mrabet farid's video: mock massacre as staff and students prepare for another Sandy Hook

Police are staging 'mock massacres' to teach schools how to cope if a lone gunman targets their campus - covering students in fake blood and pretending to kill the shooters on sight. These dramatic images show officers firing at two troubled students, played by actors, who were brought under control after appearing to shoot at a lunchtime school crowd in California. The lesson for up to 100 students and adult teachers at Petersen Alternative Center for Education in Modesto, California, was designed to help prevent a repeat of the Sandy Hook massacre. But the shocking scenes drew criticism from campaigners who fear stunts may actually encourage copycat crimes. As the scene developed, one shooter was wounded by responding officers while another hid in a classroom. Then after a simulated 911 was dialled, SWAT team members arrived and went from room to room as 20 injured students lay writing in blood-red paint either unconscious or crying for help. With the deaths of the 20 children and six teachers killed at the Connecticut school in December still fresh in everyone's mind the scenario proved to be realistic, and highly controversial. Aanisah Watkins, 18, with the Youth Entertainment Stage Company, told The Modesto Bee she felt intimidated even though she knew it was just an exercise. As part of the simulation she was barricaded in a locked classroom, with a teacher and other pupils outside. Then actors screamed and cried outside for help. 'You felt helpless, knowing you couldn't help them,' said Aanisah. 'My heart was racing, even though I knew what would happen,' said 19-year-old Denise Maldonado, a Sheriff's Department Explorer who was the first to be hit, with red streaks painted on her face showing her injuries from the loud but harmless blast. 'I knew I was the one who had to set the tone, the emotion, the craziness.' Gretchen Leuenhagen one of the teachers at the school said the experience meant she had to confront what it would be like to protect her students during a gun attack. 'Your first instinct is you're scared, but as the adult, you know you have to help them,' she said. With her actor students, she hid in the locked bathroom and called the simulated 911 every few minutes for updates. As they hid the group debated what to do if the gunman broke in. She said that her final verdict was that she would attack them with a chair, giving her students time to run. The school has 60 to 100 students on campus who have been expelled from other school districts, Sheriff's department spokesman Anthony Bejaran said it took more than 30 minutes for deputies to get the screaming students after they had finished their classroom searches. 'The human portion of you says, "I have got to get help for this person," but I cannot get them help until we get this place secure," said Sheriff's Department spokesman . The whole scenario was filmed and will soon be distributed to schools and law enforcement agencies nationwide. However there was some criticism of the lesson, with one reader posting: 'I just find it disturbing that they pretend kids are killing kids and then advertise it all over the newspaper. Do your pretend child killings in private.This won't prevent anything. Why don't the police pretend a guy came into the police department with an automatic weapon and killed dozens of cops? The debate over the right to carry a firearm is in full swing - President Obama was in Minnesota yesterday as he tries to win over popular support for a ban against assault rifles and his call for universal background checks. Mr Obama argued that there's bipartisan support for universal background checks and for gun trafficking laws. But, acknowledging the political challenges he faces, he would say only that the assault weapons ban deserves a vote in Congress.