Orange County girl charged with false report in school lockdown

Bryan McKenzie, Media General News Service
Published: May 6, 2008

ORANGE —Orange County officials are charging a middle school student with filing a false police report after she claimed last week that someone tried to abduct her from school.

School officials locked down Prospect Heights Middle School on April 30 after a student reported that a man had grabbed her but that she broke free. The student gave officials a physical description that included the man having a scar beneath one eye.

Orange County Sheriff Mark Amos said Monday that the incident never happened.

“The student admitted to her mother that she made it up and she later told investigators the same thing,” Amos said. “At this point, we’ve spoken with the commonwealth’s attorney and she will be charged.”

Authorities did not release the identity of the 13-year-old girl and offered no motive for the false report.

The report prompted school officials to lock up the middle school while deputies searched the premises. School officials also placed other county schools on either lockdown or increased security.

“A lot of resources went into the investigation,” Amos said. “It affected nearly every school in the district and that impacted a lot of students and there were a lot of emotions involved.”

Prospect Heights school officials said the searches turned up no one in the building and no indication that the students were ever in danger.

“When we received the report we immediately went into lockdown and Sheriff’s Deputy Eric Hopwood, our school resource officer, contacted the Sheriff’s Office,” Principal Frank Leech said at the time. “We were locked down for about 90 minutes.”

During a lockdown, teachers bring students into classrooms, lock doors, turn off lights and keep the students as far away from windows as possible. Exterior doors are also locked and the Sheriff’s Office is notified, Leech explained. Students practice lockdown drills just as they do fire drills, he said.

Leech said a school may be locked down when there is a potential threat to any student or staff on school grounds.

“We really err on the side of caution and, if there’s any sense that an individual staff or student may feel threatened, we’ll lockdown just to be safe,” he said. “We’d rather be proactive.”

Amos said the school system reacted quickly and responsibly.

“You shouldn’t take chances and we take these reports very seriously,” he said. “The school did an absolutely excellent job. They received the report and had the school locked down in no time. They were really on top of it.”