O’FALLON, Ill. – A 15-year-old juvenile was arrested by police Tuesday morning less than a day after he left a 'threatening' message on Hinchliffe Elementary School.
According to the O’Fallon Community Consolidated School District, the O’Fallon police did not believe the threatening portion of the graffiti had any credibility. The teenager told police he had written the message as a joke "for attention" without any legitimacy.
The 15-year-old is currently being held at the St. Clair County Juvenile Detention Center. At a press conference, the St. Clair County State's attorney said the 15-year-old was charged with making a terrorist threat, attempting to make a terrorist threat and two other charges. He is in juvenile custody and a mental health evaluation will be conducted.
"When you make these threats, we don't care what your intention is, we will investigate it to the fullest extent, and we will seek the highest levels of prosecution that we can,” Director of Public Safety Eric Van Hook said.
The 15-year-old is not a student at the school.
The district offered excused absences for Hinchcliffe students if parents felt they needed to keep them home.
"This event has caused sheer terror and panic within our community,” Superintendent Carrie Hruby said.
The day the message appeared, nearly half of the student body went home early.
"As you can imagine, with half our students gone, it's just very difficult to continue any kind of instruction because anything that was taught that day would have to be re-taught the next day,” Hruby said.
