An educator at a Denver school is on paid leave after being arrested for allegedly possessing a loaded handgun on campus — a weapon that was discovered after security staff searched for a student who had said he brought a gun to school.
Dante Quint, 25, was arrested on suspicion of the felony charge on March 1 after school security allegedly found a gun in his backpack on Feb. 28 at Bruce Randolph School, court records show.
Quint works as a paraprofessional at the school and is on paid leave while the investigation continues, Denver Public Schools spokesman Scott Pribble said in an email.
The arrest came as Denver’s school district grapples with gun violence among its students. Quint was arrested the same day a 16-year-old student died of gunshot wounds after being shot outside East High School and three weeks before a 17-year-old student shot two and wounded administrators at the same high school before taking his own life hours later.
Denver police responded to Bruce Randolph School, 3955 Steele St., at 10:24 a.m. Feb. 28 on a report of a student who told school staff he had a gun, according to Quint’s arrest affidavit. The student, whose name is redacted from the affidavit, said he was upset because he was being harassed online and told a school security officer that he had a gun, the affidavit states.
The student ran from the security officer when she tried to search him for the gun, the affidavit states. When the officer found the student a short time later, he did not have a gun on him.
The school — which enrolls students in grades six through 12 — was placed on lockdown while Denver police searched the building using police dogs. The searchers did not find any guns.
The security officer then checked school surveillance cameras and found that the student met with Quint in a classroom after he fled security, the affidavit states. The student and Quint had a close relationship, the security officer told the police.
School security officers then searched Quint and found a loaded handgun in his backpack, the affidavit states.
During the search, Quint did not respond to a security officer’s question about whether they would find anything in his bag. After the gun was discovered, Quint said the gun belonged to him and that he “must have left it in there,” according to the affidavit.
In a March 3 interview with a Denver police detective, Quint said he bought the handgun on Feb. 25 and planned to take it to a gun range on Feb. 27. He didn’t go to the gun range because he became ill, he said, and he forgot to take it out of his backpack before he went to work the next day.
Quint told the detective that no student ever had the gun. Quint was then arrested for possession of a weapon on school grounds.
Quint was released from jail March 4 on a personal recognizance bond, court records show. He is next scheduled to appear in Denver County Court on May 1 and remains listed as a staff member on the Bruce Randolph School’s website.
Quint did not respond to requests from The Denver Post for comment.
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