Monday morning was tense and scary for parents, students and staff at LCSD2 after Star Valley High School was placed on lock-down as a precautionary measure in response to a threat made against the school.  All other schools in the district were placed on lock-out.

Captain Brian Andrews said during a live radio interview during the Weekday Wake-up on SVI Radio that investigators are still working to identify the suspect who made the threat, which included a post on Snap-chat and a screen shot that was shared on Facebook.

This incident follows a national trend of increased threats on schools since the Feb. 14 school shooting in Parkland, Florida that claimed the lives of 17 people.  The News Journal from Delaware reported that nationwide threats on schools have increased from an average of 10 per day to 60 per day.  4 threats have been made in Wyoming since the Florida shooting, including the threat against Star Valley High School.

During the Weekday Wake-up Tuesday morning, Duke & Dahl’s Text-in Topic was related to this increase.   The question was asked, “What should the punishment be for a minor that makes a threat against a school, similar to the threat made Monday against Star Valley High School.”

As of Tuesday morning it was not clear if the person who made the threat against Star Valley High School was a minor or adult, but in other cases around Wyoming it was a prank from a minor.  Such as the threat made against Grant Elementary in Casper by “a small child” earlier this month.

Here are the listener’s responses to the Text-in Topic question.

“I agree it is serious, and there needs to be a punishment, but I don’t think it matters how severe your punishment, if they are deranged enough to commit such a crime, then they aren’t going to be in a mental state where they care about the punishment.”

“It’s a serious offense, and it is not funny. In reality we really don’t know if the threat was actually going to be carried out even though the suspect may be saying oh it was just a joke. It’s a felony and should be treated as such even if the person is a juvenile. They along with their parents should be fined and the juvenile should be sentenced to community service and the felony should go on their record. With a felony on their record it will affect a lot of things, school loans and grants and jobs maybe they’ll stop and think a little bit. Yes it’s a severe punishment, but it’s also a severe threat which may or may not have been carried out. This type of thing is getting way out of hand, if the punishment is severe it may not happen as often.”

“Somehow there should be some red flag/indicator permanently with anyone who makes a threat. Such as registered sex offender, there should be a registry for those who make threats. This would make it more difficult to buy guns & giving information to the public.”

“As long as the school remains a gun free zone we will have problems and have copy cats thinking they can get by with doing the same thing to hear or see their name in the media.  As far as penalty they should throw the book at them.”

“The penalty should be whatever is on the books right for this kind of event. Way too often we have seen reactions to emotions.”

“Expulsion for sure, and an unbelievable amount of community service. They should serve those people who they scared, and make up for the hours and resources spent on investigating this threat.”

“They need to put the person that made the threat in federal prison because it’s an act of terrorism also! Then make that sentence public in all major and local news. No matter the age something has to be done, this is just the start of all these threats.”

“I hope the person/persons involved doesn’t get any notoriety out of this.  But I agree that there should be a heavy penalty & the parents should be involved.  I don’t know about expulsion.  Maybe that’s what they really wanted.  Maybe a heavy fine.”

“Send them to juvie after visiting a school that has actually had an incident.”