alfred purcell ammuntion school hoax
Alfred J. Purcell III. Photo courtesy Southbridge Police Department.

There’s nothing like throwing a 30-year teaching career – and the related pension – into the garbage to advocate for more gun control. Police say Alfred J. Purcell III dropped a live 9mm round on the floor in the school where he worked. And they have it on video.

Why would a teacher sprinkle live ammo in a school hallway? He apparently wanted to create the perception that his school needed metal detectors. Cops have arrested him and now he’s now staying in a place that has metal detectors.

WALB News has the story:

A teacher in Massachusetts was arrested Thursday after leaving live ammunition in his school building’s stairwell to prove the school needed to get metal detectors, police said.

Police said Southbridge High School teacher Alfred J. Purcell III told the staff he found a live round of 9mm ammunition in a stairwell at the school shortly after 8 a.m.

But police said security video later showed that Purcell himself dropped the bullet on the floor of the stairwell before quickly leaving the area.

He returned about 10 minutes later and appeared to take a picture of the bullet with his cellphone.

He then used his school-issued radio to call for help from the school administration and resource officer, according to police.

Investigators said Purcell admitted he planted the bullet to prove the school needs to install metal detectors.

He didn’t think that police might dust the round for fingerprints?  Or that someone might review security camera footage? Purcell doesn’t seem terribly bright if he did as cops say.

Would you like to guess what was found when Purcell’s car was searched?

Police said they later searched Purcell’s car and found 102 live rounds of ammunition for a .20-gauge shotgun in his trunk on the school grounds.

…And one single round of 9mm ammo.

Authorities also discovered that Purcell’s license to carry a firearm was expired in Connecticut, where he resides.

We’re going to go out on a limb and predict that it won’t ever be renewed.

So once more, if things are as police and the security video suggest, Mr. Smollett Purcell manufactured a fake crime to create angst among students and teachers. He deserves everything he gets.

 

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100 COMMENTS

  1. If he had done that here in Wyoming, that live round would have been snapped up off the floor in a New York Second.

    Student reaction in Massachusetts to a live round on the floor: “Aaaaiiiieeee! Hellllp!”

    Student reaction in Wyoming to live rounds on the ground: “Yay! Free ammo! Look around for more!”

      • You apprehend the situation exactly.

        And there would be cute girls in the mob arguing over who was rightly supposed to get the free ammo.

        • And the girls probably out-shoot the boys up there…

    • Agreed. I’m from Boston originally. Today’s crop is heavy on the soy,light in the loafers;and largely devolved to the state of Eloi as a conscious decision.
      Gutless and Nutless is the acceptable standard, unless you’re a protected group or connected class.

    • Which is why I love Wyoming. The response in Illinois, 30 yrs ago, would have been “Oh, thanks, I’ll take that, Run along, now.”

      • And here I thought that .9mm stuff was God-awful deadly! If someone makes a .20 gauge semi-automatic assault rifle I MUST get one as soon as possible!

      • A 12 gauge bore diameter is 0.729 inches. A .20 gauge bore diameter would be around 2.88 inches, or just over 73mm. Considering the grenade launchers the US uses fires 40mm grenades, I’d say .20 gauge probably has a bit of a kick.

          • Carlos is obviously an anti-gun troll. These nuts seem to “know” so much that just isn’t true, but want to comment to express their “knowledge” to all the other leftist trolls and spread the mis-information. Their version of gangsta street credit.

        • @ Tim and MB,

          You guys clearly did not comprehend what he said. A 12 gauge has a larger bore than a 20 gauge. He was explaining IF a 0.20 gauge existed, it would have a 73mm bore, and a helluva lot of recoil. I didn’t see any anti-gun rhetoric. Just sarcasm that went way above your tiny heads.

          • @Setarip Where is the sarcasm? I see just an illogical statement….What point was conveyed with incorrect information that makes no sense.

        • “Police said they later searched Purcell’s car and found 102 live rounds of ammunition for a .20-gauge shotgun in his trunk on the school grounds.”
          He was replying to this! ((period)20-gauge). It was sarcasm. Just a reading comprehension problem.

    • A .20 gauge shotgun would have a bore diameter of approximately .123 inch. Smaller than a BB gun, but almost as deadly as an uninformed journalist.

