The man accused of plotting a mass shooting at State College Area High School will remain jailed while his case proceeds toward trial.
Centre County Judge Julia Rater bound over to court charges of conspiracy to commit murder and unlawful possession of a firearm against 20-year-old Braeden Phillips, of Milroy, after a 90-minute preliminary hearing on Wednesday at the Centre County Correctional Facility. The hearing was held at the jail because of a power outage at the courthouse.
Rater also denied a request by defense attorney Matt McClenahen to set cash bail for Phillips, a former State High student who has been incarcerated at the Centre County Correctional Facility since he was charged on April 12.
McClenahen said the case against his client was “weak.”
“I do believe that the defendant poses a threat to the public,” Rater said. “Had the events occurred, this would have been terrible.”
Owen Smith, 20, was among four former and current State High students to testify. He said that Phillips discussed details of the plan on five occasions starting in late February. Phillips, Smith said, initially texted him and told him something important. During their conversation Phillips was nervous and pacing as he told Smith that he and a friend had an “idea to shoot up State High,” Smith said.
The friend is a juvenile student who has not to date been charged.
Smith said that in subsequent conversations, Phillips talked about using AR-style rifle and pistols and about making bombs to plant in the school during the planned attack. Phillips, he said, also brought a modified Glock pistol that Smith noted had a working slide and magazine.
Phillips also mentioned a “hit list” of people he wanted to kill, Smith said. The list was on Phillips phone and Smith testified he would not show it to him, saying he learned later from others the named of some of the people on it.
The attack was planned for April 21, Phillips allegedly told Smith, and would be carried out when the morning bell rang. He said Smith initially planned it for April 20, which was the 26th anniversary of the Columbine High School shooting, but changed it to April 21 because April 20 was a Sunday. Police wrote in an affidavit of probable cause that the shooting was planned for the main staircase, with explosive devices planted in restrooms as part of a coordinated attack.
Mattie Vickers, 18, testified that Phillips discussed the plan while in the car with her in early April, saying it would happen “soon.” Vickers said that when she asked him if her friend should go to school that day, Phillips said “she should go to watch it happen.”
In another conversation, Vickers said Phillips told her he had “enough bullets for the people he wanted to kill.”
A 16-year-old student testified that he did not know Phillips well but was in the car with him and the juvenile when they began to discuss guns, asked him who he would want to shoot and asked if he wanted a gun.
Abigail Smith, 18, said she heard Phillips discuss the plan in late February and that he showed her a picture of of a gun to be used in the shooting.
On cross examination, McClenahen pressed each of the witnesses on why they didn’t go to the police. Another person who learned of the alleged plot from one of the witnesses was the first to report it to school security.
Each said that they did not at first believe that Phillips was serious, and when they did start to think it was possible they were scare he would attack them or their family members.
McClenahen also pointed out contradictions in testimony about when witnesses said they learned details of the alleged plot and their reasons for not informing school officials or law enforcement.
State College police Detective Craig Ripka testified that a search of Phillips’ residence found several shotguns and accompanying ammo, as well .223 ammo, but not a semi-automatic rifle that would be able to fire it. A search of Phillips’ phone yielded evidence that Phillips had made layaway payments on such a firearm, Ripka said.
Investigators, which included borough police detectives, Homeland Security agents and state police, also did not find a Glock but did find an airsoft pistol designed to look like a Glock, Ripka testified. It was not, Ripka said, the gun described by Owen Smith.
Law enforcement also did not find any bombs, components or instructions for making them, a manifesto or a suicide note, Ripka testified.
When interviewed by detectives, Phillips denied having any involvement in the plot, Ripka said, adding that Phillips said he did not have a hit list but did have a “shit list.”
Police have not found a hit list, but Chief John Gardner said earlier this month that if police learned of anyone at risk, they would be notified and officers would “safety plan” with them.
Ripka noted that after Phillips was charged, State High installed safety measures including metal detectors, which have since been removed, and screenings that caused significant delays to classes. On the day the alleged attack was planned for, half of the student body was absent, along with a number of faculty and staff.
In asking for the conspiracy to commit murder charge to be dismissed and cash bail of $100,000, McClenahen said prosecutors showed no evidence of overt action in furtherance of the crime and that there was insufficient evidence to show Phillips planned to carry out a plan for an attack on the school.
“What we have is various young people talking about a hypothetical plot, maybe a fantasy, but nothing overt,” McClenahen said.
“There never was a plot to attack the school. Never was going to happen. It could not have happened. And we should all be happy about that,” he later added.
First Assistant District Attorney Joshua Andrews said setting $100,000 bail would be “wildly inappropriate,” that testimony and evidence showed Phillips had taken measures to carry out a detailed plan and that the witnesses feared retribution.
“I’ll say for the record that I did find the testimony of the witnesses today to be credible, even though there might have been, some things that were contradictory,” Rater said.
“I do believe that every witness testified to the best of their ability to be credible, as I perceived it sitting up here.”
The date for Phillips’ formal arraignment has not yet been set.
