New Baldwin principal removed after gun found in his car at school

Michael Smith, the principal of Baldwin Middle-Senior High School, was removed Tuesday after police discovered a loaded handgun in his car at the school, district officials say. In a message to Baldwin families, the district said, “Although this situation does not appear to have involved any intent to cause harm, firearms on a school campus are both dangerous and illegal.”

In a press conference Tuesday afternoon, Superintendent Christopher Bernier said the Duval School Police Department had received an anonymous tip earlier in the day about the possibility of a gun in Smith’s car. Bernier said he instructed Police Chief Jackson Short to investigate, and with the help of the department’s K-9 Maverick, specially trained in weapons detection, the gun was found in the center console of Smith’s car.

Short said Smith, 48, received a citation, and the State Attorney’s Office will determine criminal charges. Jacksonville Today asked the prosecutor’s office if they’d received the case but did not receive a response by this story’s publication.

Bernier said the incident is the third time since he became superintendent — about two years ago — that an employee was found to have a gun on a school campus.

“At no time is it safe for anyone to be on our campuses with a gun,” Bernier said. “Somebody who violates the safety and the sanctity of our school buildings like this deserves our full attention.”

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Bernier said Smith has been removed from his post as principal and told to stay off all school campuses while the district conducts its own professional standards investigation.

Previous investigations of Smith

This will be the district’s fourth professional standards investigation of Smith in the last decade. As first reported by Jacksonville Today last week, Smith faced allegations of what staff and parents deemed inappropriate behavior toward female students in 2016, 2022 and 2024.

The district ruled the 2016 incident substantiated and disciplined Smith over it. The other two investigations ended in a determination of not substantiated, though the most recent one resulted in discipline via coaching, and Smith was reassigned to a new school midyear.

Leading Baldwin

Smith was assigned to Baldwin six weeks ago after its previous principal was arrested and charged with failure to report child abuse alleged to have been committed by a teacher, James Mulvey.

Bernier said Tuesday that the district had been “actively addressing” community concern over the allegations in Smith’s personnel file, but he stressed that the gun incident was unrelated.

“We’ve been looking at our hiring process, the way we go about it,” Bernier said. “There’s no way in a hiring process you would foresee this poor judgment, but the reality of it, ‘see something, say something’ worked. Somebody turned this in, we acted on it immediately, and today we know we have even a safer, safer school community because of that tip.”