MANATEE – Early Thursday morning Bayshore High School went into lockdown after a 15-year-old student threatened to commit a mass shooting.
Manatee County Sheriff’s Office responded to a call early Thursday morning of a note found at Bayshore High School implying there would be school shooting.
“We had a student approach one of our guardians that’s works at Bayshore High School and let him know he found a note in the boy’s restroom that implied that another student had intentions of engaging in a mass school shooting,” said Melissa Conway, Public Information Officer with Manatee County Sheriff’s Office.
Deputies say the note implies that because of bullying the student was going to shoot people at the school. That’s when the school was placed on lockdown.
“We began an investigation into trying to figure out whether that was a serious threat,” said Conway.
After further investigation the suspected 15-year-old student admitted to detectives that he has written the note. A search of the teen’s home found no guns in his possession.
“He had alluded to the fact that he had been bullied and he was very upset and because of that he had the intentions of possibly engaging in a shooting,” said Conway.
Manatee County Sheriff’s Office wants to warn the public that any threat made of a possible mass shooting will not be taken lightly and could result in criminal charges.
“Regardless of whether these are juveniles, every threat that is off this nature is going to be taken seriously,” said Conway. “We’re going to investigate it and there are consequences.”
The teen was arrested and is facing charges of written threats of a mass shooting.