The Morning Call

A prank turned against a Berks County high school student Tuesday when his rooftop appearance in a gorilla mask and sheepskin shawl triggered a major emergency response that included the FBI and a bomb squad.
Police officers took senior Matthew W. Pattison off the roof of Oley Valley High School at gunpoint as students remained locked in their classrooms with blinds drawn.
Officials said such a response is standard after the Columbine massacre and Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
But Pattison's mother said he never meant to draw the attention of dozens of police officers, bomb-sniffing dogs, packs of reporters and at least three helicopters that hovered over the rural school in Oley Township.
''He put on a Halloween costume as a senior prank,'' Barbara Pattison said after her son went to the county prison under $300,000 bail on reckless endangerment and other charges. ''He absolutely had no negative intentions at all.''
Pattison, an 18-year-old National Merit scholar finalist other teens described as attentive and quiet, wanted to distract students as a senior prank, Oley Police Chief David A. White said. Some of the students were scheduled to take a state assessment test.
To get onto the roof, Pattison stepped up on a stack of wooden pallets, White said. He jumped down to a lower roof when police confronted him. ''I think his intentions were to peer into the different windows from the roof.''
But White, who was the first official summoned to the school shortly after 9 a.m., said he didn't know that the person wearing the mask was a student. Officials said Pattison, of 73 Rohrbach Road, Pike Township, wore the mask to hide his face from security cameras and also covered his car's license plate with a piece of fabric.
A blue bag found outside the school prompted an evacuation and the need for bomb-sniffing dogs, White said. The students were herded across the street and kept there for 45 minutes until police determined that the bag contained a teacher's lunch. Back in the school, students got a free meal.
Nearby, state police and FBI agents interviewed Pattison.
''You never know. I don't know what his intentions are,'' White said, explaining his decision to call other agencies for help. ''In this day and age, you don't know.''
District Judge Gail Greth of Fleetwood told Pattison at his arraignment that he must stay away from the school until the case is resolved. Besides reckless endangerment, he faces charges of criminal mischief, resisting arrest and disorderly conduct.
As a few parents picked their children up from school early, they commended school districts for their zero tolerance of disturbances since two students killed a teacher, 12 students and themselves during a 1999 shooting spree at Columbine High School near Denver.
Parents noted that in 2002, the Oley Valley district made national headlines when a school bus driver kidnapped 13 students and drove them to Washington, D.C., with a rifle stashed under his seat. The driver, Otto Nuss, is serving a four-year prison term.
''I don't think it's ever an overreaction,'' Debra Harpster said as she left the high school with her 16-year-old daughter, Angela. ''I just think you can't take any chances.''
Schools Superintendent Jeffrey Zackon said seniors have been known to pull pranks, but they usually occur at the end of the school year. Past pranks also were more apparent as such, he said.
''Pranks are pranks,'' Zackon said. ''I don't consider this a senior prank.''
As Jeff Pfleger left the school with his stepson, 10th-grader Tyler Fick, he supported the officials' response but questioned why it was needed in the first place.
''You have to sign in to get into the school,'' Pfleger said. ''But anyone can climb on to the roof? That's what I can't figure out.''