        • PotG should know that “gauge” in this instance refers to “how many lead balls of that diameter = 1lb in mass”
          12ga: 12 lead balls of that diameter = 1lb
          20ga: 20 lead balls of that diameter = 1lb

          If .20ga existed: 1/5 of a lead ball of that diameter = 1lb; 1 lead ball of that diameter = 5lbs (FRIGGEN HUGE)

  3. Just WTF is it with Leftists and their pathological need to commit hoax crimes?

    And to be incompetent about it?

    • In the leftist mind you are either a victim or an oppressor. If no victim status can be found just manufacturer one. He probably felt bullied as an old white make in education and wanted so desperately to fit in. Had his hoax succeeded he’d be able to play the “gun culture gave me PTSD” card and that old spinster art teacher with all the cats might go on a date with him

    • Because there is so little REAL racism, sexism, islamophobia, and homophobia in this country you have to resort to FAKING it.

      And then of coarse they are so stupid they never take one second to think…”If I can’t find ACTUAL racism (etc) so that I have to hoax it maybe, just maybe, my belief is incorrect? Naaaah.”

  5. Glad they caught him on camera. I hate to imagine what he had in mind as a plan B if finding a single round of ammunition on the floor didn’t result in the school installing metal detectors.

      • “That sounds like a good way to postpone finals.”

        Here in Polk County (Insert banjos ‘twanging *here*), the students will be rioting hoping to find more loose ammo, like Dyspeptic mentioned…

      • In my high school the boys would but cherry bombs down the toilets to postpone finals.

        • It was *real* M-80s flushed down from the second story bathrooms (to get a nice first-floor rupture in the walls) action going in my ‘hi-skool’…

  9. A bunch of 20ga for his trunk gun and the one 9mm round?

    One stupid Fudd down, entirely too many to go…

    In case any other brainiacs are reading, live ammo is like illicit drugs; it costs money, so you don’t generally see it just lying around outside of a place where guns are used. It’s generally in boxes or magazines, so it doesn’t just “fall out of a pocket” and requires clearing a weapon to eject.

    I give him zero points for coming back 10min later; had he just appeared to be bending over to examine the round on camera, he’d be a free man today.

    Oh, and the most important question…will the school be getting metal detectors, now? The irony of the inevitable answer is multilayered.

    • “…will the school be getting metal detectors, now?”

      Yep, and the county will be unable to pay for it, so the taxpayers will eat an uppage in the property tax millage percentage…

  10. Play stupid games…. Liberalism is a disease. It is their religion, and their drug. They are depraved.

    The MAGA hat haters are even more deranged. It’s a freaking hat and you loose what little of your minds you have. Just like the reporter who took a picture of ear plugs and tweeted it out as rubber bullets. They give a bad name to freaks and circus geeks. Pretty bad when the guy in the cage biting off chicken heads is more sane than you.

  11. What did he teach, theater? I hope it was that or some bull like home ec and not math.

  12. It’s a felony to be in possession of a sinlge round of ammo in Mass without an FID or LTC, which it seems he only has a CT LTC, which has no reciprocity with Mass, so he’s going to be going away for a while so long as the DA charges him.

    It’s looney lib Mass, there’s a chance they may only hit him with misdemeanor charges of some sort that he’ll plea to and get away with community service.

    • “It’s a felony to be in possession of a sinlge round of ammo in Mass without an FID or LTC, …”

      I got so wrapped up in the idiocy of this guy that I didn’t even think of that. You even need an LTC to by ammo components.

      I’ll be interested to see if this guy is actually tried or pleaded down.

      • Massoschittholes is famous for downpleas when the perp is a liberal/democrat.
        Remember Teddy Kennedy and Chappaquiddick.

        Probably probation.

  13. “felony to be in possession of a sinlge round of ammo in Mass without an FID or LTC”. Holy crap. They’d have to lock up my whole damn state!

  15. Oh my God! One round of live ammo! It could have blown up and killed the entire city! (Ok, it’s Massachusetts, where people like a Draconian system of government).

  16. And I say, doofus! Asinine way to attempt to make a point. A piece of re-rod or ball of fencing would have made the same point.

  17. As much as I’d like to laugh…
    I can not count the amount of times I’ve found a misplaced .22 LR, 12g, etc in a pocket, cup holder or rolling around on the floor and forgot I had a hunting/range implement in the trunk or truck. Of course, I’ve never placed a round anywhere to incite panic.
    Also, I missed the memo that ammunition is ferrous therefor detectable by metal detector.

    • This is why I have separate bags for work, range, swimming, and other weekend.

  18. Shouldn’t the camera be first? Fingerprints would only get anywhere if his prints were in the system or they were already looking at him.

