Reports from the Clark County Sheriff’s Office and a conversation with a student who was present at the scene, give vivid detail to the melee at a Vancouver school that led to nine arrests and 27 emergency expulsions.

The clash between students and officials began during an all-district eighth-grade basketball tournament at Gaiser Middle School on the evening of March 15.

Tia Lee, 14, an eighth-grader at Jason Lee Middle School in Vancouver, is one of the students who was emergency expelled, which means that the school district has 10 days to evaluate the evidence and decide if she and the others will be permanently expelled or if they will be allowed to return to school.

According to Lee, trouble began when a circulating rumor caused one boy to confront another in the stands.

When the confrontational boy was asked to leave the stands, Lee said, “he apparently didn’t move fast enough so he was dragged off the bleachers by the school staff.”

From there, Lee said, he was taken out of the school.

Other students followed the school staff and the student as they left the building. According to a statement from Vancouver Public Schools, the students “interfered” with the process of removing the student.

Outside, Lee said, the student “was pinned up against the brick wall outside of Gaiser.”

Lee said the kids watched and tried to figure what was going on.

In their statement, Vancouver Public Schools said the other students, who were from a variety of schools in the area, “continued to interfere with the actions of security staff.”

At that point, the school’s security staff called the police and canceled the tournament, telling all students to leave.

“Once the police showed up,” Lee said, “is when everyone started getting more intense.”

Narratives from some of the officers who arrived on the scene describe a “riot situation,” where students were yelling at officers, using racial slurs and gendered curse words, while simultaneously calling the police racists and murderers.

The names of the minors involved, and their family members, have been redacted from the reports.

The reports say that between 50 and 70 children surrounded school officials and deputies. When the officials asked the students to move, they refused. A coach who was on the scene also asked the kids to move, and they began to comply, but didn’t leave school grounds.

“The aggressors were yelling several things to include, ‘cops are murderers,’ ‘you are all racist pigs,’ ‘we know our rights, we don't have to leave’ just to name a few,” wrote Deputy Scott Kirgiss. “The situation was extremely tense and there were now over 20 deputies, officers and troopers on scene.”

The melee continued as Deputy Jeffrey Ruppel detained the original student who was taken from the gym.

According to Ruppel’s report, the boy resisted arrest, “flailing his body and spinning, trying to break my grip and get away.”

Ruppel said that as he struggled with the boy, who managed at one point to free an arm, other students rushed the pair and tried to pull the boy away.

“Several kids were trying to run behind me, still cursing and making threats to hurt me,” Ruppel wrote. “The crowd of over 50 was advancing around all adults.”

According to his account, Ruppel managed to get the boy handcuffed and in the patrol car and left the scene. But the fracas continued and other reports say that students continued threatening, and in some cases attempting, to assault officers.

“One in particular,” wrote Sgt. Brian Ellithorpe in his report, “threw a pine cone toward the officer however due to the light weight of the pine cone it did not make it to the officer.”

“One juvenile at one point yelled at several deputies to take off their uniforms and fight them like a real man,” wrote Sgt. Melissa Sager.

Another student spit gum at an officer.

The brawl escalated as officers tried to get the students to leave the school, though Lee said there wasn’t really anywhere to go because students weren’t supposed to leave without an adult.

Over 30 officers were called to the scene.

“I saw a young male in a red hoodie, with hair protruding out of it, who had already been identified to me as a potential assailant, who had said something to the effect of, ‘I want to punch a cop’ being told to get off the property by a deputy,” wrote Sgt. Jason Granneman. “I saw the male go into the middle of NE 99th Street, stop and flex both his hands down and scream.”

Officers began arresting more students who refused to comply with their orders. Not all the arrested students cooperated even after their arrests.

“When I tried to identify [redacted] she was somewhat difficult,” Ellithorpe. “She would only tell me her name, not the spelling, telling me to ‘figure it out.’ Eventually she spelled her first and last names for me. When asked her middle name she said ’FU.’”

Both Lee’s account and the police reports support that idea that race was an issue during the confrontation.

Vancouver police have been part of three fatal officer-involved shootings in February and March.

“[Redacted] stated he was mad cause his friend was arrested and didn't think it was right,” Sager wrote. “He stated; ‘The white kid started the fight, but all you pigs care about is killing blacks.’ I asked [redacted] why he didn't leave the school when instructed to do so and he didn't think cops could make you leave a school.”

Lee said she saw two students run from the police. One was arrested, she said, and one was let go. The boy who was let go was white, she said, and the other was not.

Vancouver Public Schools have yet to determine the fate of the 27 expelled students.

“School administrators are reviewing video of the incident and will respond with appropriate disciplinary actions,” Superintendent Steve Webb said in a statement earlier this week. “The behavior displayed on Friday night will not be tolerated, and every student involved will be held accountable.”

Lee said she was expelled for taking the video and very much hopes she will be allowed to go back to school.

She also hopes that both kids and police will get better training in how to interact with each other.

Ultimately, nine students between the ages of 13 and 15 were arrested on charges including trespass, failure to disperse, third-degree and fourth-degree assault, disorderly conduct and resisting arrest.

According to The Columbian, two of those teens, a 13-year-old boy and a 14-year-old girl, appeared in court on felony charges on Monday. The other seven face misdemeanor charges.