Campus school resource officers responded to the scrum Tuesday and learned that the two students involved were arguing about the stolen computers, officials said.
Michael Hernandez, 18, had participated in at least two burglaries last summer at Clement Middle School, and sold numerous laptops to friends at up to $200 apiece, Redlands police spokesman Carl Baker alleged.
Hernandez was arrested on suspicion of burglary and possession of stolen property. Police believe Hernandez and two juveniles broke classroom windows to enter the school and took at least three Apple iBook laptops, a desk-top, a projector and computer charger, valued together at $9,000.
Twenty more laptops taken from the school are still missing, Baker said, and authorities believe Hernandez and the other two suspects may have sold those as well.
Although numerous laptops had been taken, the teens who had purchased the computers had been passing one computer charger among them, Baker said.
When someone lost that charger, the fight broke out. Police didn’t name the teens involved in the fight.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on December 5, 2006. Read the original PDF.