UNDERCOVER EFFORT NETS 17 ARRESTS

Romona High School: Police Say 13 Students Were Targeted, Mostly For
Pot-Related Drug Offenses.

RIVERSIDE - Thirteen Ramona High School students and four adults have
been arrested in a three-month undercover investigation into drug
activity at the school that ended Dec. 6.

Riverside police spokesman Steven Frasher declined to discuss details
of the arrests, including what prompted police to focus on Ramona
High. Frasher said most of the arrests involved marijuana.

Frasher said the adults arrested were not connected with the
school.

Dianne Pavia, spokeswoman for the Riverside Unified School District,
said police approached the district about doing an undercover drug
operation at one of the high schools. Pavia said she did not know why
Ramona was picked.

Ramona Principal Mike Neece said he didn't know there was an
undercover officer in his school until October, when he became
suspicious. He said the officer was hanging out with a lot of
different groups of students, which is unusual. Then, Neece said,
police called to tell him what was happening.

Neece said police didn't find the volume of drug sales they expected.
But he said he wouldn't have been surprised if there had been more.

"At any public high school in America, if you think there's no drug
activity at all going on on campus, you're foolish," Neece said.
"Everything that exists in society comes to school every day."

Neece said he worries that the targeting of Ramona High will further
stigmatize the school.

"We've worked so hard in the last three years to make Ramona not seem
like a second-class place," Neece said.

Neece said students caught in drug activity on campus will receive a
five-day suspension, followed by an expulsion hearing.

Outside of Ramona High Monday, students said all of the arrests
happened the day the investigation ended, and word spread fast.

"Everybody knew," said George Mawad, 17, with a laugh.

The students said the undercover officer just showed up in class one
day.

"They said he was, like, 23, 24," Mawad said.

"But he looked like 15," said Anna Olan, 16, finishing his
sentence.

Mawad said one of the students arrested was a good friend of his --
and a 4.0 student.

Mawad, Olan and Albert Vieira, 15, all said it was easy to buy
marijuana, or any other drug, in or around the school. The students
said they're regularly approached by people wanting to sell them
drugs or asking where they can buy drugs.

"They just assume you smoke pot," Vieira said. "I've been asked to
buy pills, crack."

Mawad said, "Don't get me wrong, it is a really good school. But the
whole thing about drugs, that's going to be everywhere."

For the time being, they said, most students have taken their drug
dealing elsewhere.

"Everybody is so paranoid now, I swear," Mawad said. "Everybody is
looking out for a narc."