RICHLAND — An eighth-grader at Gull Lake Middle School is facing expulsion after he hid a handgun on school grounds as part of a plan to runaway from home with two friends and "live off the land," school officials said Wednesday.

The boy, whose name has not been released, was arrested Tuesday by Kalamazoo County sheriff's deputies and is being held in the county juvenile home on charges of carrying a concealed weapon and bringing a loaded weapon onto school property, Lt. Jim VanDyken said.

Gull Lake Community Schools Superintendent Christopher Rundle said the incident began to unfold Monday night when the boy stole the family car and ran away from home. He then traveled to a local Walmart to pick up a girl from his school and the Hickory Corners post office to pick up a boy, but neither of them showed up.

Rundle said the boy's parents notified school officials Tuesday morning that their son had run away or had been kidnapped and that their vehicle was missing. A district bus driver later spotted the family's vehicle in the staff parking lot at the middle school and an assistant principal confronted the boy inside the building just after 7:30 a.m.

Rundle said the assistant principal searched the boy and found .22-caliber rounds in the boy's pocket.

Rundle said the principal asked the boy where the gun was and the boy led the principal to the school's back parking lot where he had buried a. 22-caliber pistol under some crushed rock.

Rundle said the boy told school officials the gun belonged to his grandfather and he had taken it from his home to use it to hunt for food.

“It's not a situation where students and staff were in danger,” Rundle said. It was a situation where he had a loaded gun on the property … and it was in our possession through the cooperation of the boy.

“They were going to live off the land and hunt squirrels and things.”

Rundle said state law requires that the boy be expelled for bringing the weapon onto school property. He said he will recommend expulsion for the boy to the district's school board at its next meeting, Nov. 21.

Contact Rex Hall Jr. at rhall@kalamazoogazette.com or 269-388-7784.