Scottsdale high school threat came from out of the country, police say

PHOENIX — A threat that forced the lockdown of a Scottsdale high school on Wednesday came from out of the country, according to police.

Scottsdale Police Chief Jeff Walther told KTAR News 92.3 FM’s The Mike Broomhead Show on Thursday that the threat wasn’t isolated to Chaparral High School.

“We now know that the call that came in yesterday was from outside of this country,” Walther said. “This particular caller hit three different locations and three different states yesterday.”

What happened in Scottsdale high school threat?

Dispatchers received a series of calls around 9 a.m. Wednesday and were told there was a gunman on the Chaparral campus, which is located near Scottsdale Road and Shea Boulevard, who had taken hostages in a bathroom.

Walther said the caller “wanted some media coverage on his plight and what was going on in his life.” He said the department had information to believe they were talking to a live person who was at the campus.

The school resource officer responded immediately and at one point, more than 40 Scottsdale police officers were on scene.

“We were clearing restrooms and we were going into classrooms,” Walther said. “We had the school on lockdown with our partnership with the Scottsdale Unified School District and then ultimately cleared the entirety of the school and found that there was no suspect.”

Walther said the department was on high alert because a day earlier, a threat had been called into nearby Sequoya Elementary School.

“The trauma that causes two days in a row, two calls related to either the threat of violence or committing violence or the threat of an active shooter,” Walther said. “So definitely two days of trauma for our young people in the city.”

Have there been more school threats across the Valley?

School threats across the Valley have not been an anomaly.

Most recently, a teenager was arrested Wednesday and booked into the juvenile justice system on one count of making a terrorist threat against Estrella Mountain Elementary School in Goodyear.

Two students were arrested just this week for alleged school threats in the West Valley.

On Sunday, a 12-year-old Buckeye girl was arrested for allegedly making a terroristic threat against a school in Wisconsin.

And last week, a teenage boy was arrested for allegedly making mass shooting threats against 12 Phoenix-area schools and a 12-year-old Apache Junction girl was arrested for posting a school threat on social media.

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