    • “Fingerprints would only get anywhere if his prints were in the system or they were already looking at him.”

      If he (was) a teacher, most states fingerprint and BC all school employees that have contact with students.

      TruthTellers above thinks he will likely get at least some time in lockup for not having a Mass. FOID card, so that biology teacher just might get some continuing ed. credit for an aspect of biology he may have thought he would never experience…

      *snicker* 😉

      If he does, I’d like to dedicate a song to him that might make his time in the slammer go just a little bit easier for him, compliments of ‘Frankie Goes to Hollywood’ :

      ‘Relax’

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WZ33w3B8Hw

  19. OK, I am a teacher and, when I first read the headline, I thought, Ya, I could imagine a forgotten round of ammunition dripping out of my pack.

    However, this article had a second level of dumb. As a teacher, it is important to know where the cameras are and what areas they cover. If you are in a spot with a student or parent that you have even the slightest concern for things going sideways, in any manner, on the list of important things to do is to be in a place that the cameras cover. You want those cameras if it ever turns into a “teacher hit me” vs “teacher used the minimum amount of force necessary to defend himself.” I have even seen “you do know, the cameras cover the spot we are in” to defuse situations.

    • “teacher hit me”

      Or ‘teacher grabbed my boob’. That’ll get you in even more trouble.

  20. ‘Purcell doesn’t seem terribly bright…’

    Well being a public school teacher should be your first clue.

  21. Since the cartridge in question consisted of brass, lead and copper (assuming typical 9 mm round), it’s highly questionable that it would set off a metal detector. Most screening detectors work by pulse induction, which requires the metal to have a degree of magnetism. Brass, lead and copper have very low PI ratings.

    • A few years ago I walked right through a metal detector at a courthouse with a speed strip of 6 .357 magnum rounds and it didn’t go off. I remembered to leave the gat in the car but forgot about the speed strip until after I was in, so I just kept my mouth shut.

  22. 102 rounds of .20 gauge?

    So, with propellant, wads, primers and wadding that’s what, over half a ton of ammunition?

    • It’s too late for me, or I’m lazy and that’s my excuse. Can someone do the math?
      A .20 gauge would mean that a round ball of this diameter would be five pounds…

    • Exactly. Another edu-moron instructing your children. I remember this clown. A few years’ back, the “Teechurz” in his school went on strike and were marching in front of the school. This dweeb had to be left behind. Even with two hours of practice, he couldn’t master marching in a circle.

  27. After working with thousands of mental patients and convicts, at first glance, he don’t even look balanced. Good point brought up, let’s see how Mass plays this out and if he truly gets bitten by the snake in his box.
    A couple years ago, a thing teens are pro criminals are doing now in a local city is checking open cars for guns to steal or stealing them from homes they know locally from Facebook pics, etc. Well, some of the high school kids had a pretty tight group that weren’t getting caught and during the day at school, the motor heads go to a separate facility called the academy for car stuff, right. Well, they were bringing in their own vehicles to an auto class that was run by a young man, not much older than the teen’s he taught. Somehow he either found one of the stolen guns that were left in their cars overnight or they gave him one for whatever reason, etc. A maintenance man was cleaning the restroom in this area and noticed some loose ceiling tiles, so he took a look and found 9mm loaded with extra clips hidden up there. The local news said that the auto teacher said he found it in a car and didn’t know what to do with it, so he hid it for the time being. I called BS pronto and called a detective there I know and told him to go slow and hold his feet to the fire a little closer and be patient and not accept his statement just yet as truth. Sure enough, a week later he cracked and spilled the beans on the teen’s he got it from and seems he was thinking of how to get it out of the building or leave it there for protection from the teen’s who were on his class in case they had a mass shooting. He’s gone now and got a few charges, but pretty light compared to what this dipstick did intentionally on the left.
    My detective buddy got promoted to Captain, as I helped him solve two stolen gun cases in less than a year just based off the local news information I got and people I know in that area. Too bad the detective let it go to his head/ego, as the last lead I had on a crime, he referred me to his Sargent, his former position. I like to work with the same people or not at all, so I said “Goodbye” and hung up. Their getting paid and the credit for it, not me, so screw him now.
    Kids..

  29. The article alludes to the supposed fact that he will be losing his job…. LOL…. FUNNY…
    THEY WILL PROMOTE THIS GUY!!!!!
    He needs that round of 9mm shoved down his FKN THROAT till he chokes to death… Lol…
    a little too far? Maybe, but like was also stated in a comment, WHAT WILL HE DO NEXT????

