Body found at downtown Las Vegas Academy
Las Vegas police are investigating a dead body found at a downtown Las Vegas performing arts high school Monday morning.
Students at Las Vegas Academy, on East Bridger Avenue and South Seventh Street, arrived at school to find a crime scene near the magnet school's portable classrooms.
Metro received a call from a school employee about 5:25 a.m. to report the body of an adult male had been found on campus, Metro spokeswoman Laura Meltzer said. The death appears to be a suicide, she said.
Clark County School District Police Capt. Ken Young said Metro will lead the investigation.
Frustrated students took to social media Monday morning.
"That moment when someone dies on the LVA campus, and the school day continues as usual," one student said on Twitter.
"Why are administrators not cancelling school does it even phase them that there's a dead body on campus?" one post read. "Why are we still at school if somebody died? This is teaching that death can be taken lightly and should not be made a big deal out of."
District spokeswoman Melinda Malone said the body was discovered earlier in the morning, but there wasn't enough time to cancel school entirely. And with finals set to start Tuesday, ensuring students get instruction time is important.
After school, students told the Review-Journal it was an odd day.
"The day was strangely normal. Teachers and admin seemed to ignore the fact that there was a crime scene in the middle of campus," Emily Sheehy said. "Instead of giving us information on what was going on, the school kept quiet, which caused rumors to spread around.
"Kids were saying all around that they heard the man was killed and it was not suicide. Some said he that he was shot or stabbed," the 17-year-old technical theater major said. "None reliable sources, but that's what was spreading around."
Ethan Raeder, 16, said the students weren't directly told anything. There was no announcement, and he didn't hear anything about counseling being offered to anyone.
The visual arts major said many kids were just looking for an excuse to get out of school.
"No one knew who the person was, so that's all it was to people, a body," he said. "They didn't consider the fact that that body probably had a mom and dad, friends and family."
Both students said the event fits in with a common catch phrase used by students, "only at LVA," which is used to describe weird occurrences at the school.
"People say that all the time, like when kids randomly break out in dance or a homeless person wanders on campus," Sheehy said.
Raeder said only parts of the campus are fenced off and also mentioned homeless people wandering onto campus.
"It's ('Only at LVA') kind of a joke within the students at LVA. We are located in downtown Las Vegas, an older, maybe not-so-great part of town," Raeder said.
"We don't want to lose instruction time if we don't have to," Malone said. "If we don't have to close the entire school, we won't."
Malone said the body was discovered early enough that that no students saw it, but crisis counseling is being offered to anyone at the school who needs it. A Parent Link automated phone message has already started going out to notify parents.
The district said it doesn't believe there is a connection between the man who was found dead and CCSD. The Clark County coroner will identify the man and determine the cause and manner of death.
Review-Journal writers Neal Morton and Lawren Linehan contributed to this report. Contact Wesley Juhl at wjuhl@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0391. Find him on Twitter: @WesJuhl
