A San Marino High School senior was arrested Monday morning after a text the student sent to a group of friends threatening extreme physical harm to one of the recipients was discovered by the FBI, causing a lockdown of San Marino High School.
The student, who is a minor, was released at 5:00 p.m. Monday evening, according to a family member. The threat was reportedly intended as a prank among friends, but mentioned the shooting of one of the recipients by the subject. In an apparent effort to disguise the source of the threat, the subject outlined a plan to “[come] to your school [Monday]” to follow through with the threat, apparently lending further credibility. One source told The Tribune the text message was sent through an application that can disguise the identity of the sender.
San Marino Police Chief John Incontro told The Tribune that the FBI in Washington, D.C. received an anonymous tip about the text message on Sunday. By Monday morning, the FBI determined the source and recipient of the text message and informed the West Covina branch of the FBI, who this morning at 6:20 placed a call to Incontro. Incontro initiated a conference call that included San Marino High School Principal Dr. Issaic Gates, Superintendent Loren Kleinrock and Assistant Superintendent Linda de la Torre. At 6:45 a.m., it was agreed that the campus should be locked down.
Detectives from the San Marino Police Dept. were dispatched to interview the recipient and the apparent source of the threats. Officers also arrived at San Marino High School to search and secure the campus, which was occupied by students attending classes and activities during “zero hour,” a class period that runs from 7:00–7:54 a.m.
The subject—who is a juvenile—was arrested shortly after 9:00 a.m. for making criminal threats and was taken to a local juvenile detention facility.
“Apparently, someone at the FBI believed it was serious enough to get involved,” Incontro added.
School Board President Lisa Link was contacted early in the morning and went immediately to the SMHS campus.
“The first and immediate goal was to secure the campus and confirm that all students, faculty and staff who were already on campus were in safe locations with access to food, water, and restrooms,” Link said. “Once there was a police presence protecting the various entry points on the campus, the next priority was communicating with faculty and staff who were on their way to work, and then with parents and students who were not yet on campus. While any inconvenience to parents’ and students’ schedules is not desirable, we appreciate the community’s understanding that the safety of our students who were already on campus was the overriding priority.”
Link was grateful for the police response.
“On behalf of the Board of Education, I thank Chief John Incontro, Commander Aaron Blondé, the San Marino Police Department and other local police departments for all of their outstanding efforts to provide a safe and secure environment on the San Marino High School campus this morning,” Link said on Monday afternoon. “Our gratitude extends as well to Principal Gates, District administrators, and the teachers and staff who were on campus during the lockdown. It is obviously very distressing to hear about threats of violence against our students and to have to lock down a school campus, but it is reassuring to know that the SMPD and the District effectively worked together to follow established protocols to ensure our students’ safety.”
Incontro said that a total of eleven officers from the Pasadena, San Gabriel, Alhambra and South Pasadena Police Departments were dispatched to the campus and that the SMPD this morning held over its four officers from the overnight shift and called in another five officers and a sergeant to respond to the threat and police the community.
“Once we secured the campus, we focused on the investigative leads,” Incontro told The Tribune. “Once we spoke to the victim and the subject, there was nothing to lead us to believe there was another threat at San Marino High School or any of the District’s other campuses.”
Incontro also said that the subject was “very cooperative” when contacted by police.
