TULSA, Okla. — After several school threats across Green Country and the nation, Tulsa Public Schools and Tulsa Police held a joint news conference on Thursday to explain their actions to ensure student safety.
FOX23 learned some threats are coming from outside of the state and in some cases outside of the U.S.
While most are not credible, they take all of them seriously.
“We haven’t had this as much where it’s a national trend to do these kinds of threats,” Tulsa Police Chief Dennis Larsen said.
Larsen said 99% of the threats they receive are false, but one of the few instances that has been valid this school year happened on Sunday.
“We had an incident come in, called by a parent, that individual had threatened to bring a gun to Memorial High School,” Larsen said.
Larsen said the FBI was quickly notified and was able to pinpoint the IP address where the threat came from.
The FBI, Tulsa Police, and campus police knocked on the student’s door and arrested them.
TPS said with an increase in threats, they’re increasing safety measures.
“Making sure that our schools know that this is a priority every single day just like taking attendance,” TPS Superintendent Dr. Ebony Johnson said.
When TPS middle and high school students come back from fall break, their everyday routine will be different.
“All of those things including, bag checks, wand, walking through a detector officially, will be every single day for the rest of the school year, right after we come from fall break. In the meantime, we are already doing a various set of checks and looks inside of our schools,” Johnson said.
Johnson said anyone who makes threats or breaks rules will have severe consequences.
“We have an obligation that once it’s made aware to us inside of a school, we connect to Tulsa Police Department authority. So it is two fold. It is the district and city that come together on social media threats, students choosing to bring facsimile weapon or bona fide weapon,” Johnson said.
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