Officials: Gun was stolen

[Times photos: Joseph Garnett Jr.] Ridgewood High School sophomore Tina Franke comforts her friend Ami Sullivan on Friday at the Pasco County Sheriff's Office. Sullivan questioned authorities' inaction and the sheriff said, "You need to go look in a mirror if you want to start blaming people."

And no students came forward about the gun, Sheriff Lee Cannon says, so there was nothing authorities could do to prevent Teddy Niziol's shooting.

By TAMARA LUSH, AMY ELLIS and AMY WIMMER

© St. Petersburg Times, published January 22, 2000

NEW PORT RICHEY -- Teddy Niziol heeded a warning from an unlikely source, a classmate assigned to help the sheriff's deputy at Ridgewood High School.

Authorities wanted to talk to him about a gun, the classmate said, so he skipped sixth period on Wednesday. An hour later, as he sat behind the wheel of his vehicle in the school parking lot, his best friend accidentally shot and killed him, authorities say.

On Friday, police said that the .22-caliber pistol was stolen in a string of burglaries last weekend in St. Pete Beach -- and that Niziol, 16, was involved in the thefts. Several stolen items were recovered from the vehicle.

Pasco Sheriff Lee Cannon said Niziol may have been killed with a gun he had stolen.

"It appears that is so," Cannon said. "We can't ask him."

St. Pete Beach Police Detective Ron Russo said that a stolen credit card was recovered from Niziol's body and that the gun matched one stolen from St. Pete Beach resident James St. Pierre.

"I didn't feel too good about it, but, you know, they did steal the stuff," said St. Pierre, 70, who has lived on the beach for 30 years. "What else can I say?"

[Speical to the Times] Officials say the notes between students Samantha Lang and Teddy Niziol did not indicate a gun was on on campus.

Niziol's best friend, Steven Moschella, 16, is being held without bail on a charge of manslaughter. He admitted to accidentally shooting Teddy as he played with the gun in the back seat of Teddy's Toyota truck, police said.

Police and school officials came under fire by parents and students during a meeting at the school on Thursday. Tearful students said officials had been told as early as 9:30 a.m. Wednesday that Teddy had a gun. Andrew Enerson, 17, turned in a note describing Teddy's plans to sell a gun and said authorities could have acted sooner and saved Teddy's life.

Friday afternoon, Cannon released the note during a news conference. It did not say that there was a weapon on campus.

"We get notes like this every week," Cannon said.

The note was written in first-period math class by Teddy's friend Samantha Lang. In it, she asked whether Teddy was going to sell a gun to another student named Marty. Teddy responded with his own note, saying: "I'm not selling Marty a gun. I'm trying to sell it to Joey."

Cannon and Ridgewood High Principal Art O'Donnell said it would have been impossible for school and police officials to prevent Wednesday's tragedy after they read the note.

For one thing, they said, the note contained no last names. For another, the note didn't say there was a gun on campus -- it only highlighted problems among a group of kids that started during a party the weekend before.

The student aide to the school's on-site deputy saw the note and warned Teddy, Cannon said.

"I can assure you that that student will not be assisting (the officer) any more," he said.

Whether she is disciplined will depend on the school, he said, declining to release the student's name.

"The tragic thing is that many people had information about this weapon," Cannon said. "None of those people stepped forward."

Sheriff Lee Cannon said of the note: "We get notes like this every week."

During the meeting Thursday night, Teddy's father, Ted Niziol, begged students to alert school officials any time they hear a gun may be on campus.

"This came from two kids playing with something they shouldn't have been playing with," he said. "We taught him to cross the street, we taught him about drugs, but we never thought we needed to teach him about guns."

On Friday, Niziol declined to respond to his son's possible involvement in the burglaries.

"The truth is going to come out," he said.

O'Donnell said he barely slept Thursday night, agonizing over whether he should have done anything differently.

Never, he said, did he have any indication Teddy had brought a gun to school.

"I have a son at this school," O'Donnell said. "If I had any reason to believe there was a gun on campus, we would've gone after it."

"The note was about an ongoing problem some kids were having in the community," he said. "I didn't see this as a threat to anyone at the school."

At the news conference on Friday, one student challenged O'Donnell and Cannon, insisting that had the school deputy interviewed two other students before the end of the school day, Teddy would be alive.

"Why is my friend dead?" Ami Sullivan, 16, asked.

Cannon shot back: "A lot of (Teddy's) close friends knew about this, including you. You need to go look in a mirror if you want to start blaming people."

-- Funeral services have been scheduled for 10 a.m. Monday at Our Lady Queen of Peace Church in New Port Richey. Visitation will be at the North Meadowlawn Funeral Home and Cemetery from 2 to 4 p.m. and 6 to 8 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

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