ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – This past Monday, police say they found a student with a loaded gun at West Mesa High School. Fortunately, they found him after a classmate stepped forward. 

That student told someone about the gun hours after the Bernalillo County sheriff was there talking to teens about guns. 

New Mexicans to Prevent Gun Violence had its gun violence prevention workshop at the school Monday with BCSO Sheriff John Allen as a speaker. His message was focused on the importance of say something if you see something. That apparently resonated with at least one student.

“We can see that they actually are getting the message and now feel like they have tools to keep them safe,” said Miranda Viscoli, co-president of New Mexicans to Prevent Gun Violence. 

The group hosts workshops in several Albuquerque and Santa Fe schools year round.

Viscoli says she saw the lessons in action Monday after Allen spoke at the final workshop at West Mesa High School. 

“He was really talking to them very honestly about ‘Hey if you see this you have to let somebody know, somebody will get shot and killed,’” said Viscoli. 

Hours later, the school went on lockdown after police say they found a 16-year-old student intoxicated and with a loaded gun on campus. 

“We were literally put on shelter in place later in the afternoon while they were getting that gun removed from the young person,” Viscoli said. 

Police say it’s all thanks to another student reporting it. 

“So it does show that when we have these conversations with our young people that they actually are hearing it, but we have to be repeatedly in that classroom,” said Viscoli. 

APS officials say that student never threatened to use the gun on anyone, but he is facing charges.

While that intervention may have worked, Allen was anything but pleased with what happened after that student was arrested. 

He and Bernalillo County District Attorney Sam Bregman have serious concerns with the local Juvenile Detention CEnter, which is also called the Youth Services Center. 

That teen was taken there but never booked. Allen and Bregman wrote a letter to Bernalillo County officials. In it, they write the teen was taken to UNM hospital because he was basically drunk. 

Doctors cleared him, and he was taken to YSC to be put in custody. But the letter states the teen waited around four hours and was described as noncompliant and acting erratically. 

Eventually, YSC officials decided to just release him to his parents. Allen says that’s a prime example of violent teens avoiding accountability. 

“What’s discouraging is that juveniles tell us themselves they know how to play the system. They tell everybody, ‘I just have to tell them I have been drinking, and I am going to be rejected or released to my parents or somebody else that evening or this morning.’ They’re not worried about law enforcement or the consequences,” said Allen. 

“The idea that we have law enforcement going out, picking up teenagers who commit violent crimes or the act of committing a violent crime, and then bringing them to the D home, and they don’t get booked is unacceptable, just unacceptable at every level,” said Bregman. 

Greg Perez is the deputy Bernalillo County manager for Public Safety. He wrote a letter back to Allen and Bregman Wednesday. He says YSC officials never refused to book the teen. Instead, staff wanted to make sure he was medically cleared. 

He claims that paperwork didn’t have specific information. Perez also claims the decision to release the teen to family was made by APS police. 

The letter ends by saying the county is committed to improving the intake and detention of youth accused of dangerous crimes.