HOUSTON -- Harris County probation board members are demanding answers after an unplugged metal detector allowed a 16-year-old boy with a loaded handgun into the Juvenile Detention Center, KPRC Local 2 reported Wednesday.

The judges on the board were not gentle with juvenile director Harvey Hetzel.

"It scares the living daylights out of all of us. We want to know what you are going to do today to take care of the problem," said Judge Lisa Millard.

Hetzel told the board that a staff member unplugged the metal detector that led to an armed teen sneaking in a pistol.

And that detector may have been unplugged for a month or more. Officials said it had been malfunctioning before that.

"We're very lucky that nobody got killed," Harris County Judge Ed Emmett said.

Hetzel suspended two supervisors, but he could not tell the board exactly who had unplugged the detector, or if anyone had reported it was broken.

"Are you just going to accept everybody saying we don't know and I don't remember?" Judge John F. Phillips said.

"No sir. We are going to go and we are going to interview all of the staff that could have been involved," Hetzel said.

"It's unacceptable. There's no way around it. And what's particularly unacceptable is going on two weeks we don't have any answers who knew what and when," Emmett said.

"We've got to figure out a policy where this cannot happen again," Judge Michael Schneider said.

The board gave Hetzel 48 hours to get some answers and report back.

"You know the buck stops with me. I'm upset this happened and I'm responsible," he said.

The incident occurred on Nov. 6 when the 16-year-old was brought to the downtown detention center for probation violations.

Investigators said he smuggled a .25-caliber pistol into his cell after being searched by police and detention center staff.

The pistol was discovered after another inmate alerted guards.