  30. Taxpayers are going to save a bundle on this. He won’t get serious jail time but that pension is gone. That’s where the real money goes.

  31. Rant about an “epidemic” that doesn’t exiist then backfill with bullshit.
    Classic.

  32. Had my high school installed metal detectors, I would have gladly walked in with a pocket full of nuts and bolts. After that I would assert my rights under the fourth amendment. I would repeat that exercise daily.

  33. Teacher harming no one with “arsenal” in his car stages fake arms on campus event, also harming no one, to encourage more restrictions n searches like the ones that didn’t stop him.

  34. School camera surveillance allows terrorist test-case to place fake danverous device, then come back for a selfie.

    “We know exactly who we didn’t stop.” said a spokesthing.

  35. In the ‘70’s and ‘80’s I taught in AZ. At least once a month a student (7-9 yrs. old) would bring a live cartridge, usually but not always a .22 lr, to school to show his friends and brag about going shooting with his dad, uncle, etc. (Sorry ladies, I’m sure some of the girls went shooting, but I don’t remember any bringing their ammo to school.) We didn’t panic, didn’t go ballistic on the student, didn’t call SWAT, just collected the live ammo, reviewed the school rules with the student, and sent a note home requesting that a parent come to school to retrieve the ammo. The only time I ever got upset was when I caught a repeat offender about to hit a live .22 round with a rock while 5-6 of his friends gathered around. He went to the principal and was suspended for~a week. Later that same year, he brandished a small, (1.75 in. blade) lock blade knife on the playground during recess. Another suspension, no expulsion; ahh.. the ‘80’s….
    I think it’s interesting that the commenters who can’t resist making snarky, rude remarks about teachers are the ones who can’t spell 3rd grade words and obviously have no idea how to use periods, commas or apostrophes (no ‘s needed).

  36. Privacy. You have no privacy. Cameras are every where. And those with Alexia in your phone everyone is listening to you as well. 1984 has been embraced by the public without government efforts.
    Im glad he was caught on camera.

  37. A LIVE 9mm round?

    Why, was it walking around and talking to people? Inquiring minds want to know.
    If it’s laying on the floor, maybe it was just sick, or died from it’s injuries.

  38. Perhaps the Teacher in his frustration with the Conservative tight wad Neanderthals that ran the School board he simply decided to sacrifice himself for the lives of his students. If anything this man should be regarded as a hero not a villain. Since when in the hell is it dishonorable to try and save your students lives. Metal detectors can and do save lives and even if they only were used when there is a known impending threat without them it lets the nut cases simply walk in and start shooting. Really this is not rocket science to anyone who is not mentally challenged.

    • I appreciate your willingness to give him the benefit of good intentions gone awry, but he could have raised the issue repeatedly with his employer, the news media, MA department of education, etc. without sacrificing his career and possibly his freedom. Better to be a gadfly than a jailbird. I think he was seeking his 15 minutes of fame more than students’ safety.

    • If you were serious about student safety, vlad, you would be advocating for armed school staff, including teachers to protect the students. But we know you have no concern for the students.

      You’re a simple, ‘America bad’ troll.

  39. How many hoaxes have been perpetrated that advance socially conservative causes?

    • Well since photographic evidence is now the standard that means the conservatives were all correct. Since you don’t have photographic evidence to disprove them correct?

      In Virginia gun rights people use hidden microphones to catch reporters lying about them.

  40. Why is it a crime to bring ammo to a school? Ammo is a legal product and harmless without a firearm.

    Meanwhile heroin, weed, fentanyl, crack etc… are rife in schools with nary a complaint from the SJWs.

    And dont forget the school nurses office, filled with Ritalin, depressants, anti depressants, transgendering drugs etc etc…. thats all gubmint approved.

  42. Thanks to the police department there for quickly and publicly bringing this hoax out into the open.

  43. Good thing they had cameras in the stairwell. Otherwise, every school in the district would have gone on “Lockdown”, because, you know, those bullets can just become “active shooters” and fire themselves (because it’s the inanimate object that causes the violence, according to the lamestream media).

    Also, good thing he dropped a 9mm bullet (or was it a .9mm ?) rather than the “.20 gauge” shells (five-pounder cannonballs) that they found in his car, because someone could have tripped over a 0.20 gauge five-pound cannonball. A .20 gauge shotgun would make one helluva punt gun, five pounds of lead per shot!

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