No criminal background check could have warned the parents in Oley, Pa., that a school bus driver would disappear with their children.
No warning signs flashed that Otto Nuss, 63, would pick up 13 children from Oley Valley High School on Thursday and not take them six miles to Berks Christian Academy in Birdsboro, Pa. Five frantic hours later in Landover Hills, Md., police found the children unharmed and said Nuss had a loaded rifle in the school bus.
Cindy Calcagno, assistant transportation director for the Oley Valley School District, said Nuss behaved normally before he went to pick up the children that morning.
Nuss went through a criminal background and child abuse check and had to pass a commercial driver's test before being hired to drive a school bus, Calcagno said. According to the National Association of Pupil Transportation, 40 states have mandatory criminal and drug and alcohol background checks.
"This case is such an anomaly. … We've heard about bus hijackings but none of us can ever recall a bus driver hijacking his own bus," said Mike Martin, executive director of NAPT. "And I don't know if you could ever prevent someone from hijacking their own bus if they chose to do so."
The children, ages 7 to 15, are now back in Oley after being reunited with their parents at the Prince George's County police station Thursday night. According to an FBI affidavit, Nuss had a M-1A .308 caliber semiautomatic rifle that was found behind the driver's seat, covered by a coat. Some of the children, FBI officials said in the affidavit, saw the weapon and feared Nuss was going the kill them. One, according to the affidavit, wrote 9-1-1 in reverse in a fogged window.
Nuss faces charges of federal kidnapping and is scheduled to appear in court today.
The Mystery Surrounding the Rifle
Police do not know why Nuss drove his 13 young passengers past their intended destination and took them to Maryland and why he was carrying a loaded rifle. Nuss, the FBI said, told authorities that he only wanted to show them Washington, D.C. However, it remains unclear how Nuss, who police say is a licensed hunter, was able to get his weapon on the school bus.
Martin said when school bus drivers report to work, they are supposed to get their keys and check their vehicles. However, their supervisors are supposed to watch them as they make their checks, watching for any unusual behavior or signs of unstable behavior or drug or alcohol-induced impairment.
It would be difficult for drivers to smuggle weapons into buses, Martin said, because they usually drive the same vehicles every day, and those vehicles are inspected after their shifts.
Sending a Message Parents, experts say, may have to take a more spontaneous and proactive approach to protecting their children instead of relying on background checks and warning signs.
"There's no easy way of assuring that children will be safe, that something like this won't happen again," said Richard Krugman, dean of the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center School of Medicine. "Parents can volunteer to ride along on buses, randomly pop in to observe their children's events to make sure the environment that they're in is safe. It sends a message that they care about their children and are monitoring their safety."
Industry experts hope that Thursday's episode does not weaken parents' confidence for their children's safety on school buses. One incident involving one driver does not reflect the school bus driving safety measures as a whole.
Martin suggested that a system of sharing criminal databases should be developed from state to state as sometimes background checks do not go back far enough or include other states. That, he said, will prevent criminals from crossing state lines and getting bus driving or coaching jobs.
"Parents should know the systems are in place for protecting their kids," Martin stressed. "I hope there's not a parental backlash because of one crackpot."
Photo Copyright Don Murray / GEtty Images
