HAMPTON, Va. (WAVY) — Hampton City Schools were made aware of school shooting threats made online Wednesday, a notification that had parents upset, saying they weren’t given a chance to decide if their child should attend school.
The Hampton City Schools sent a letters to parents and families regarding rumors of a threat to the school. One parent said his son feared for his life after the online threat.
“He is scared to death to have to go back to school, he told me he doesn’t want to go to school to die,” said a parent.
The school mentioned the circulation of social media posts suggesting there would be multiple school shootings, listing Hampton City Schools as a possible site. The school system has said there was no credible threat, but out of an abundance of caution, more security was at the school Wednesday.
10 On Your Side spoke to a man who didn’t want to go on camera, but said he was upset with how the school told parents about the threat.
“The whole problem is you knew ahead of time,” the parent said. “You should’ve told the parents and let the parents make the decision whether to send their child to school this morning or not because I can tell you that’s not a chance I would have been willing to take with my child’s life.”
Hampton City Schools told parents the threat had circulated nationwide, and was not limited to Hampton. They said the safety of students and staff remain a top priority, but this parent disagrees.
“To take these kids’ lives more serious — what if that would’ve really happened this morning? There would be dead kids now and they had the chance to avoid it,” the parent said. “I don’t know what they need to do anymore because these other schools got shot up, they had the resource officers there. Like I said, I don’t think they can keep them safe anymore, honestly. The way it looks, they just can’t keep them safe at school anymore.”
Here is the full letter to families:
We have been made aware of an anonymous threat that has been circulating nationally on social media platforms claiming multiple school shootings will occur. It has been brought to our attention that Hampton City Schools has been mentioned in these posts as well as several of our schools. Again, this is a national circulation that is not isolated to Hampton or even the Hampton Roads area, but throughout the country.
Please know the school division is actively collaborating with the Hampton Police Division (HPD). HPD continues to investigate this matter; however, through their current investigation, the police division has no evidence that there is any credibility to these posts.
The safety of our students and staff remains our top priority. Every day, we utilize comprehensive safety measures, including walk-through weapons detection systems, school security officers, school resource officers, camera and radio systems, and secured external and classroom doors. Additionally, we have routine weapons detection canine visits scheduled throughout the school year for the entire division.
Even though there has been no credibility to these posts, out of an abundance of caution HPD road officers are increasing their presence today around school campuses throughout the school division. We have also scheduled additional weapons detection canine visits at our schools.
Parents, we encourage you to talk to your children about the serious consequences of creating or sharing such threats. Hampton City Schools treats all threats with the utmost seriousness, and any threat made against our schools will result in severe disciplinary action, up to and including expulsion.
If you ever have any concerns, we urge you to reach out. You can contact the division by using our Safe School Hotline at 757-727-2255 (CALL). We would rather look into a concern and confirm it is not a safety issue than not know about a potential problem.
Thank you for your ongoing support as we work together to maintain a safe and nurturing environment for our students and staff members.
