Santa Rosa’s Montgomery High School will remain closed for the rest of the week after a stabbing that left a 16-year-old student dead and another hospitalized. The 15-year-old suspect in Wednesday morning’s stabbing was arrested 40 minutes later, about a mile north of the campus. Police say the younger boy was in art class, when the two other boys rushed into the classroom and started fighting him.
“The student who was inside the classroom produced a knife,” said Santa Rosa Police Chief John Cregan. “The knife was describe as a folding knife with a black handle. It had a blade of approximately 4 to 5 inches.”
The younger student stabbed one of the older ones in the chest three times. That student, Jayden Pienta, died at Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital. The other 16-year-old was stabbed in his left hand and was also taken to the hospital for treatment. Officers found the freshman suspect a short time later hiding in a creek bed. The victim’s family set up a memorial last night, remembering the 16-year-old as “kind-hearted, sweet loving and gentle.”
Questions about campus safety are coming to the forefront after Wednesday’s deadly stabbing. During an on-campus news conference, a student asked Santa Rosa Police Chief John Cregan why it took a loss of life for police to start caring about the school. Cregan blamed the Santa Rosa City School Board for removing community resource officers from the campus, saying the police department didn’t make that choice. Santa Rosa City Schools trustees decided to suspend the district’s relationship with the Santa Rosa Police Department in June of 2020. The school resource officer program had put officers on local high school and middle school campuses for 25 years before that.
