BAKER COUNTY, Fla. — A threat made on social media led to the lockdown of five schools in Bradford County on Friday.
The lockdown has since been lifted, but the boy police say triggered the lock down could be in big trouble with the law.
Capt. Barry Warren with the Starke Police Department said this could've been a dangerous situation.
If this threat would've been carried out, Warren said it could've done a lot of harm. Authorities decided to lock down several schools, including Bradford Middle School because there are several schools close to one another and they didn't want to take any chances.
Right around 3:15 p.m., Bradford Middle students were being let out for the day, but right before lunch time it was a much different scene.
"About 11:40 this morning we locked down, basically a code red lock down of five schools," Warren said.
Those five schools were Bradford Middle, Bradford High School, Bradford-Union Technical Center, Starke Elementary School, Southside Elementary School and also the school district offices.
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"This lock down came to fruition due to some threats made by a student who is already on some disciplinary issues," Warren said.
Warren said the threats were made on social media by a 13-year-old boy who is assigned to a local alternative school.
"Made some threats on social media pertaining to starting a fire as well as killing unnamed or unknown amount of people," Warren said.
The student was arrested off campus.
The Bradford County School District sent out an alert on social media and also through email but no text messages or phone calls went out to parents.
A school spokesperson says the incident was resolved quickly which is why they didn't call or text parents.
Angela Cornwall, who has a child in two schools that were locked down, said she would've liked to know.
"Contact the parents. There's recorded messages that go out … we get notifications by phone calls when the water system is messed up," Cornwall said.
The school district said students were never in any danger according to police. The student was seeking revenge over something having to do with the trouble he was already in with the school.
Police say some student made a threat Thursday that was brought to the attention of the school resource officer. On Friday, police say students alerted teachers of more specific threats on social media that ultimately led to the lockdowns.
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