LC Student Arrested For Bomb Threat
On May 1, 2023, Lake Central High School administration and a St. John Police School Resource Officer began a preliminary investigation after learning that at least two students had received an airdrop message on their cellular telephones. The message read ‘bombing the school, it will go off as soon as the bell rings this is not a joke.” The message was airdropped at 11:50 AM.
Additional St. John police officers responded to the school as well as a bomb sniffing police K9 and a thorough search was conducted. No bomb was located. School authorities made the decision to dismiss school early as a precaution while police continued to investigate.
Students who received the airdrop message had been in the same classroom and after reviewing school security cameras, police observed two students enter the classroom directly before the airdrop message was sent and the same two were observed leaving the classroom immediately after the message was sent. Neither student was supposed to be in that particular class.
St. John Police detectives interviewed both students in the presence of their parents during the next two days. Parents provided their student’s cell phones to police upon our request as part of the investigation.
St. John Police requested the assistance of the FBI who provided an agent who specializes in analyzing cell phone data. Through the forensic analysis of the cell phones, we were able to determine that the airdrop message positively originated from one of the phones in our custody.
This afternoon, St. John Police arrested the offender, a 15 year old Lake Central High School student. The student was taken to the Lake County Juvenile Detention Center and is being held on the following ten preliminary charges:
3 counts of Intimidation, Level 5 Felonies,
1 count of False Informing, Class A Misdemeanor,
3 counts of Harassment, Class B Misdemeanor,
3 counts of Disorderly Conduct.
“We want our community to know that we take any threat to the safety of our schools very seriously and will vigorously investigate any threats, and prosecute to the fullest extent of the law,” St John Police stated.
