Driving into school the morning of Friday, October 22, most students were shocked to find the letters “MHS” vandalized on windows, school walls, the senior wall, speed bumps, stairs, the parking lot, and over the Marshall Hamilton Stadium sign.
“It brings tears to my eyes; it really does. They desecrated a memorial,” said Amy Wedge, English teacher, about the destruction to Leesville’s stadium, specifically the Marshall Hamilton sign dedicated in honor of the school’s first athletic director who died of cancer in 2008.
The night of Thursday, October 21, an undetermined number of people trespassed onto the Leesville campus, sometime between 12 and 4 o’clock in the morning.
To view more pictures of the vandals’ work, click here.
They were caught on camera, and although they were fully covered, several backpacks will help in distinguishing them. The vandals appeared to be school age, and most assume they were Millbrook students attempting to portray school spirit.
“We’ve notified Millbrook’s administration, and they’re working on identifying the students. We have also notified the police, and we will definitely press charges,” said principal Scott Lyons.
As for the cleanup, Lyons has confidence the campus will be back to normal before the game tonight.
“We have parents out correcting what was wrong, as well as Mr Espinal’s [an LRHS art teacher] second period repainting the senior wall and various signs around the school. We’ve got four power-washers, and we feel good about cleaning it up.”
Facility maintenance workers from Leesville, Millbrook and Sanderson came to help power wash, and they were clearly miffed about the immaturity of the vandals.
“We’re aggravated. We have almost a dozen salaried employees power washing walls, bricks, sidewalks and repainting the parking lot and the speed bumps. We have better things to do than this,” said Anthony Bruno, a facility maintenance worker.
When fans enter the stadium for the 7:00 p.m. kick-off, they will see a clean campus and the Loonies cheering, proudly and respectfully, for the Pride.
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