Lexington High School student charged with threatening to ‘shoot up’ school
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A student at Lexington High School has been charged with making a threat against the school.
The student, who is not being identified by authorities because he is under 18, had posted on social media that he would “shoot up the school,” the Lexington County Sheriff’s Department said in a news release.
“The FBI became aware of the threat early this morning after receiving a community tip,” Lexington County Sheriff Jay Koon said in a statement. “Agents alerted us and we followed up with an investigation based on our standard procedure when these come in.”
The student was never on campus at Lexington High School on Friday, the sheriff’s department said. Sheriff’s deputies and FBI agents arrived at the student’s home Friday morning before he left for school. He was charged after law enforcement interviewed the child and his parents.
The sheriff’s department said the student was motivated by a social media trend that encouraged students to disrupt the last day of school before the winter break by calling in threats. School districts in the Midlands have warned students against participating in the trend.
Schools across the country have been on edge since a school shooting in Oxford, Michigan, late last month left four students dead. The same week of the Michigan shooting, some parents at Chapin High School pulled students out of school amid what school officials later called “debunked” social media rumors that a student had a gun on campus.
In the S.C. Midlands, schools have highlighted security measures and training for dealing with violence on campus to reassure families locally, including their close working relationship with law enforcement.
This is the third student in Lexington County charged with making threats against their school in the past two weeks.
“The safety and security of all who learn and work at our county’s schools is one of our top priorities,” Koon said. “We’re committed to investigate such threats and we’ll always take them seriously.”
The student was released to the custody of his parents after being charged. He will appear in Lexington County Family Court at a later date.
This story was originally published December 17, 2021 at 3:37 PM.
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